Do You Like Poetry? Here's One that's Worth Memorizing.

Hat tip to The Catholic Thing for publishing this beautiful poem by Lope de Vega. And a prayer of gratitude to Longfellow for translating it into English. It reminds me of Thompson's The Hound of Heaven. 

                        TOMORROW    

Lord, what am I, that with unceasing care
Thou did’st seek after me, that Thou did’st wait
Wet with unhealthy dews before my gate,
And pass the gloomy nights of winter there?
Oh, strange delusion, that I did not greet
Thy blest approach, and oh, to heaven how lost
If my ingratitude’s unkindly frost
Has chilled the bleeding wounds upon Thy feet.

How oft my guardian angel gently cried,
“Soul, from thy casement look, and thou shalt see
How He persists to knock and wait for thee!”
And oh, how often to that Voice of sorrow,
“Tomorrow we will open,” I replied,
And when the morrow came I answered still “Tomorrow.”

Lope de Vega

— translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

On this Feast of the Holy Innocents...

...please pray for the defenders iof our modern innocents imprisoned for trying to rescue them from our modern Herods!

THE HOLY INNOCENTS

And today, the 28th of December, the Church marks the Feast of the Holy Innocents, who were martyrs in deed though not, being infants, in will.

The horrific slaughter of children at the command of King Herod is a jarring contrast to the peace and innocence of the birth of Jesus we celebrated just three days earlier. [Read more here....]

Sunday Meditation: Be Irrelevant to the Modern World, It's the Duty of a Good Catholic!

Fathers, love your children!

I've know Fr. Jerry Pokorsky for years.  I first met him when he headed the Pro-Life office in the Diocese of Arlington and was meeting individually with the chairmen of parish committees. He took me out to lunch. 

That, in itself, was unusual, and I later returned the favor. His articles at The Catholic Thing are always informative and wise. So if you want a mentor to give you some good advice in Catholic living, check him out. Here's the advice portion of his article, Dare to Be Irrelevant:

• Men, be faithful to your wives in marriage. Be kind and considerate. If you are involved with porn, give it up. Just do it.

• Ladies, this is from the Book of Proverbs: “It is better to sit in a corner of the housetop than with a quarrelsome wife and an unruly household.” (Prov. 25:24)

Have no fear, little flock -- not even against the plague!

God's love never fails. Trust in Him and join in the rosary today at 4:00 p.m. EST.

A friend sent me an email early this morning with a link to an article from The Catholic Thing. Here's the bit that really struck me. The author, Robert Royal, describes a contact from a colleague about Archbishop Wilton Gregory's message to his flock about the coronavirus. The archbishop wrote that his "number one priority" is:

Sunday Meditation: The Bell Tolls for Ireland and for Western Civilization

In 1624 John Donne wrote a short book of meditations titled Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions. At the time he was dean of St. Paul's, a prestigious position in the Church of England. The meditations were inspired by a long period of illness with spotted fever when he lay in his sickbed and listened to the funeral bells ringing at a nearby church. He made this observation in Meditation XVII:

The Church is Catholike, universall, so are all her Actions; All that she does, belongs to all. When she baptizes a child, that action concerns mee, for that child is thereby connected to that Head which is my Head too, and engraffed into that body, whereof I am a member … All mankinde is of one Author, and is one volume; when one Man dies, one Chapter is not torne out of the booke, but translated into a better language. [Unusual spellings are from the original.]

From there follows a poem that contains two very famous lines: "No man is an island." and "For whom the bell tolls."

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.

Sunday Meditation: Will Parents Being Non-Judgmental Lead their Children to Hell?

I was reading Fr. Jerry Pokorsky's article at The Catholic Thing this morning about non-judgmental clergy, a real indictment against priests who refuse to be shepherds warning their sheep. Instead, they let them run headlong into spiritual danger. But the paragraphs that really struck me had to do with parents:

Someone recently told me about a Catholic religion teacher who was called by a concerned parent. The teacher was presenting the Catholic faith in a methodical fashion. An upcoming topic was to be love and marriage. The parent wanted assurances that his young daughter would not be taught that the lesbian lifestyle of her older sister is immoral. 

If the younger sister came home with a crisp understanding of Christian marriage, she would become hopelessly “judgmental” – a truly horrible person – at least in Dad’s judgment. And she might even find herself denied entry to one or more colleges on the basis of her “intolerance.” You see, believing and living the Catholic faith is “judgmental” and it ruins education – and careers.

Insanity Reigns on Campus!

More free speech here than on campus!

What a week! I still can't wrap my mind around the evil attacks in Paris. So I'll focus on our own insanity here.

On campus students are repeating the antics of the 60s. No, they aren't holding sit-ins at the administration buildings. They're using hunger strikes and manufactured injuries to get people fired and turn campuses into bastions of political correctness rather than institutions for rational discussion. I'm not sure these privileged lefties have a rational cell in their collective brain. (Yes, I know I didn't put an s on brain. There's only one -- the brain of the collective, the puppet master of the left.)

Comparing Planned Parenthood to ISIS? Right on!

Fr. Jerry Pokorsky got taken to the woodshed by a parishioner recently for comparing Planned Parenthood to ISIS in the weekly bulletin. (Seems apt to me. The only difference between the victims is their size and place of residence and the fact that the kid killers have the consent of the moms.)

The Catholic lady who pulled Father aside to remonstrate with him knows Cecile Richards, head of PP, personally and finds her "very friendly" (at least to born women). Really, the lady says she's pro-life, but finds Father's approach over the top, one that causes other parishioners (not her) to "roll their eyes" when they read the bulletin.

Let Us Weep for Holy Mother Church from the Foot of the Cross

These two article made me weep for my church. We are at the foot of the cross with Mary crying, "Abba, Father," with her son!

The Synod in Poetry and Prose

O Jesus, meek and humble of heart, make our hearts like unto Thine.

O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.

Our Lady of the rosary, prayer for us.

I haven't seen this, but it sounds interesting....

Daredevil and the Devil

"Daredevil's greatest superpower is his Catholicism." Slate

Are you as intrigued as I am? It sounds like it actually presents a priest as a wise counselor instead of a child molester or other kind of monster. Think I'll watch an episode. Looks pretty violent, but so is the Old Testament when you get down to it.

Have you seen it? What do you think?