Dear Friends,   I have long admired Saint Thomas Aquinas. His keen intellect was capable of wading through tumultuous sofisms and heretical claims to defend doctrinal matters. His reverent heart composed poems, revealing a wisdom that articulated the great mysteries of our faith. Deign, O Jesus, Pelican of heaven, me, ...

Dear Friends,   How many times have we read the accounts of the feeding of the multitude in the Gospels? Hundreds, I am sure. What caught my attention recently was not the presentation of the miracle, but what happened before it. Jesus and the Apostles had slipped away on a ...

Dear Friends,   “Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” Isaiah 43:19 “And he who sat upon the throne said, ‘Behold, I make all things new…Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.’” Revelation 21:5   Another year has turned, and ...

Dear Friends in Christ, January 7th is the feast day of St. Raymond of Peñafort, a model of a man born into nobility who seemed to make the most of his God-given talents. Well educated, he was teaching philosophy by age 20. In his early 30s he earned doctorates in ...

Dear Friends, As the worldly New Year begins tomorrow for many (our Liturgical New Year began with Advent’s first Sunday), people of good will frequently use this event to ponder where they are in their lives and where they would like to be.  We adjust our lives to start on ...

Dear Friends,   Last year, my community planned a special Christmas activity that dates back to the times of St. Therese of Lisieux in her Carmelite community. Each person drew a folded piece of paper with the names of a character from the Nativity scene. We then put ourselves in ...

Dear Friends, I recently stood on a cliff, overlooking the ocean at night under millions of stars, and the power and majesty of God was palpable. My thoughts centered on the birth of my newest grandchild—so tiny, so perfect—and the mystery of the Incarnation. I thought on how God the ...

“For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there but water the earth… so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I intend and prosper in the ...