Still Here…But Taking a Break

-

I have not abandoned the blogosphere, I'm simply trying to make sure that my duties to God, my wife and son, and my job are all completed first.  Remember the post below about all the exciting things going on in my life?  Well, that excitement has faded into fatigue and stress.

I seem to be getting everything completed in a timely manner.  However, completing those projects and tasks, as well as making time for prayer and my family, takes every ounce of my energy.  There is rarely anything left over to share with the cyberspace community.

Alas, I will try to find more time to write in the future (probably far into it since I'm preparing for a youth retreat and the World Youth Day celebration).  In the mean time, please keep me, my family, and my youth ministry in your prayers.

In the mean time, you might try out a few things that I've found to be enjoyable in recent days.

  1. This article by Fr. Frank Pavone, which serves as a reminder of the world's inconsistent philosophy on the rights of individuals.
  2. Reading classic fictional literature.  I am within twenty pages of completing The Three Musketeers, and I should like to pick up other books in the near future such as The Chronicles of Narnia series, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and others.  I'll return to history and theology after I have disembarked from the crazy train (is that ever possible?).
  3. Enjoying a cold Sunset Wheat Ale by the Leinenkugel Brewery.  I tried it for the first time last night and found it to be...um...delicious!  It goes best with an orange slice.

I do hope to bring back plenty of pictures of the Land Down Under, so look for a post sometime around the end of July.

God bless! 

Popular posts from this blog

Learning Virtue from St. Martin de Porres

-
Image
[This post appeared originally on my full site, which is now no longer in operation, in November 2012.] It seems that more should be written about a saint from whom we can learn so many lessons in virtue.  Yet that is not the case with St. Martin de Porres, from whom we have much to learn about humility, detachment, fasting, justice, and charity.  The website of the St. Martin de Porres Shrine and Institute (located in my own diocese; a wonderful initiative with a beautiful chapel) offers a mere four paragraphs of biographical information, while other sites ( here , here , and here ) devote no more than 10 sentences to this exemplar of heroic virtue.  Surely, Brother Martin, who was so humble in this life, finds that to be a fitting scenario even after his death. From the very earliest days of his life, he embraced his lowly situation.  He desired to do nothing more than glorify the Creator by serving creatures.  He reached out to slaves, orphan...
Read more

St. Cyril of Jerusalem on the Eucharist

-
Image
Although the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist was not the first thing that convinced me I needed to become Catholic, it was of prime importance in my journey home. Now that I am home, the Eucharist is what sustains and strengthens me on my perpetual search for holiness. Indeed, it is the "source and summit" of my Christian life. Thus, I always enjoy taking time to read what Christians in the first centuries had to say about "the breaking of the bread." My findings are such: there is clear evidence that, from the time Christ instituted the Eucharistic meal on Holy Thursday, Christians believed Christ's body, blood, soul, and divinity to be TRULY present. They never considered that it might be "just a symbol." Only within the last five centuries has the "just a symbol" argument taken form, no doubt to the detriment of the true Faith and otherwise faithful Christians. To prove my argument, I have provided two quotes from St. Cyril of Jer...
Read more

Gratitude: Foundation of Our Spiritual Growth

-
Image
Gratitude is not simply a quaint idea to which we should tip our caps during a few short weeks in November each fall.  It is important that we move beyond a trite understanding and application, and come to understand the real place of gratitude in the spiritual life.  It is nothing less than a virtue and disposition that is at the foundation of our potential spiritual growth.  (In a corresponding way, its absence is at the “foundation” of spiritual stagnation.) Before we ever begin to speak of spiritual realities, gratitude simply helps us to get by more efficiently, effectively, and happily than the opposite alternative.  Grateful people grow and flourish, even in the midst of difficult circumstances, in ways that ungrateful people do not.  Still, we must resist the temptation to deal with gratitude simply on the natural level.  We must bring these principles to the supernatural level and grasp them there. We must come to understand that gratitude...
Read more