Catechesis

What’s the Church’s teaching on reincarnation?

A listener wrote in to The Cale Clarke Show to ask Cale about the concept of reincarnation. He said that he knows that the Catholic Church teaches that reincarnation does not exist, but he heard that it was in scripture and then later removed from canon at the Council of Nicaea. Is there any truth...Continue reading→

Embracing the Power of Forgiveness

Pope Francis reminds us of the importance of forgiving others: Jesus does not say, “Blessed are those who plot revenge.” He calls “blessed” those who forgive and do so “seventy times seven” (Matthew 18:22). We need to think of ourselves as an army of the forgiven. All of us have been looked upon with divine...Continue reading→

Love is Not Boastful

Precepts of the Church (CCC 2042) 1: Attend Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation. 2: Confess your sins at least once a year. 3: Go to Communion at least once a year during Easter season. 4: Keep holy Sundays and holy days of obligation. 5: Observe the prescribed days of fasting and abstinence....Continue reading→

Love is Meek

Blessed are the meek… because “love is patient” (makrothyméi). Pope Francis links this assertion of 1 Corinthians 13 to God’s meekness and mercy: Makrothyméi… [is] the Greek translation of the Old Testament, where we read that God is “slow to anger” (Exodus 34:6; Numbers 14:18). It refers, then, to the quality of one who does...Continue reading→

Hungering for the Lord’s Day

Hungering for the Lord’s Day Holiness is a right relationship with God: “Be holy; for I the LORD am holy” (Leviticus 20:26). Our hunger and thirst for righteousness makes us hunger and thirst for God and for keeping his special Day holy, thus fulfilling the Third Commandment. Think: if you love your mother, wouldn’t you...Continue reading→

How long should your confession be?

Many of us have been there: Standing in the confession line, waiting our turn, wondering what’s taking the people in front of us so long to confess their sins. It should go without saying that situations like this are no excuse to become impatient or angry at anybody, but frustration and confusion are perfectly natural...Continue reading→

The Trolley Car Dilemma

Have you ever heard of the “Trolley Car” dilemma? On The Patrick Madrid Show, Patrick discussed this hypothetical quandary in the context of choosing who lives and who dies, and he tied it to the decision to drop the nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The Trolley Dilemma is a 2014 moral problem...Continue reading→

Thirsting for Justice and Virtue: Commandments 1 and 3

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied (Matthew 5:6). In Sacred Scripture justice or righteousness are essentially religious notions, like the biblical notion of holiness. As God says: the “righteous shall live by faith” (Hebrews 10:38, quoting Habakkuk 2:4), and “without faith it is impossible to please” God...Continue reading→

Rebuild My Church

If your family or children participated in an All Saints Day celebration chances are you would have seen a few children donned in long brown robes with a white rope tied about their waist. St. Francis’ love of nature and animals captivates the hearts of many children, including my own son. The young love to...Continue reading→

Meek Love Bears All Things

St. Paul says: “Love bears all things” (panta stégei). Christian meekness means “more than simply putting up with evil… [or] holding one’s peace… It implies limiting judgment, checking the impulse to issue a firm and ruthless condemnation: Judge not and you will not be judged (Luke 6:37)” (Amoris Lætitia 112). For condemning others is the...Continue reading→

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