“I can’t promise you not to return to the Grotto; something tells me I ought to go; it drives me thither. I must follow the impulse within me.”
— Bernadette Soubirous, recounted in St. Bernadette and Her Visions of Our Lady by Richard F. Clarke, S.J., 1888
“THE safest and most necessary austerity, is that which regulates the senses, passions, tongue, and conversation; which cuts off idleness and all occasions of sinning, and mortifies self-will, obstinacy in our own opinion, and the vain esteem of ourselves. This kind of mortification has this advantage over the other, that we practice it without danger, that it is difficult to exceed in it, that the carnal man fears it much more than the exterior, that he is always sensible of it, and never accustoms himself thereto.
“FOR, if thou freely indulgest in meat and drink, and bridlest not thine appetite by fasting, it needs must be that the noble fire of the spirit, smothered by the frequent indulgence of the body, should grow dull, and the soul, like the drowsy flesh it inhabits, fall into heavy sleep.
“Therefore, let us bridle our bodily desires, and follow the clear interior light of prudence. Thus, the soul having her sight made keener, will breathe more freely, and will pray to the Creator with the stronger hope.”
— Prudentius (348-c. 413 AD)
“ST. Augustine says: ‘Heavy work it is, to keep at it, continualIy mortifying and curbing our will: look at the prize and reward to be given you for it, and you will see that it is all very little in comparison: hope of reward lightens the stress of toiL’ So he says we see here in the labours of merchants, farmers and soldiers. Now if the fury and force of the sea and its fearful waves do not dismay mariners and traders, nor rains and storms field-labourers, nor wounds and deaths soldiers, nor blows and falls wrestlers, when they set their eyes on the human hopes which they expect to realize by their labours, how shall one who looks for the kingdom of heaven quail before the labour and mortification that virtue requires? (more…)
BELOW is a list of reading possibilities for Lent, including familiar classics and lesser known works — all of which are secondary to the most important books of all: the Old and New Testaments. If you don’t mind reading on a screen (or listening to audio versions), you can obtain any of these books below for free.
LENTEN READING
Perfect Contrition: The Golden Key to Paradise, Fr. J. de Driesch
The Passion and the Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ, St. Alphonsus de Liguori
A Catholic commentary on Holy Scripture; Bernard Orchard, ed.
Haydock’s Bible Commentary,George Leo Haydock
Of Prayer and Meditation, Ven. Louis of Granada
The Sinner’s Guide, Ven. Louis of Granada
Meditations for Lent, St. Thomas Aquinas
Lenten Sermons, Fr. Augustine Wirth
Pope St. Leo the Great’s Sermons on Lent
The Mystery of the Crown of Thorns, A Passionist
What Jesus Saw from the Cross, Fr. A.G. Sertillanges
A Doctor at Calvary: the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ as described by a surgeon, Dr. Pierre Barbet
The Foot of the Cross, by Fr. Frederick William Faber
Spiritual Conferences, by Fr. Frederick William Faber
The Sacred Passion of Jesus Christ, Rev. Richard Clarke
The Sufferings of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Fr. Thomas Jesus (more…)
“OUR Redeemer would not have us receive the announcement of the great feast as one of sadness and melancholy. The Christian who understands what a dangerous thing it is to be behindhand with divine justice welcomes the season of Lent with joy; it consoles him. He knows that if he be faithful in observing what the Church prescribes, his debt will be less heavy upon him. These penances, these satisfactions (which the indulgence of the Church has rendered so easy), being offered to God unitedly with those of our Savior Himself, and being rendered fruitful by that holy fellowship which blends into one common propitiatory sacrifice the good works of all the members of the Church militant, will purify our souls, and make them worthy to partake in the grand Easter joy. (more…)
THE French abbot Dom Prosper Guéranger predicted in the 19th century that Western nations would be overrun by foreign invaders in the not-too-distant future. His prediction has proven true, a warning that people and governments of the West ignored.
In his writings on the pre-lenten season of Septuagesima, in the entry on Thursday of Sexuagesima Week, the monk explained why the West would be broken “in pieces like a potter’s vessel:”
God promised Noah that He would never more punish the earth with a deluge. But, in His justice, He has many times visited the sins of men with a scourge which, in more senses than one, bears a resemblance to a deluge: the invasion of enemies. We meet with these invasions in every age; and each time we see the hand of God. We can trace the crimes that each of them was sent to punish, and in each we find a manifest proof of the infinite justice wherewith God governs the world.
It is not requisite that we should here mention the long list of these revolutions, which we might almost say make up the history of mankind, for in its every page we read of conquests, extinction of races, destruction of nations, and violent amalgamations, which effaced the traditions and character of the several peoples that were thus forced into union. We will confine our considerations to the two great invasions, which the just anger of God has permitted to come upon the world since the commencement of the Christian era.
LITANY OF THE LOVE OF GOD
(Composed by Pope Pius VI, 1717 – 1799)
Lord have mercy on us.
Christ, have mercy on us.
Lord, have mercy on us.
Christ, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.
God the Father in heaven,
Have mercy on us.
God the Son, Redeemer of the world,
Have mercy on us.
God, the Holy Ghost,
Have mercy on us.
Holy Trinity, one God,
Have mercy on us. (more…)
ST. Valentine was, according to limited historical accounts, a beloved Catholic priest and physician who was martyred by beheading in the year 270 A.D. A tradition has come down that he married couples in secret because the Catholic faith was forbidden. From “St. Valentine, Priest and Martyr” by Fr. Francis Xavier Weninger:
The holy Priest Valentine lived at the time of the Emperor Claudius. He was held in high estimation, both by the Christians and heathens, on account of his natural amiability, wisdom and virtue. Claudius himself desired to see him, and on his being brought into his presence, said to him: “Why do you refuse to be my friend, when I wish to become yours? Nothing in you displeases me, but that you confess a faith which is against our gods.”
“NOTHING else is wanted to cause a boat which is launched on a fast-flowing river, to be carried away by the stream and swallowed up in the waters, than that rowers should cease to ply their oars, but if the boat is going against the current, strenuous exertion on the part of the crew is required to bring it to its destination. So it is with man; he needs but to give way to the frailty of his corrupt nature to be borne to eternal perdition; but to contend against the forces of his passions, the seductions of the world, and the temptations of the devil, and guide his bark to the haven of everlasting felicity, calls for no slight effort on his part. ‘The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence’ (Matt, xi. 12). The path of virtue is a difficult ascent, not an easy descent. Virtue is not won in times of peace, but of warfare. Many appear to be virtuous, but are not so in reality, because their virtue costs them nothing.”
— Rev. Francis Spirago, The Catechism Explained: An Exhaustive Exposition of the Christian Religion
FROM Dave Troy’s piece “What We’ve learned from the Latest Epstein Documents:”
8) The breadth of [Epstein’s] reach into US, UK, and other European power networks is unparalleled. This suggests access to virtually unlimited funds and intelligence. He may have received that primarily from his Kremlin channels, through other partners, and also through his own entrepreneurial activities with people like venture capitalist Peter Thiel.
9) Silicon Valley is deeply compromised by Russian influence. Through investors like Yuri Milner and Thiel, and Epstein’s assistant turned VC Masha Drokova Bucher, there is a clear, concerted effort to drill into Silicon Valley’s tech networks for capture, control, and wealth generation.
10) Russia created Epstein. Russia exposed Epstein. This is a clear strategy of demoralization. No one has heaped more praise on Rep. Thomas Massie (the primary sponsor of the law that forced the release of these documents) than Russia’s proxies. Russia knew that the files would reveal Epstein’s geopolitical manipulations. The hope is that we lose faith in elites, in government, and in democracy. This sets the stage for escalation. We should be careful about falling for this trap.
Epstein had a huge role in shaping the information environment over the last decade, and that appears to have been his intention. Steve Bannon lives; he should be held accountable, as should other living collaborators. [bold added]
“SOME think they are merciful when they are bitterly unmerciful; think that they are kind to their children when they let them behave as they please. That is not mercy. Mercy is not idle sympathy in an emotional sense, feeling kindly towards someone. Mercy sometimes has to be severe, strong. The hands of a nurse dealing with her patient are merciful hands, not less merciful because they are firm! The poison may have to be pressed out of the wound. Then it is not mercy not to hurt the patient. That is not merciful. That is unmerciful. It looks unkind; it seems unkind; he winces under her action. The body quivers because she will not let him go. She presses the wound to expel the unclean matter. It must be expelled, by strong pressure if there be no other way. To be tender, compassionate, full of mercy is the very profession of the nurse. Yet that must not undo her firmness. A doctor, again has strong hands, and merciful, because of the very strength of them. His cutting of human flesh is mercy. Mercy must be wise.”
— Bede Jarrett, O.P., Our Lady of Lourdes, 1954
ON the morning after the 12th apparition of Our Lady to the simple girl Bernadette Soubirous in a grotto in Lourdes in 1858, a Paris newspaper reported:
“That little actress, the miller’s daughter at Lourdes, collected round her again on the morning of the 1st of March, beneath the Massabieille rock, nearly two thousand five hundred boobies. It is impossible to describe the idiocy and moral degeneration of these persons. The visionary treats them like a troop of monkeys and makes them commit absurdities of every kind. This morning, the pythoness was not inclined to play the seer, and to make a little variety in the exercises, she thought the best thing was to play the priestess. Assuming a grand air of authority, she ordered the fools to present their Rosaries and then blessed them all.”
OUR Lady of Lourdes, who appeared to the sickly girl Bernadette Soubirous in 1858 in Lourdes, France and who is honored today on her feast day, came into a society in which skepticism and revolutionary thinking were commonplace. In Saint Bernadette Soubirous, (1844-1879), Abbé François Trochu describes this atmosphere:
At St. John’s Club, conversation on the subject had just taken a livelier turn. Its members used to meet in a room of the Café Français near the church — and here were to be found the notables of the town, independent gentlemen, doctors, lawyers, magistrates, officials of all ranks.
The frequenters of St.John’s Club were not anti-clericals: not one of them would have passed the parish priest without greeting him or, on occasion, shaking hands with him. Moreover, no one in authority could have taken any exception to their convictions or their conduct. At this period, the Imperial government showed itself favourable to Catholics: The Revolution had not as yet had time to ‘recapture Napolean III’ on the morrow of his attempted assassination by Orsini on January 14th of this same year, 1858.
1.For they have said, reasoning with themselves, but not right: The time of our life is short and tedious, and in the end of a man there is no remedy, and no man hath been known to have returned from hell:
2.For we are born of nothing, and after this we shall be as if we had not been: for the breath in our nostrils is smoke: and speech a spark to move our heart,
3.Which being put out, our body shall be ashes, and our spirit shall be poured abroad as soft air, and our life shall pass away as the trace of a cloud, and shall be dispersed as a mist, which is driven away by the beams of the sun, and overpowered with the heat thereof:
4.And our name in time shall be forgotten, and no man shall have any remembrance of our works. (more…)
“IF you completely conquer yourself, you will more easily subdue all other things. The perfect victory is to triumph over self. For he who holds himself in such subjection that sensuality obeys reason and reason obeys Me in all matters, is truly his own conqueror and master of the world.
“Now, if you wish to climb to this high position you must begin like a man, and lay the ax to the root, in order to tear out and destroy any hidden unruly love of self or of earthly goods. From this vice of too much self-love comes almost every other vice that must be uprooted. And when this evil is vanquished, and brought under control, great peace and quiet will follow at once.
“THE Americanist faith is evoked on every ceremonial occasion by each political faction in its own distinct fashion. It is inscribed on national monuments and in patriotic legend. The conservative cult of the Constitution as a God-given document reflects it. So does the Monroe Doctrine, which establishes the New World as an American sphere of influence, not on the grounds of self-interest, but as a means of carving out a “truly free” segment of the globe. The symbolism of the Statue of Liberty, the adulation of unrestricted capitalism and the spirit behind the American Civil Liberties Union are all different manifestations of the same religious definition of the meaning and glory of the United States. Moreover, the fideistic way in which this American Religion is taught, one which permits no investigation and discussion of the principles upon which it rests, is as classically Puritan as the historical influence of “preachers”—ministers, and then, in secularized form, professors, psychologists, journalists, etc.—in the interpretation of the true will of the supposedly autonomous individual. (more…)
“I HAVE been amazed that some are utterly in doubt as to whether or not the Holy Virgin is able to be called the Mother of God. For if our Lord Jesus Christ is God, how should the Holy Virgin who bore Him not be the Mother of God?”
— St. Cyril of Alexandria