Today the Holy Father's General Audience was on St. Therese of Lisieiux, St. Therese of the Child Jesus. The greater part of the audience is a retelling of her life. In the last two paragraphs the Pontiff reflects on her significance for us. I have translated these two paragraphs from the Italian. (An English translation [...]
Archive for the ‘love’ Category
Only excerpts or summaries of the posts are shown on this page. Click on the title of a post to see the whole post.Therese of Lisieux – Pope Benedict XVI's General Audience
Wednesday, April 6th, 2011Married Saints and Continence
Thursday, January 27th, 2011Why did so many married saints live in continence, that is, without having sexual intercourse with their spouse for a significant portion of their life as married persons.
(1) Because such continence is and was considered very helpful for growing in virtue.
(2) Because the holiness of such persons is more evident.
(3) Because persons advanced in charity and virtue are disposed to practice such continence.
Counterfeit Charity
Thursday, June 3rd, 2010St. Francis de Sales in his Treatise on the Love of God devotes the fourth book to describing how we may lose charity, and there notes how charity, which is properly a share we have in God's own love, produces a likeness of itself on the human level. So long as charity remains, this is [...]
Mortal Sin and Fundamental Option 2
Sunday, May 16th, 2010In the previous post I attempted to describe a man who, as far as morally possible, related to his family in a manner analogous to the manner a Christian relates to God, so that even things that normally are not incompatible with marital love would exclude it. We could also consider a more realistic case, [...]
Mortal Sin and Fundamental Option
Tuesday, May 11th, 2010One of the reasons why many theologians have been attracted to the theory of a "fundamental option" is that it seems in certain respects to correspond better to real-life experience. If we consider visible human relationships, between two married persons for example,we don't find persons who go frequently back and forth from being totally committed [...]
Fundamental Option and Salvation
Sunday, May 9th, 2010The CDF in Persona Humana (1975) and Pope John Paul II in Reconciliatio et Paenitentia (1984) and in Veritatis Splendor (1993) reject the theological theory of a fundamental option insofar as such a theory is understood or interpreted in a manner that denies the traditional doctrine concerning mortal sin, whereby any one conscious and deliberate [...]
Perfect Contrition and the Sacrament of Penance
Wednesday, May 5th, 2010I was struck today by a potentially misleading formulation in the Catechism of the Catholic Church regarding the necessity of intending to confess one's sins in the Sacrament of Penance. A certain inseparability of remission of sins and the Sacrament of Penance is taught by the Council of Trent and by Pope John Paul II: [...]
Judging Favorably
Saturday, March 7th, 2009As promised, this post is on seeing the best in people–judging them charitably, or favorably, rather than indifferently or strictly. St. Thomas Aquinas explains in an article on favorable judgment, "whether doubtful matters should always be interpreted in the more favorable way", that when a person's fault is not manifest, we should always tend more [...]
Seven Principles of the Spiritual Life
Friday, February 27th, 2009I've added Br. Thomas's description of Seven Principles of the Spiritual Life to the website. The principles, based on the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Therese of Lisieux, are the following: 1. To keep God in mind at all times.2. To trust in God as much as possible.3. To do all things for [...]
Universal Call to Holiness
Sunday, January 25th, 2009"There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call" (Eph. 4:4). St. Francis de Sales, whose feast we celebrate today, is known for his teaching that all Christians are called to holiness. The teaching of the universal call to holiness did not originate [...]
I am a Catholic seminarian and deacon in Vienna, and a teacher at the