By a prodding of Providence, I walked into an old religious house some days ago in the French village where I live, where, as in the massive, once flourishing house of sisters across the road, the remnants of a formerly vibrant missionary order spend their waning years in retirement. The same saintly founder bequeathed both…
Cardinal Silvio Oddi, who died in 2001, was one of the most outspoken conservative prelates of his time. He also has a special place in the history of the debate about the message of Fatima, inasmuch as he insistently tried to get Pope John XXIII to publish the Third Secret of Fatima. As the British…
With the news that Pope Francis might relax the rule of priestly celibacy in certain regions, there has been much celebration in certain quarters of the Catholic world. Many of those celebrating see celibacy primarily as a burden that forces unnecessary loneliness onto priests. What they fail to see is that such loneliness can have…
In the middle of the fourth century, Saint Jerome remarked that the world “awoke with a groan to find itself Arian.” Arianism divided the Church and Empire of the fourth and fifth centuries and beyond by claiming that the Divine Logos, Jesus Christ, was not of the same substance (homoousios) as the Father and not…
Image: The miracles of St. Francis Xavier (see full image here), by Peter Paul Rubens Two good friends, fellow parishioners, are having coffee and donuts after High Mass one Sunday. Maximilian: I really enjoyed Father’s homily today. His explanation of the parable of the mustard seed and the yeast in the dough hit the nail on the…
By Fr. Paolo M. Siano From October 20 – 29, 1981, the Plenary Congregation of the Pontifical Commission for the Revision of the Code of Canon Law met in the Vatican to discuss and vote on the renewal of canon 2335 of the 1917 Code of Canon Law which conferred excommunication on Catholics enrolled in…
Many Fatima devotees were, I think it’s fair to say, disappointed when the centenaries of each of the original apparitions in 1917 came and went with no discernible event taking place to mark the occasion. For my part, I have always believed that God prefers to be less predictable than this, though there is certainly…
Image: The famous floating torii gate at the Shinto shrine on Itsukushima Island, Japan. It is Sunday, 6:30 AM, when I board the train to make it in time for the 7 AM Mass at the sole Catholic church in Yokkaichi, a port city on the East coast of Japan’s main island, where I have lived…
Last month, our friends at LifeSiteNews conducted an interview with Dr. Claudio Pierantoni, Professor of Medieval Philosophy at the University of Chile, along with several other Catholic Scholars on the topic of the development of doctrine. The occasion was the controversy raised by the pope’s recent comments that the Death Penalty “is, in itself, contrary to the Gospel.”…
In just a few days, from 16 to 17 November, the newly reformed Pontifical Academy for Life will host a conference in Rome on the topic of “End-of-Life Questions.” (Nota Bene: the event is already closed.) One of the announced speeches’ title is: “Euthanasia in the Netherlands: Balancing autonomy and compassion.” As this title indicates,…
Image: Left: Fr. Thomas Weinandy, OFM Cap. (CNS); top right: Fr. James Martin, S.J. (Wikipedia); bottom right: Msgr. John Strynkowski (YouTube) Fr. Thomas Weinandy, OFM Cap., is owed a debt of gratitude for his courage and forthrightness in making public his letter to Pope Francis respectfully criticizing and encouraging the Holy Father to fulfill his principal charge: to…
