“THE first purification to be made is from mortal sin. The means whereby to make it is the sacrament of penance. Seek the best confessor within your reach, use one of the many little books [if needed] written in order to help the examination of conscience. Read some such book carefully, examining point by point… Read More The First Purification. By St. Francis de Sales.
“The Saint is a medicine because he is an antidote. Indeed that is why the saint is often a martyr; he is mistaken for a poison because he is an antidote. He will generally be found restoring the world to sanity by exaggerating whatever the world neglects, which is by no means always the same… Read More Saints of Flesh and Blood
On giving, not just consuming. Melvyn Bragg and guests (In Our Time, BBC) discuss Charles Dickens’ novella, written in 1843 when he was 31, which has become intertwined with his reputation and with Christmas itself. Ebenezer Scrooge is the miserly everyman figure whose joyless obsession with money severs him from society and his own emotions,… Read More Dickens and the meanings of A Christmas Carol
Catholic Critique 