The experience is probably a common one. You find yourself out in public and see a person from the back or side and say to yourself, “Hey, that’s Mike! (or Sarah, Ted, Mary, etc.),” only to discover when the person … Continue reading
Category: «Ad Rem» A Weekly Email Message from the Prior
Is Jesus Really Our Friend?
There is a popular old Protestant hymn by Charles Crozat Converse that readers may have heard: “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.” The hymn dates from 1868, but the words were borrowed from an 1855 poem called “Pray Without … Continue reading
The Jewish Nation will Enter the Church
Though it is not a defined dogma, the future conversion of the Jewish nation to the Faith is a common teaching of the Fathers and Doctors, inferred directly from Holy Scripture. This mass conversion (which need not be absolutely total) … Continue reading
The Catholic Quest
Certain common tropes appear in much of the world’s literature and drama, old and new. This is so much the case that the same theme of forbidden love due to family rivalry meets us in Ovid’s Pyramus and Thisbe (ca. … Continue reading
Let’s Have a Little Hero Worship
A wonderful passage of G.K. Chesterton’s The Everlasting Man deals with the false claim that Jesus was a “man of his times.” Usually offered as a dismissal of Our Lord’s morals and doctrines as something time-bound and hence obsolete, the … Continue reading
The Childslayers
When Brother Francis was teaching me Christology, he would constantly repeat something that Father Leonard Feeney often said to him. Holding an icon of the Mother and Child at the beginning of each class, he would say, “Here is the … Continue reading
Grow into Spiritual Childhood this Advent
As this year’s short Advent progresses, many of us will perhaps be thinking of our Christmases as children. As one gets older, it is easy to become sentimental about Christmas past, even without the benefit of its eponymous ghost to … Continue reading
The Four Ends of the Mass as Elements of Christian Society
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is first and most importantly an act of worship of the Divine Trinity. It is the highest act of the virtue of religion, which itself is expressed most excellently in the cult of sacrifice. … Continue reading
Religious Pluralism is Evil
There is this myth going around that a comprehensive pluralism is a good thing. It is, in fact, a strength according to certain people. What I mean by pluralism here is defined by Merriam-Webster’s (in the fourth sense, a and … Continue reading
Heaven: A Holy Beatitude, not a Carnal Fantasy
Muslims and Mormons, it is fairly well known, have a very carnal eschatology. The paradise of the Muslims has rivers of wine (a beverage forbidden to them on earth), along with rivers of milk and clarified honey. Each man will … Continue reading
The Fatima Devotions and Your Happiness
Saint Benedict Center’s twentieth annual conference is now history, and by all accounts it went well. There were many converts and reverts to the Faith present, and there were even some non-Catholics in attendance. (See this picture, worth more than … Continue reading
Fatima, Sin, and a ‘Filial Correction’
A group of Catholic clergy, theologians, and other scholars publicly issued a “filial correction” of Pope Francis on Saturday, accusing the Supreme Pontiff of “propagating heresy” in the apostolic exhortation, Amoris Laetitia. The document, initially signed by forty scholars, was … Continue reading
This is the End of the Law
Our beloved mentor, Brother Francis, used to remind us often of the importance of purpose. One way he did this was to tell the story, related in various ascetical treatises on the religious life, of the monk who used to … Continue reading
Catholic Truth, Si; False Dialectic, No!
We live in an age of false dialectics and disinformation of all sorts, at the national and international levels. It is a time when the historical crimes, real or perceived, of Euro-American Christians function as camouflage for an agenda of … Continue reading
A Worldview in the Light of Fatima
The upcoming Saint Benedict Center Conference will be dedicated to the subject, “A Worldview in the Light of Fatima.” This theme was chosen in honor of the centenary of the Fatima apparitions, which will be coming to a close less … Continue reading
