«Ad Rem» is our Prior’s fortnightly email message offering news and commentary regarding the Slaves of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the Crusade of St. Benedict Center, and issues affecting the universal Church. Each number offers brief, ad rem (“to the point”) commentary on timely or otherwise important matters. Click here to subscribe to our email list and receive the «Ad Rem» each time it’s published.
For those who were liturgically tormented in their youth by weapons of Mass destruction, it’s almost a sweet revenge to hear the words recently spoken by Cardinal Antonio Canizares Llovera, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline … Continue reading
The corruption of the flesh weighing upon us so heavily during our earthly sojourn, we often find ourselves desiring what is base and wicked. But our wills can be motivated to love what is truly good, and therefore to desire … Continue reading
For years, physicists have been on an Arthurian quest for what they call the “grand unified theory.” Far be it from me to bore readers with an explanation of this theory that they can find elsewhere, but the gist of … Continue reading
In medieval Latin, a florilegium (literally, a “gathering of flowers”) is a systematic collection of writings from larger works. Its literal Greek equivalent gives us the word anthology. In the Ages of Faith, works of the Church Fathers and other … Continue reading
“Triumphalism” is a bad word in some circles. That those circles have been influential in academic, ecclesiastical, and civil society in recent decades helps to explain our sad lot. I’ll not forget the perplexity that overcame me when I read … Continue reading
March 27 and March 30 brought us news of the deaths of two early members of Saint Benedict Center, Abbot Gabriel, O.S.B., and Sister Maria Cordata, M.I.C.M. Coming just before and during Holy Week, when the events of our Lord’s … Continue reading
Every year around Holy Week, the publishers of America’s popular reading material let loose a volley of blasphemies against our Lord’s Resurrection. Citing one or another perfidious “noted scholar,” the glossy-covered journals that accost us at the checkout counter vie … Continue reading
To remain little is to recognize one’s nothingness, to expect everything from God, as a little child expects everything from his father; it is to be disturbed about nothing, not to earn a fortune.
Even among poor people, as long as the child is quite small, they give him what he needs; but as soon as he has grown up, his father no longer wishes to feed him and says to him: “Work now, you can be self-supporting.” Well, so as never to hear that, I have not wished to grow up. Continue reading
We continue what be began in our last number, a three-part study of spiritual childhood by Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877-1964). St. Teresa of the Child Jesus reminds us that the principal virtues of the child of God are those … Continue reading
Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877-1964) was one of the greatest theologians of modern times. He was a staunch anti-modernist, who engaged and exposed the twerpy upstarts responsible for the neo-modernist Nouvelle Théologie (“New Theology”). Much more than a controversialist, the … Continue reading
In “Christology for Joe,” an article that answers questions from a thoughtful young man, I made some observations about the way the English language has been Protestantized. In this number of the Ad Rem, I excerpt from that article the … Continue reading
Speaking of the work of Saint Benedict Center and the Slaves of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Brother Francis often said, “We are three things at once: a crusade, a religious order, and a school of thought.” Usually, he would embellish this utterance with little summaries of each of the three. By crusade, he meant our two-fold apostolate for the conversion of America and the restoration of doctrinal sanity, beginning with that very fundamental dogma, extra ecclesiam nulla salus. (We put the definite article and a capital C here: The Crusade.) By religious order, he meant our Congregation’s First and Second Orders… Continue reading
Father Michael Jarecki is our chaplain. At ninety-two years of age, he is not yet quite as long-lived as Brother Francis (who died at ninety six), but he’s close. I fear that his recent hospitalization is a sign that he … Continue reading
We are in the midst of the Chair of Unity Octave. This is a good time for some considerations on what constitutes true Church unity and why it is so important. The fundamental truth concerning Christian unity seems, in these … Continue reading
Around here, the news of December 19 was received with great joy. I refer to the publication of the decree, approved by His Holiness, Benedict XVI, clearing the way for the canonization of Blessed Brother André. Because this news is … Continue reading
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