Thursday 28th March 2024

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A Leaven In The World… Mary Assists Us As We Carry The Cross Of Her Son

May 11, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on A Leaven In The World… Mary Assists Us As We Carry The Cross Of Her Son

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK Of fair-weather friends we always have plenty: those who are with us when the road is wide and the going profitable or pleasant. Friends are hard to find when the times are bad. When the going gets rough, the weather inclement, and the climb demanding or dangerous, it is then that we can find ourselves feeling very much “alone.” This is what the world would have us believe. As for our Lord, so for us, when the shattering of the cross implodes our lives, we can discover more convincingly the freeing truth in the midst of our pain: God our Father is our truest friend and most faithful ally. Mary never believed herself alone as…Continue Reading

An Apologetics Course . . . Fidelity To The Truth

May 10, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on An Apologetics Course . . . Fidelity To The Truth

By RAYMOND DE SOUZA, KM Some of the faithful Wanderer readers have asked me to present articles more specifically destined to train new apologists in the mission to defend the faith. A kind of training course, as it were. I am happy to see that these articles in The Wanderer have encouraged some or many to take up the banner of apologetics and join us in the fray. Therefore, to meet their request, this week I start a new series on the Raiders of the Lost Art — the art of putting logic at the service of the faith. So we begin by defining the word: Apologetics is the art of presenting the truths of the faith in a logical…Continue Reading

The Universal Sacrament Of Salvation

May 9, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Universal Sacrament Of Salvation

By DON FIER The one true Church, as we saw last week, is a mystery of our faith, a mystery that was revealed first of all to the apostles when our Savior said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables” (Mark 4:11). In the mystery of the Church is realized the divine design for humanity’s salvation, a plan revealed by the word and life of our Lord Jesus Christ. She is a mystery inasmuch as “in her visible reality there is present and active a divine spiritual reality which can only be seen with the eyes of faith” (Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic…Continue Reading

Catholic Replies

May 8, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Catholic Replies

Editor’s Note: Writing in a recent parish bulletin, Fr. George Rutler of the Church of St. Michael in New York City said that “we need a historical sense to appreciate the contrast between civilization before and after Christ changed the world. He contrasts the world redeemed and unredeemed in his imagery of the Good Shepherd who ‘lays down his life for his sheep’ versus the wolf that ‘attacks and scatters the sheep.’ The contrast is vivid again today, in the saints who follow the Good Shepherd and the evil people who terrorize humanity as wolves. “Often, the wolves do not look like wolves at all. It is easy to spot a terrorist, but most moral degenerates can disguise themselves well.…Continue Reading

Bishops And Holiness

May 7, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Bishops And Holiness

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Seventh Sunday Of Easter (YR B) Readings: Acts 1:15-17, 20a, 20c-26 1 John 4:11-16 John 17:11b-19 In the first reading today, we hear about the election of St. Matthias into the company of the Twelve. However, when Peter speaks about the betrayal of Judas and the necessity of another taking his office, the word that is used in Greek is episcopate. In other words, it is the office of the bishop. This election demonstrates that the episcopal office is one of succession, but it also shows that there was a very early understanding of the hierarchical structure in the Church. This becomes a very important point for us to understand because today there are many people…Continue Reading

Archbishop Sartain’s Homily At Cardinal George’s Funeral . . . We Only Take With Us What We Have Given Away

May 6, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Archbishop Sartain’s Homily At Cardinal George’s Funeral . . . We Only Take With Us What We Have Given Away

(Editor’s Note: Below is the text of the homily that Archbishop J. Peter Sartain delivered at the April 23 funeral Mass for Francis Cardinal George, OMI, the retired archbishop of Chicago. Before Sartain was named archbishop of Seattle in 2010, he was the bishop of Joliet, Ill. (Cardinal George died April 17 at the age of 78, after fighting cancer for a number of years. (Archbishop Blase Cupich of Chicago — George’s successor — was the main celebrant for the April 23 Mass at Chicago’s Holy Name Cathedral. Nine cardinals and over 50 bishops, including the apostolic nuncio, Archbishop Carlo Viganò, concelebrated the Mass. (Cardinal George was the first archbishop of Chicago to retire from the office. He was also…Continue Reading

A Leaven In The World . . . Social Networks, Virtual Reality, And Trinitarian Love

May 4, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on A Leaven In The World . . . Social Networks, Virtual Reality, And Trinitarian Love

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK The omnipresent cell phone is blamed as often as it is praised. We like our cell phones for the convenience of reaching out to others by voice or text whenever we like as well as surfing the Internet and obtaining information and directions whenever we need them. Electronic devices of all kinds have become a welcome addition to our lives as we accomplish various tasks at work and at home. But, perhaps just as often, cell phones are blamed for the downside that comes with their ubiquity. We often hear stories of families together only in a physical sense for dinner or other occasions as one or more members pull out their cell phones to…Continue Reading

Did Jesus Christ Found A Church? If He Did, How Can She Be Identified?

May 3, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Did Jesus Christ Found A Church? If He Did, How Can She Be Identified?

By RAYMOND DE SOUZA, KM Part 4 The Church is holy. Sanctam: The ultimate goal of the Church is personal holiness, identification with Christ, as St. Paul says, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” (Gal. 2:20). It is not merely covering oneself with the Blood of Christ, and allowing the inside to remain sinful and morally rotten — like a snow-covered dunghill, as Luther suggested, or a whitewashed sepulcher. It is not the Church of saints alone, because the Founder came for sinners, for those who need a doctor. The Kingdom of God is like a fisherman who catches fish both good and bad; it has both wheat and chaff, both sheep and goats.…Continue Reading

The Mystery Of The Church

May 2, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on The Mystery Of The Church

By DON FIER The one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church, as the “convocation” of God’s people, was prefigured from the beginning when our first parents sinned and were promised a Redeemer. Her remote preparation began with the calling of our father in faith, Abraham, and her immediate preparation began with the election of the Chosen People of Israel, a sign of the future gathering of all nations. Providentially prepared for in the Old Testament, the Church was founded in the New Testament “by the words and actions of Jesus Christ, [was] fulfilled by his redeeming death and Resurrection, . . . [and] has been manifested as the mystery of salvation by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost” (Compendium…Continue Reading

Catholic Replies

May 1, 2015 Our Catholic Faith Comments Off on Catholic Replies

Editor’s Note: Writing in his blog (http://johnkippley.com) about the long-term consequences of dissent from Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae, John Kippley said that this dissent not only “entailed the rejection of the whole idea of natural law as the reasoned basis for Catholic moral teaching,” but it allowed Catholics to substitute personal preference for personal morality, which means that “‘anything goes’ if it’s mutually acceptable.” He went on to say: “The point is this. The intellectual acceptance of contraception entails the acceptance of the idea that modern man and woman can take apart what God has put together. What do I mean? Ask anyone who believes in God these two questions: 1) Who put together in one act…Continue Reading