While Inferno remains the most famous part of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, the poems’ two subsequent parts, Purgatorio and Paradiso are necessary for understanding Inferno in its entirety. Much like understanding only one part of the…

In the northern part of the United States this is the season when mortality is on the mind. Leaves fall, the harvest is gathered, and nature retreats in anticipation of the deathly stillness of winter. With the Church’s annual…

Pope Francis on Sunday will pronounce the formal canonization of five people, including the John Henry Cardinal Newman. Cardinal Newman is a curious figure in Church history, especially as pertaining to the divide between Roman Catholicism…

On April 21 this year, around the world all of Christendom will be united in spirit in celebration of the Resurrection of Our Lord. We reach beyond frontiers both natural and man-made in common jubilee. Here in America, I’ll be attending…

These days we are used to our confessions being entirely private matters between only ourselves and our priests. Any penance we perform we usually keep to ourselves. Seldom do we directly tell others about the sins we needed to have…

Let’s face it, there are plenty of us who could stand to go to confession more often. And we have a duty to receive the sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation. According to the Church’s command, “after having attained the age of…

While we might associate Feb. 14 with St. Valentine, in the Roman calendar it is also the feast day of two of the most important men in the history of Eastern Europe. Sts. Cyril (826–869) and Methodius (815–885), recognized by St. John…

The annual March for Life in Washington that marks the U.S. Supreme Court legalizing abortion in January 1973 is an intriguing affair. It is a surreal sight, seeing so many different people from across the nation rallying around a single…

The great medieval saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153) famously said there are three ways of interpreting the Advent season. More specifically, the three ways of understanding the coming of Christ which the Advent season anticipates. For…

This Dec. 1, I was witness to a peculiar ritual no doubt occurring in many of your own hometowns around this time of year. Much of the town gathered around a large pine tree, moving around to keep themselves warm in moist, cold New England…