A report on the Interfax-Religion web site has caused a stir in Fatima circles. The headline says it all, or almost all: Vatican has no plans to convert Russia to Catholicism – Cardinal Paul Poupard. According to the article, The … Continue reading
Category: «Ad Rem» A Fortnightly Email Message from the Prior
«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.
Peace, a Fruit of the Holy Ghost
I began to write this on the feast of St. John of San Facundo, a Spanish Augustinian Friar of the fifteenth century. He is the patron of the city of Salamanca. Conspicuous for being a peace maker among factions, he … Continue reading →
A Marian Primer
A recent convert to the Faith wrote us asking “how I can get to know Our Lady” because “the Virgin Mary has eluded me on my religious journey”? We sent him the following answer (edited for his privacy). We offer … Continue reading →
Tolkien and the Eucharist
In honor of yesterday’s Feast of Corpus Christi and its Octave, remnants of which still exist in the 1962 Liturgy, this is something of a literary tribute to the Bread of Life.
Politicizing the Eucharist
Recently, a group of 18 congressmen, nominally Catholic, have insulted the Vicar of Christ as they publicly rejected the Church’s teaching on abortion. What occasioned the fashionable agitprop stunt was an interview that Pope Benedict gave in flight to Brazil, … Continue reading →
Father Feeney and the Bloggers, Part II
This is about where I left off in the last Ad Rem, with my (slightly edited) “blogger swan song”: Father Feeney’s statements on Judaism were very strong, yes. So were the statements of St. Augustine, St. John Chrysostom, and a … Continue reading →
Romano Amerio: The Rehabilitation of an ‘Integrist’
A major figure of the Traditional movement is now undergoing something of a posthumous rehabilitation. Dr. Romano Amerio has a singular status among those who object to present ecclesial novelties in the name of tradition. This Swiss-Italian philosopher and philologist … Continue reading →
Father Feeney and the Bloggers
I have already mentioned that media attention has come our way because of a site-plan-review process we are undergoing (see The Problem of Pluralism and the Delight of Demographics). Four distinct blogs have been born as a result of this … Continue reading →
On the Church and the World: Lessons from the Easter Liturgy and the Russian Prophet
Lessons from Today’s Liturgy. During Easter Week, the traditional liturgy presents us with rich Scripture readings proper to every day of the week. Today, Wednesday of Easter Week, we read the Gospel account from John 21 about the post-Resurrection miraculous … Continue reading →
Blessed Holy Week and Easter!
Our Mancipia for Easter is late this year, but it will yet still arrive in Paschaltide, God willing! I offer for your considerations our Easter meditation from last year. It’s a PDF file whose its contents — at least the … Continue reading →
Passiontide Meditation
“He that is of God heareth the words of God.” — a meditation on Passiontide, based on the Gospel and Epistle for Passion Sunday. Passion Sunday. Today is Passion Sunday. The Church gives it this name because the two weeks … Continue reading →
What is the Natural Law?
It is not uncommon to run across the term “natural law” in Catholic journals and newspapers. Frequently, the context is a discussion of hot-button moral issues in the culture war, such as abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality, birth control, and so-called “end-of-life … Continue reading →
Lenten Combat Considerations
For your edification, I offer some thoughts on this week’s Sunday Gospel and Epistle, which focus us on the spiritual combat of the Lenten season, and of the Christian life. These meditations were prepared for Sunday, so they refer to … Continue reading →
Cardinal Biffi and Soloviev’s Antichrist
Much attention has justly been given to Cardinal Biffi’s Lenten Retreat to the Pope and leaders of the Roman Curia (e.g., “Pope’s Retreat Preacher Speaks on Antichrist As a ‘Pacifist, Ecologist and Ecumenist’”). Soon after the retreat — because papal … Continue reading →
On the Hatred of ‘the World’
Below is a sublime liturgical reflection from the pen of my favorite spiritual writer, Abbot Prosper Guéranger. It is an excerpt from The Liturgical Year for the Tuesday of Quinquagesima Week, where that profound Benedictine master writes about the hatred we … Continue reading →