Dear Josie, You know, of course, how much I admire you.  Of all my nieces I believe that you have received a special vocation.  And now that I see you falling prey to the seductions of Californian culture, it makes my stomach turn.  Certainly it is only to be expected, since you opted to go west for your studies, but that doesn’t make it less worrisome.  Don’t get me wrong, I am not berating your moral or religious practices, which seem to be holding strong, thanks be to God (and to your mother’s prayers, I am sure).  Rather, I am concerned about your worldview, your Weltanschauung, as they call it in philosophical circles.  Though California may seem to be the pinnacle and epicenter of civilization (especially when you experience it from the Edenic precincts of a coastal college campus), it really isn’t.  To inure yourself against succumbing to the narrow minded and comfortable mindset that is slowly numbing your universal sensibilities, I recommend keeping abreast of the wide spectrum of Church affairs – which includes academia and California, but doesn’t exclude the rest of the world.  Take, for instance, the issue of Christian unity, which was the heartfelt concern of today’s saint. You see, Josaphat was the son of a Catholic father, but he lived in an Orthodox region.  (You remember, I presume, that the Orthodox Christians, most of whom live in the eastern Mediterranean or in Slavic countries, have rejected the primacy of the Roman Pontiff ever since the unfortunate falling out of 1054.)   Early on he felt a call to serve the cause of unity by dedicating himself to the priestly ministry, which he did with great success in the Ukraine, Poland, and finally in Belarus, where he was made bishop of the Eparchy (diocese) of Polatsk.  Upon his arrival the entire eparchy was in a deplorable state of relaxed morals and ecclesiastical disarray.  His prudent pastoring and passionate preaching initiated a vibrant reform in every aspect of the community.  In Polatsk as elsewhere, his great cause was reestablishing union with the Successor of St Peter, the Bishop of Rome, and because of his exemplary virtue and tireless charity, he won the whole Eparchy to this all-important cause.  Soon, however, Orthodox dissidents established a parallel hierarchy in the aftermath of the Union of Brest (politics often seems to get in the way, doesn’t it?) and sent their own archbishop to Polatsk, one Moletius Smotritsky.  Smotritsky energetically set about undoing the good work accomplished by Josaphat, and soon had raised a vociferous anti-Catholic party with members throughout the diocese.  Such was their ire at the saintly archbishop who insisted on returning to union with the ancient Church that they eventually stormed his quarters and murdered him, throwing his mutilated body into the river. And that, my dear niece, is the kind of thing that still goes on throughout this embattled world.  Do keep abreast of such events, and expand the geography of your prayer to include them.  This, I believe, will help immunize you against the lotuses of the Californian, collegiate Weltanschauung. Yours always, Uncle Eddy

Dear Terry, It took me a long while to get through your last note.  Not only was it quite long (which is fine – I’ve plenty of free time on my hands), but also your thoughts were muddled and complicated and densely tangled – it would have been helpful if I had had a machete!  I daresay that you are unnecessarily tying yourself in knots, and those knots, unfortunately, are holding you back from the joys of true Christian discipleship.  If you want my humble, avuncular opinion (and I’m going to give it even if you don’t want it), I would say you need to get back to spiritual basics.  For the next week, simply meditate on and act out the unpretentious formula for holiness and peace of mind given to us by our Lord himself: love God with all your heart by loving your neighbor (e.g. dorm mates, classmates, roommates…) as yourself.  It will help clarify things if you contemplate the example of today’s saint. Few (if any) of the great Church leaders from the fourth century had an impact as far-reaching and long-lasting as St Martin of Tours.  Not only was he elected to the bishopric of Tours, which became the center of his mind-bogglingly robust evangelizing activity, not only did he found the first (and second) monasteries in France, which thrived uninterruptedly until the Protest Reformation 1200 years later, not only did he topple innumerable pagan shrines and win the hearts of simple people through an unceasing flow of miraculous healings, but he also came to the defense of the true faith whenever it was threatened and put his own life in jeopardy again and again in order to further the cause of Christ.  How did he come to such greatness?  He practiced the Christian basics, my dear nephew, the basics. Martin was the son of a Roman military officer from modern day Turkey.  They moved to Italy when his dad got promoted, and, in accordance with Roman law at the time, Martin, as a son of a military veteran, was forced to join the army when he was 15.  Even then, however, he had leanings towards a more religious lifestyle.  He was sent to Gaul (modern day France), where he began to receive instructions in the Christian faith, and sneaked off to spend time alone in prayer whenever he could.  It was during this period, before he was yet twenty (about your age, if I’m not mistaken), when he reached a turning point.  He was coming back into the city after hard day’s patrol near Amiens.  It was winter and bitter cold.  As he approached the city gate he saw a starved, half-naked man shivering with cold as he begged alms from the passers by.  Some of the people laughed at the poor man; some derided him; no one gave him anything.  Martin’s heart was moved, and he wanted to do something, but all he had was his great military cloak and his armor.  He stopped his warhorse and dismounted.  He removed his heavy cloak and, taking his sword, cut it in half.  He wrapped one half around the poor beggar and dangled the other half from his shoulders.  The passers by now laughed at him.  That night, in a dream, he saw our Lord wrapped in that half cloak he had given away, and heard him say, “Martin, yet a catechumen, has covered me with this garment.”  Soon thereafter he abandoned the Emperor’s service in order to serve a higher King, and history changed its course. The basics, dear Terry; I implore you to get back to basics.  And I remain, gladly, your Uncle Eddy

Dear Lee, I was truly sorry to hear of the difficulties your COMPASS chapter is encountering this fall – sorry, but not surprised.  The ancient enemy never tires of sowing weeds among the wheat, as our Lord pointed out. The important thing, of course, is to avoid discouragement, to stir up that precious virtue of hope and trust in God.  And the way to do that is simply to remind yourself (preferably during a visit to the Chapel) that you are not the boss – God is.  If you were the boss, you would have to be able to control everything in order to guarantee the success of your endeavors.  But you aren’t, so you don’t.  You are merely a rank and file soldier in the army of Christ, and he is the commanding officer.  He can see the whole picture, and he will ensure that your efforts (if they are sincere and directed towards extending his Kingdom and not the kingdom of your ego) are not in vain.  Take a lesson from today’s saint in this regard. Leo the Great faced more and greater obstacles in his 21 years as Pope than most people face in a whole lifetime.  It all began even before he was elected to the Chair of Peter – they had to send a delegation from Rome to Gaul (modern day France) to inform him of his Papal dignities; the previous Pope had dispatched Leo to resolve the violent quarrels between two imperial generals (Aetius and Albinus) that were threatening to leave all of Gaul at the mercy of invading Gothic barbarians.  That kind of set the tone for the next two decades.  In the Eastern half of the waning Roman Empire heresies were running rampant under the indecorous encouragement of haughty emperors.  Leo had to reclaim the true faith from the energetic upstart Eutyches, who collaborated with Emperor Theodosius in calling an illegitimate Council (the infamous “Robber Synod” of Ephesus in 448) in order to propagate his errors. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Attila the Hun had invaded Italy, sending shock waves of terror and destruction throughout the peninsula.  The Emperor (who had relocated to far away Constantinople) was helpless in the face of Attila’s frightful savagery, and as the barbarians approached Rome, the Romans, quaking in their sandals, huddled behind their dilapidated defenses and sent Leo out to negotiate.  Miraculously, the negotiations were successful, and Leo saved Rome from destruction by agreeing to pay an annual tax to Mr Attila. Such cataclysmic crises were on Leo’s daily agenda for 21 years.  In the face of them, his unshakable trust in God not only kept discouragement at bay, but actually enabled him to thrive, to take every challenge as an opportunity to show his love for Christ by spreading and defending the Church.  In this difficult moment of your foundation of Compass, why not take Pope St Leo as a special patron?  I’m sure he’s just itching to get back into the fray. Love, Uncle Eddy