When the Blessed Virgin Mary, the spouse of the angelic Joseph, the royal son of David, was fourteen years, six months and seventeen days old, there occurred to her, and for her and through her, the greatest event that ever … Continue reading
Category: Articles
What is Development of Doctrine?
An explanation of authentic doctrinal development. We hear a lot about doctrinal development. All too often, it is in the context of articulating some novelty that something is called a “development of doctrine.” While there is a true notion of … Continue reading
Holy and Roman
Voltaire, whose corrosive wit did so much to dissolve the faith of the pre-revolutionary French aristocracy in their right to rule (not to speak of their adherence to the Faith) once quipped that “the Holy Roman Empire is neither holy … Continue reading
Crushing the Infamous One
The Dialogue of the Carmelites, by Francis Poulenc, is one of the few operas composed in the past half century worth hearing. Poulenc based his 1958 work on a drama of the same title that was written by Georges Bernanos, … Continue reading
The Contradiction of Core
And immediately as he had made an end of speaking, the earth broke asunder under their feet:85 And they went down alive into hell . . . and they perished from among the people. — Num. 16:31,33 The book of … Continue reading
In the Company of Ignatius
“Therefore every scribe instructed in the Kingdom of Heaven, is like to a man that is a householder, who bringeth forth out of his treasure new things and old. ” (MT 13:52) Throughout the long history of our Catholic religion, … Continue reading
Homesick For Heaven: Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity
In the long history of our Holy Catholic Church, the Carmelite Order is the only group of religious that can trace its beginnings back to Old Testament times. From the age of the prophet Samuel, there existed in the Holy … Continue reading
Catholic Teaching Concerning a Just War
Editor’s Introduction: Catholic doctrine is never an “untimely” thing. However, certain doctrines come to the fore from time to time due to circumstances in the Church and the world. Presently, there is a “perpetual war for perpetual peace,” as one … Continue reading
Mary Co-Redemptrix
In this little paper I would like to deal primarily with Holy Scripture. The theological arguments for Our Lady Co-Redemptrix from Tradition and the Magisterium have been more than adequately handled by Dr. Mark Miravalle in his excellent Mary Co-redemptrix, … Continue reading
Holy Mary – the Flower of Carmel
Thy head is like Carmel: and the hairs of thy head as the purple of the king bound in the channels. (Cant. 7:5) In the ancient land of Palestine lies Mount Carmel (in Hebrew, Hakkarmel, “the garden”), the crown of … Continue reading
La Reconquistadora – The Virgin Mary and the Virtue of Fortitude
For the better part of eight hundred years, Catholic Spain fought to liberate herself from Islamic occupation. The Reconquista, or Reconquest, as this war of liberation was called, began to make great strides in the second half of the eleventh … Continue reading
The House Upon a Rock
Tu es Petrus, et super hanc petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam . With these words, taken from the sixteenth chapter of St. Matthew’s Gospel, 1 Our Lord promised to build His Church upon the petram (rock) of Petrus (St. Peter).
July 20 – 1944
It is a date that means nothing to most Americans, but this July 20 there will be commemorated in Germany, especially by the nation’s remaining Catholics, the sixtieth anniversary of an act that possibly could not have been committed by … Continue reading
Calling Good Evil – on A Moral Reckoning by Daniel Goldhagen
Jewish author Daniel Goldhagen’s recent book, A Moral Reckoning: The Role of the Catholic Church in the Holocaust And Its Unfulfilled Duty of Repair (Alfred A. Knopf; 362 pages; $25.00), contains what may be considered the ultimate aim of all … Continue reading
In Defense of Original Sin
There is a very ambiguous statement in Vatican II’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium , Chapter 2, paragraph 16. It reads as follows: . . . Those also can attain to salvation who through no fault of their … Continue reading
