“Woe to the world because of scandals,” said Our Lord. “For it must needs be that scandals come: but nevertheless woe to that man by whom the scandal cometh” (Matt. 18:7). Later, the Apostle takes up a related theme: “For … 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.
Theme for 2024: ‘The Charity of Christ Presseth Us’
Until the beautiful feast of February 2, the Purification, we remain in Christmastide. The stunning good news the angels announced to the shepherds should be still ringing in our ears all this time: “Glory to God in the highest; and … Continue reading
Order, Disorder, and the Wisdom of God
Ordo ab chao — “order out of chaos” — is a motto used in various permutations of Freemasonry. It refers to the “new world order” that the revolutionary Masons will bring out of the chaos they create in their revolutions … Continue reading
Sanctifying Time as the World Ends
The Church’s traditional liturgy sanctifies our time — the day, the week, the month, the season, the year. What is quite literally mundane and temporal is thus transformed into something heavenly and spiritual, an anticipation of our partaking in God’s … Continue reading
The ‘Our Father’ as a Trinitarian Prayer
There is a principle of Trinitarian theology that tells us all the acts of the Holy Trinity ad extra are acts of all Three Persons. (Ad extra means toward the outside, as distinguished from ad intra, meaning toward the inside. … Continue reading
The War Crimes in Gaza from a Catholic Worldview
Before you read this Ad Rem, please stop and pray this Prayer to Our Lady of Palestine. The Gospel for the Feast of Christ the King, celebrated this past Sunday, closes with this verse: Pilate therefore said to him: Art … Continue reading
Real Love is Ordered
For this Ad Rem, I am sharing some snippets from the talk I gave at this past weekend’s Saint Benedict Center Conference, whose theme was “Cultivating and Passing on a Catholic Worldview.” The title of my talk was “‘Virtue is … Continue reading
A Mighty Help to Our Mothers’ Heroes
We here at Saint Benedict Center are in between two big fall events — the Pilgrimage for Restoration, which has us limping and aching, and our annual Conference, which has us feverishly preparing. Because of that, my time to write … Continue reading
An Anti-Modernist Meditation on the Woman of Canaan
One of the methods to my madness in selecting subjects for my show, Reconquest, is to take scandalous current events in the Church as occasions of edifying my listeners by giving the proper Catholic outlook on a question — citing … Continue reading
Is Extra Ecclesiam Nulla Salus a ‘Principle’?
Reviewing some correspondences with members of the sacred hierarchy recently, I came across multiple references to the dogma, extra ecclesiam nulla salus, which referred to it, not as a dogma or a doctrine, but as a “principle.” Does that word … Continue reading
Synodality: The Latest Ecclesiastical MacGuffin
Catholic film director Alfred Hitchcock popularized the notion of the “MacGuffin” in motion pictures. This, according to Wikipedia, is “an object, device, or event that is necessary to the plot and the motivation of the characters, but insignificant, unimportant, or … Continue reading
Indifferentism as a Sin against the Love of God
Supposing that a cardinal of the Holy Roman Church had said, while discussing a major youth event he is tasked with organizing, “We don’t want to convert the young people to Christ or to the Catholic Church or anything like … Continue reading
What Happens When You Deny the Doctrine of Creation?
My first order of business is to explain the meaning of “the Doctrine of Creation” in the title of this Ad Rem. For my purposes here, I will define the term thus: the literal, historical truth of the first chapters … Continue reading
What Is a Catholic Worldview?
This fall, Saint Benedict Center’s annual Conference will have as its theme, “Cultivating and Passing on a Catholic Worldview.” It is my purpose in this Ad Rem to outline some key elements of a Catholic worldview, without trying to be … Continue reading
Aristotle and Saint Thomas on Happiness
“The pursuit of happiness” — along with life and liberty — is one of the unalienable rights that we were endowed with by our Creator according to the Declaration of Independence. But in spite of the word being so deeply … Continue reading
