Catholic Students Are Dynamite!
It’s Catholic Schools Week, and the Diocese of Sacramento has just released this great video celebrating Catholic students:
Author: Deacon Nick
The Faith that Banishes All Fear
In today’s gospel, the disciples wake Jesus up out of fear that they will perish at sea in their little boat. After calming the wind and water, Jesus asks them, “Why are you terrified? Do you not yet have faith?” It has been said that the most common phrase in the Bible is “Be not afraid.” In today’s meditation from Give Us This Day, Charles de Foucauld reminds us why: Complete freedom from fear is one of those things we owe wholly to Our Lord. To be afraid...
Open the Door and Let the Spirit Get to Work
Deacon Greg Kandra has a seemingly endless supply of inspiring, funny, and/or deeply spiritual videos to post on his blog The Deacon’s Bench. Here’s one he posted yesterday about a parish that’s using its prime location to great effect in evangelizing: Sometimes it’s that simple. God doesn’t need much from us–just a little–and once we’ve opened the door, the Spirit gets to work. Read the rest of the story at The Deacon’s Bench to find out what St. John’s is doing over Superbowl weekend.
St. Teresa of Avila’s Prayer for Peace of Soul
This resonated with me today: O Jesus! Who knows how much in Holy Scripture refers to peace of soul? Since, O my God, you have seen how important this peace is to us, incite Christians to strive to gain it. In your mercy do not deprive those on whom you have bestowed it, for until you have given them true peace and brought them to where it is unending, they must ever live in fear. As quoted in At the Still Point: A Literary Guide to Prayer in...
Hundreds Work Together to Create Unbelievable Fan-made Star Wars Movie
“Crowdsourcing: the practice of obtaining needed services, ideas or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people and especially from the online community rather than from traditional employees or suppliers.” – Merriam-Webster.com Made from the contributions of hundreds of people around the world, this version of Star Wars: A New Hope is a crowdsourced wonder:
Vocation in The Lord of the Rings
Though National Vocation Awareness Week has ended for this year, the working out or living out of our vocations goes on. Jeffrey Langan, Associate Professor at Notre Dame, delivers a fascinating lecture in which he uses Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings to illustrate the dynamic of vocation. Though he seems to be speaking mostly about the ordained or religious life, many of his remarks could also be applied to marriage and other vocations.
Who Will You Be This Day?
National Vocation Awareness Week ends this weekend, and today’s gospel meditation on John 1:35-42 by Rachel Subras in Give Us This Day fits the occasion well: You are called like Simon to leave aside your plans and go when summoned, to be beheld and known by God’s own, and be renamed. You do have a choice. You can retreat, take comfort in the familiar, and risk missing your calling. Or you can set out, take on the discomforts of the strange and the stranger, and live into, live up...
Leaf by Niggle: One of Tolkien’s Most Overlooked Works
Today is J.R.R. Tolkien’s 120th birthday. Known, of course, mainly for The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, one of his most under appreciated works is a gem of a short story called “Leaf by Niggle.” This simple story is a beautiful allegory for the creative life and for the transition into eternal life. Similar to C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce, “Leaf by Niggle” is much more subtle. It is also deeply spiritual and rooted in a solid Catholic theology of art and afterlife. “Leaf by Niggle” complements...
Relive Your Geek Past: Play Zork Online
One of the great things about being my age (which I will not say, but should not be hard to guess), is that many of the things I got teased about when I was geeky kid are cool now that I am a geeky adult. TV shows like Psych and Chuck make their money by appealing to lifelong geeks like me. Geeks are so cool now, you’d think everyone in my generation grew up reading Tolkien, programming TRS-80s, and playing Dungeons and Dragons. But I know better. There...
Mary: A Model of God’s Invitation to Shared Life and Sacrifice
How wonderful to open up the January issue of Give Us This Day and discover that the very first meditation of the new year is by my diocese’s very own Bishop Blase Cupich. Here is the conclusion of his meditation on this Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God: This blessed virgin agreed not only to give birth to the Son of the Most High God. She also consented to enter into a unique relationship with God, a relationship that is so intimate that only the bond between a...
The 10 Best Books I Read in 2011
2011 was a record year for me in terms of number of books read. I use Goodreads.com to keep track of my reading, and about this time last year Goodreads opened up the 2011 Reading Challenge. My goal for the year was 36 books, which was a slight increase over the past few years. I had read 31 books in both 2009 and 2010, and my previous high was 34 books in 2006. I felt fairly confident that I could read three books a month. Much to my...
Three Valuable Lessons from the Holy Family
Today’s Office of Readings provides a beautiful meditation from Pope Paul VI on this feast of the Holy Family. As Paul VI reflects, he recalls three things we can learn from Jesus’ upbringing: Silence First, we learn from its silence. If only we could once again appreciate its great value. We need this wonderful state of mind, beset as we are by the cacophony of strident protests and conflicting claims so characteristic of these turbulent times. The silence of Nazareth should teach us how to meditate in peace...
