I have come back from the missions with feelings of joy and gratitude, for these last three missions have been blessed in a wonderful way. God seems to take a special delight in seconding my efforts, just because I have hurt Him so much in the past and have been so really ungrateful. It is one of the big humiliations of my life and makes me thoroughly ashamed of …
Life
July 15, 2010
Saint Francis in Meditation Francisco de ZURBARÁN c.1635-39 Copyright The National Gallery 2010 The soft chimes of the angelus bell mark the fall of evening. Another day is gone. Another precious day, our measurement of God’s most precious gift, time, has passed away and is swallowed up in the vast gulf of the irrevocable past. Another day has passed! Another stage of our journey towards our final end is traversed. …
July 12, 2010
Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati Sunday, July 4 Apart from being the 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time, or the 6th Sunday after Pentecost (depending on which calendar you use) and Independence Day (if you are on the other side of the Atlantic), it is also the memorial of Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati. Amongst other things, Blessed Pier Giorgio was renowned, as a very young man, for his heroic charity towards the …
June 28, 2010
St Oliver Plunkett July 1 Feast of St Oliver Plunkett As a child I was convinced that one day God would give me the grace of martyrdom. When quite small I read and re-read every martyr’s life in the twelve volumes of Butler’s Lives of the Saints, and longed and prayed to be a martyr, and I have often done so ever since. As years went on, the desire grew …
June 28, 2010
St Peter repenting, by Jean Chouvay, late 17th C June 29 Feast of St Peter and St Paul Jesus during His mortal life practised many virtues; but none is more conspicuous, none appeals more strongly to us, than His infinite mercy, His tender forgiveness of all injuries. A vile sinner is brought before Him, her very mien proclaims her crime. “Have none condemned thee? Neither shall I. Go, sin no …
June 28, 2010
Fr Doyle was a prolific letter writer If an aspiration, on the authority of the Blessed (now Saint) Cure d’Ars, often saved a soul, what must you not do each day you suffer so bravely! This thought certainly will help you and make the pain almost nothing, and will add to its merit, since the motive for bearing it will be all the higher. COMMENT: Today’s quotation comes from a …
June 28, 2010
A soldier helping a casualty at the Battle of the Somme From the Gospel of the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time: As they were going along the road, a man said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, …
June 27, 2010
St Josemaria Escriva June 26: The feast of St Josemaria Escriva, founder of Opus Dei Today the Church celebrates the feast of St Josemaria Escriva. Instead of a message from Fr Doyle, we have a message from a saint, ABOUT Fr Doyle. From point 205 of St Josemaria’s The Way: We were reading — you and I — the heroically ordinary life of that man of God. And we saw …
June 25, 2010
The Miraculous Catch of Fish by Gaspar de Crayer Do nothing without consulting Him in the Tabernacle. But then act fearlessly, if you see it is for His honour and glory, never minding what others may think or say. Above all, “cast your care upon the Lord and He shall sustain you”, (Psalm 54. 23). Peace and calm in your soul, prayer ever on your lips, and a big love …
June 25, 2010
St John the Baptist by Titian c. 1542 The Birthday of St John the Baptist Today the Church celebrates the feast of the birth of St John the Baptist. Fr Doyle does not seem to have written about St John very much, but in one letter to his sister, a nun, written on 19th December 1916, alludes to the similarities between the harshness of his own life and that of …
June 24, 2010