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March 4, 2020

Note from the Assistant Managing Editor:

We are in the first full week of Lent.  Our reflection from Caryll Houselander is a reminder of why we practice both corporeal mortifications and works of mercy in this season — because "we cannot separate our souls from our bodies ... by means of our bodies we can offer Christ to the Father and give him to one another."

Even though Easter is still 40 days away, we can still "give some thought to improving our practice of warm hospitality."  Leila Marie Lawler offers "9 Hospitality Thoughts" in a helpful how-to.

Then George Weigel writes about an ancient Lenten pilgrimage that has reemerged in popular devotion.  "In the mid-centuries of the first millennium, the Bishop of Rome, his clergy, and his choir would gather every day of Lent at a starting-point church (the collecta) and process to the statio, the "station church" of the day; there, Mass was solemnly celebrated before the congregation broke its Lenten fast."

Pope Leo the Great rounds off these Lenten thoughts with "Fasting in Body — and Mind — during Lent."  "The right practice of abstinence is needful not only to the mortification of the flesh but also to the purification of the mind," he says.  "The mind then only keeps holy and spiritual fast when it rejects the food of error and the poison of falsehood."

My prayer this week is that our bodies, our hearts, and our minds are purified this Lent and become immovably rooted in Christ. - Meaghen Gonzalez



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"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear." - George Orwell



New Resources


 
Loving with All Our Being - Caryll Houselander - from Wood of the Cradle, Wood of the Cross: The Little Way of the Infant Jesus

Our human relationships with one another are a giving of Christ to one another, and a receiving of Christ from one another.


 
Rigid Diversity - Theodore Dalrymple - Taki's Magazine

It is not necessary for a government to be thoroughgoingly despotic for us to live in a totalitarian condition in which we are afraid to say some things and — what is even worse — are required to say others.


 
Reading, writing, prayer, fasting - Father James V. Schall, S.J. - ISI

Something "liberal" should color our education, something that frees us from the absorption found in most lives and occupations.


 
9 Hospitality Thoughts - Leila Lawler - Like Mother, Like Daughter

Here I just want to put down the little things that make people feel truly welcome and comfortable in your home; the generous touches of warm hosting I have observed in others, that make for a culture of friendship and festivity.


 
Aventine meditations - George Weigel - The Catholic Difference

For all that it's witnessed over the centuries, the Aventine hadn't previously seen what's happened there on the past 25 years or so of Ash Wednesdays.


 
Fasting in Body — and Mind — during Lent. - Pope St. Leo the Great - public domain

Lent must be kept not only by avoiding bodily impunity but also by avoiding errors of thought and faith.


 
Thomas' "Guide to Practical Shipbuilding" - Father George W. Rutler - From the Pastor

Earnest preachers use their personalities to lead people to Jesus without obstructing him with themselves.

Editorials of Interest:

Are Sundays a day off during Lent? - Catholic News & Inspiration
Count your blessings - Mercatornet
Millie Fontana - Them Before Us

Editorials of Interest


Filipino archbishop requests abstinence from applause during Mass - CNA

"The community of prayer becomes just an audience in need of entertainment; liturgical ministers become performers; and preachers become erudite toastmasters. It should not be so."


The fall of a spiritual giant - Mercatornet

Jean Vanier, the Canadian founder of a community for the intellectually disabled, has been exposed as a sexual abuser.


Judge not lest ye be judged — a lesson for our time in light of Jean Vanier revelations - ACS

We should not give up discerning between right and wrong and observing the character of those around us, but we should stop occupying our petty little judgement-throne trying to usurp the place of God and instead allow the Holy Spirit to give us Light by which to see.


Are Sundays a day off during Lent? - Catholic News & Inspiration

The forty days of Lent is a bit of a metaphor rather than a literal count.


How to identify and crush your predominant fault - Matthew Leonard

If we don't fight it, we're in big spiritual trouble. We'll have no fertile interior life, which means no real spiritual growth.


The fast and the furious - Spectator

How to handle Lent.


Where do Ash Wednesday ashes come from? - CNA

"Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return."


Coronavirus highlights the $35 billion vaccine market. Here are the key players. - CNBC

The vaccine market has grown sixfold over the past two decades, worth more than $35 billion today, according to AB Bernstein.


In Cookie Season, Girl Scouts USA Problems Continue - NC Register

As Girl Scouts numbers decline amid the organization's enthusiastic embrace of progressivism, Christ-centered organizations such as American Heritage Girls and Little Flower Girls' Club are flourishing.


Lesotho PM murder case could have canon law consequences - CWR

Prime Minister Thomas Thabane of Lesotho has been charged with the murder of his estranged former wife. The trial, and its verdict, could have an unforeseen canonical consequence for Thabane and his second wife, who has also been charged with the murder.


An addiction healed through Jesus and Mary — then temptation - Catholic Stand

When you are faced with temptation...


Black law scholar explains how critical race theory is a 'dangerous and destructive ideology' - The College Fix

Critical race theory is an analytical framework to analyze institutions and culture. Its purpose is to divide the world into white oppressors and non-white victims.


Count your blessings - Mercatornet

If you catch coronavirus, you still missed out on bubonic plague.


Millie Fontana - Them Before Us

Growing up with two mothers forced me to be confused about who I was and where I fit in the scheme of the world.


One, Holy, Catholic and . . . Islamophobic? - Crisis Magazine

Muslim immigration touches on the nature and identity of American and Western society, so it is still an important issue. Large-scale Muslim immigration into non-Muslim countries causes problems.


Consumption vs. Community - CWR

Charles Marohn, author of Strong Towns, explicitly recommends the Catholic idea of subsidiarity, and his proposals are not grandiose or concerned with national policies, but rather with neighborhood charity.


Vatican opens archives of Holocaust-era Pope Pius XII - BBC

Interventions by the Catholic Church saved thousands of Jews from the Holocaust a fact acknowledged by the Yad Vashem research centre in Israel..


Preserving Parental Rights and Fundamental Freedoms - YouTube

Father Copenhagen explores bioethical issues and the principles needed to address the urgent religious and ethical problems arising from mandatory vaccination.


You're okay with third-trimester abortions? - YouTube

The Daily Caller asked college students during which trimester they thought abortions were acceptable. Then they showed them what a baby looked like at that point in the pregnancy. "Does this ultrasound change your mind?"


Sacred Art in Secular Terms - YouTube

There is a vigorous return to liturgical art happening today. This movement to rediscover the ancient language of the West can be understood in secular terms and as a natural consequence of an exhaustion in the revolutionary understanding of how art develops.


St. John Henry Cardinal Newman and
St. Justin Martyr, pray for us

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