Episodes

  • January 13: Saint Hilary, Bishop and Doctor

    January 13: Saint Hilary, Bishop and Doctor
    Jan 13 2025
    January 13: Saint Hilary, Bishop and Doctor
    c. 310–c. 367
    Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White
    Patron Saint of lawyers

    A pagan discovers Christ, converts, and then suffers for Him

    Today’s saint was born a pagan, to pagans, in a pagan city. But his broad and deep education brought him into contact with Holy Scripture, where he found the truth he did not know he was seeking. He became a Catholic through reading. He was to then spend his adult life defending Catholic truth with his pen. The convert converted others and preserved the orthodoxy of the Nicene Creed against the Arian heresy. Saint Athanasius called Saint Hilary a “trumpet” of orthodoxy against theological error.

    Saint Hilary was elected the Bishop of Poitiers, France, about 350. His learning and intelligence placed him at the center of the violent theological battles of the fourth century. The Council of Nicea in 325 had left some theological definitions open to incorrect interpretation. A man named Arius caused immense confusion by just such misinterpretation. Arius argued that the words of the Nicene Creed meant that Jesus was less than God the Father, that Jesus had a beginning in time, and that Jesus was of like substance to the Father, not of the same substance. Saint Hilary was the first theologian from the West, as opposed to the more theologically mature theologians from Egypt, Asia Minor, and the Middle East, to see what a grave threat Arianism was.

    Saint Hilary spent the better part of his adult life studying, writing, and arguing to ensure that the Nicene Creed was understood and adhered to throughout the Church. He was even sent into exile by the Emperor for not conforming his views to Arian teachings. But he used his time in exile to read and write extensively, eventually becoming such a thorn in the side of the Emperor that he restored Hilary to his diocese. Saint Hilary went on to attend various synods of bishops in an effort to maintain the truth of the Nicene Creed against determined opposition at the highest levels.

    Hilary’s life proves that good theology matters. Bad theology easily leads to bad worship, bad morality, and the decline of true Christian community. To disrupt or correct bad theology is to disrupt or correct bad community. And it is sometimes the obligation of the Church to break up false ideas of the church, of marriage, of family, of government, etc. When certain things are built up, their opposites inevitably are broken up. Saint Hilary knew all of this. He knew that bad theology was not just bad in and of itself but that it also had negative repercussions in the lived reality of the Church. When Saint Hilary defended theological truth, he defended many other truths as well.

    Saint Hilary, through reading and study, you came to love the truths of the Catholic faith. Your love then showed itself in your willingness to suffer for that truth. Help us to know, love, and serve God by knowing, loving, and serving the instrument of His truth on earth—the Catholic Church.
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    4 mins
  • The Baptism of the Lord: Monday January 8, 2024

    The Baptism of the Lord: Monday January 8, 2024
    Jan 7 2024
    The Baptism of the Lord
    First Century; Sunday after January 6 or the Monday after the Epiphany
    Feast; Liturgical Color: White/Gold

    He humbly bowed His head as an example, not because He was imperfect Who would not want a doctor who, before he cuts, lifts his shirt a little, shows his own scar, and says to the patient, “I had the same. It’s going to be alright!” What soldier would not be just a little braver, stand a little taller, seeing medals for valor on his commander’s uniform? We want our heroes, our leaders, and our guides to lead through personal example. To have been there. To have done that. And we want our Savior to do the same. To empathize. To participate. To identify. To accompany. Actions resonate more than words.

    Our sinless God “became” sin, in the words of Saint Paul. Jesus identifies with sin but never sinned. Jesus carries sin but is not a sinner. Why? Because to become sin is to become man. In order for God to enter into human reality, He had to identify with all that sin entails. God wanted to stand with us shoulder to shoulder. He did not fake becoming man but really became man. And if God came to forgive sins and sinners, and to shed His blood for them on the cross, He had to bear the burden they bore yet retain His perfection.
    This is why our sinless God was baptized on today’s feast. God lays to the side His perfection and dignity and bows His head in the dirty waters of the Jordan River. He lined up with sinners to receive in humility what He did not need, to attend a school whose subjects He had mastered. Our God knew the value of empathy. He knew the power of example. And He knew that His ministry to mankind had to start not on a golden throne but in the mud with other men just trying to start again and again and again.

    The fullness of the Holy Trinity, first revealed subtly at the Annunciation, is present and spoken for at the Lord’s baptism. The Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, hovers. The voice of God the Father intones His favor over His Son. And the Son enters into the essential Christian pact with man—I will become like you so that you can become like me. Sins will be taken away through water and blood. I will suffer for your benefit. This is the promise. And the Church’s priests will carry on the baptizing, forgiving, and consecrating until the sun sets for the last time. God comes to us most intensely through the Sacraments. Jesus’ actions prove this.

    O Lord, You are not remote. You know sin but are not a sinner. Help us to renew our baptism through a frequent reception of confession and the Holy Eucharist. By receiving one, we strengthen the others. By receiving You, we receive God Himself.
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    4 mins
  • January 7: Saint Raymond of Peñafort, Priest

    January 7: Saint Raymond of Peñafort, Priest
    Jan 7 2024
    January 7: Saint Raymond of Peñafort, Priest
    c. 1175–1275
    Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White
    Patron Saint of canon lawyers and medical record librarians

    He wove scripture and the law into a harmonious tapestry

    Today’s saint lived numerous lives inside of his one hundred years on earth. He was an intellectual prodigy who was teaching university-level philosophy by the age of twenty and who took degrees in civil and canon law from the premier law university of the time—Bologna. While in Bologna, he likely came to know the founder of a new religious Order who had also moved there and who would later die there—Saint Dominic de Guzman. The example of the Dominicans led Father Raymond to exchange the diocesan priesthood for the Dominicans.

    Saint Raymond’s abilities and holiness were such that everyone seemed to want him in their service. Kings and Popes and Bishops and Orders all had plans on how to utilize him best. He was called to the Pope’s service to make the great contribution for which he is still known today, the organization of a huge compendium of Church law which served as the basic reference for canon lawyers until the early twentieth century. Exhausted by his three years of effort on this project, he returned in middle age to his native Barcelona.

    But his life of quiet and prayer did not last long. He was shocked to learn from Dominicans sent to him from Bologna that he had been elected the second successor to Saint Dominic as the Master General of the Dominican Order. He served his Order well and dutifully as Master General but not long. He resigned due to old age when he was 65. But there was still a lot of life left to live. Saint Raymond’s activities in his old age included efforts to try to convert the Muslims then occupying Spain, his rejection of an episcopal appointment, the establishment of theology and language schools dedicated to converting Muslims, and his probable personal encouragement of the young Thomas Aquinas to write an apologetic work directed at non-Catholics, the Summa contra Gentiles.

    Saint Raymond’s life shows an admirable synthesis of traditional piety and devotion, service to the Church, obedience to his superiors, love of theology, dedication to his Order, and respect and love for the law.

    To know, love, and follow the law is not contrary to charity. When kept, the law promotes charity and protects the weak, the poor, and the ignorant from being taken advantage of. It takes very smart and holy people to protect simple people and bad people from themselves. Saint Raymond was smart and holy. He laid his gifts at the altar of God, and God used those gifts splendidly.

    Saint Raymond, teach us to see the law of God and the law of the Church as one harmonious law meant to foster true communion among men and true communion between God and men. May God’s law be our law. And may the law never be an obstacle to true love and devotion.
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    4 mins
  • January 6: Saint André Bessette, Religious (Canada; U.S.A.)

    January 6: Saint André Bessette, Religious (Canada; U.S.A.)
    Jan 5 2024
    January 6: Saint André Bessette, Religious (Canada; U.S.A.)
    1845–1937
    Optional Memorial (Canada & U.S.A.); Liturgical Color: White
    Patron Saint of family caregivers

    He loved the Word of God, though he could not read

    Saint Paul teaches in his letter to the Romans that faith comes by hearing. It’s a good thing it doesn’t come only by reading. Until modern times, a relatively small percentage of the population has been able to read. Today’s saint had faith enough to move mountains, yet if he looked at the page of an open book, he saw only impenetrable symbols. André Bessette was functionally illiterate. His faith did not come by reading or study. It came by hearing, by watching, by praying, by listening, and by reflecting.

    As Catholics, we are not a people of the Book. We are a people of the Word. And that Word is an idea and a person long before it is a script. “In the beginning was the Word...and the Word became flesh,” Saint John’s Gospel begins. Our faith would live and thrive even if the Bible had never been compiled. The Church is a living Word. Saint André’s life witnesses to the primacy of the living Word over the written Word.

    Saint André was the eighth child born into a large and desperately poor family from Quebec, Canada. Alfred was his baptismal name. His father died in a logging accident and his mother of tuberculosis by the time he was 12. The many children had to be dispersed to friends and relatives. Our saint then spent the next thirteen years doing manual labor, including factory and farm work, throughout the Northeastern United States. After he had wandered enough, he wandered back home by age 25. His perceptive parish priest noted his generosity of spirit and deep faith. He recommended the young man to the Congregation of the Holy Cross in Montreal, sending Alfred to them with an almost unbelievably prophetic note stating: “I am sending you a saint.”

    Alfred took the name of this same parish priest, André, and after much difficulty was allowed to join the Congregation as a brother. He was given the unremarkable task of minding the door of a boys’ school, where he welcomed guests, delivered mail, and ran errands. But then something happened. And happened again. And then still again. Sick people who came to visit him were cured by his touch and his prayers. Brother André insisted it was God and Saint Joseph.
    Thus began a many decades-long ministry to the sick of Canada who sought out his healing touch.

    The lines of sick people became so long that he could no longer do his job at the school door. He attended to people all day long. He became famous for all the right reasons. He built a modest shrine to Saint Joseph on a hill. The shrine became very popular and grew until it became, and still is today, the most dominant structure in all of Montreal. Our saint did not live to see it completed. But he lived so long and so well that one million people filed past his casket when he died. He edified people not by his learning but by his healing and by the warm humanity that animated it.

    Saint André, you healed the sick and found time to attend to all who came to you. You encouraged those who sought you to confess their sins and to go to Mass. Intercede for all believers so that we see in Jesus our divine physician, healer of soul and body. Amen.
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    5 mins
  • The Epiphany of the Lord: January 5, 2025

    The Epiphany of the Lord: January 5, 2025
    Jan 5 2025
    January 6: The Epiphany of the Lord
    January 6 or the first Sunday after January 1 where this feast is not a Holy Day of Obligation
    Solemnity; Liturgical Color: White/Gold

    Catholicism did multiculturalism before anyone else

    The Feast of the Epiphany has traditionally been considered more theologically important than almost any other Feast Day, including Christmas. The early Christians had only Scripture, not the wealth of tradition we have today, to guide them in marking the great events of the life of Christ. So Holy Week and Easter, the Baptism of the Lord, Pentecost, and the Epiphany jumped off the pages of Scripture as great events which merited celebration. These few dates became fixed points on the calendar and were later surrounded over the centuries with numerous other feasts and saints’ days.

    Two lessons from the visit of the Magi are worth considering. The first is that the wise men’s gifts were given after Christmas. Many Catholic cultures preserve the ancient tradition of giving gifts on the Epiphany, not on Christmas itself. This tradition separates the birth of Christ from gift giving. When these two things—the birth of Christ and the giving of gifts—are collapsed into the same day, it causes some confusion of priorities, and the birth of Christ never wins. Waiting to exchange gifts until January 6 lets the Child God have the stage to Himself for a day. It makes people, especially children, wait—a rarity in the modern Western world. Postponing gift-giving until January 6 makes for a long, leisurely Christmas season and has the benefit of tradition and good theology as well.

    Another great lesson from the Magi is more theological—that a true religion must be true for everyone, not just for some people. Truth is not geographical. It climbs over borders. Truth by its nature conquers untruth. The Magi are the first non-Jews, or Gentiles, to worship Christ. They tell us that the mission field of Christ is the whole world, not just the Holy Land. The Church is forever bound, then, to teach, preach, and sanctify the world over.

    The Magi crack everything open. The true God and His Church must light a fire in Chinese souls, Arab souls, African souls, and South American souls. This may take until the end of time, but Christianity has time on its side. The Magi give personal testimony to the universality of the Church, one of its four marks. The Epiphany is the start of the multi-cultural, multi-lingual, multi-ethnic, and faith-united society that the Catholic Church envisions as the only source of true human unity. Catholicism started multiculturalism and diversity without sacrificing unity and truth.

    Balthasar, Caspar, and Melchior, your minds were prepared to receive a greater truth. You give an example of holy curiosity, of pilgrimage by light to light. When you discovered your treasure, you laid down your gifts in homage. May our search also find. May our pilgrimage also end in truth.
     
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    4 mins
  • January 4: Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, Religious (U.S.A.)

    January 4: Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, Religious (U.S.A.)
    Jan 4 2025
    January 4: Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, Religious (U.S.A.)
    1774–1821
    Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White
    Patron Saint of Catholic schools, widows, loss of parents

    She had it all, lost it all, and then found it all again

    In late 1803, Elizabeth Ann Seton, with her husband, left the United States for Italy, as a confident, high-born, wealthy, educated Yankee Protestant. She returned in June 1804, bankrupt, a widow, burning with love for the Holy Eucharist, tenderly devoted to Mary, and with the heart of a Roman Catholic. She was received into the Church the next year. Her upper-class friends and family abandoned her out of anti-Catholic spite.

    Our saint was an unexpected convert. She was, well into adulthood, a serious U.S. Episcopalian. She loved the Lord. She loved the Bible. She loved to serve the poor and the sick. Her excellent Episcopalian upbringing provided sufficient preparation for not being Episcopalian any longer. She took that faith as far as it could go. She probably never suspected her faith was lacking until she experienced the abundance of Catholicism.

    After her husband died of tuberculosis in Pisa Italy, Elizabeth and her daughter were taken in by family friends from nearby Livorno. In God’s providence, this Italian family lived their faith with relish. Elizabeth was not only consoled and cared for by them in her grief but also saw how engrossing their faith was. The longer she stayed in Italy, the more its Catholic atmosphere enveloped her. She wept at Italians’ natural devotion to Mary. She wondered at the beauty of a Corpus Christi procession through the narrow streets of her town. She understood the Holy Father’s link to the early Apostles with clarity. And so she came to see the gaps in her native religion. She hadn’t noticed them before. Having seen the real thing with her own eyes, she knew that she held a replica in her hands. The real presence of Christ in Catholicism is often understood only after a real absence is felt in non-Catholic Christianity.

    After her conversion, Elizabeth spent the rest of her short life dedicated to Catholic education. She started a Congregation of sisters in Maryland that taught girls, especially poor girls who could not afford an education. She was the first of tens of thousands of teaching sisters to operate Catholic schools in the United States. She is rightly considered in the United States as the foundress of Catholic parochial education. Besides her husband, she also lost two of her five children during her lifetime. She struggled, like all founders, to build up her Congregation. But her intelligence, charm, and drive paid off. Her Order thrived and thrives still. The Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul gather each year on this feast near her tomb inside an immense Basilica in Northern Maryland to thank God for their foundress, for a life so well lived.

    Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, help us overcome the alienation of family due to our religious convictions. Aid us in persevering through the hardships of illness and death, and give us the same zeal for souls that you showed toward your students, seeing in each one the image of God.
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    4 mins
  • January 3: The Most Holy Name of Jesus

    January 3: The Most Holy Name of Jesus
    Jan 2 2024
    January 3: The Most Holy Name of Jesus
    Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: White

    Names are powerful, and none is more powerful than Jesus

    Mary and Joseph did not sit across from each other at the kitchen table in the evenings debating a name for their child. They didn’t flip through the pages of a book of saints or bounce ideas off of their friends and family. The baby’s name was chosen for them by God Himself. They were just taking orders. The Archangel Gabriel announced to Mary, “And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus” (Lk 1:31). And Joseph had a dream in which the angel told him, "...you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins" (Mt 1:21). The Gospel of Luke further relates that “After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child; and he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb" (Lk 2:21). Jesus was named eight days after Christmas, January 3.

    The New Testament is filled with incidents where the name of Jesus is invoked to drive out devils, cure illnesses, and perform miracles. The Holy Name is explicitly exalted by Saint Paul: "...at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth" (Phil 2:10). Jesus reinforces the power of His own name in St. John’s Gospel: "...if you ask anything of the Father in my name, he will give it to you" (Jn 16:23).

    “Jesus” was the given name of the Son of Mary, while “Christ” was a title. “Christ” is the Greek form of the Hebrew “Messiah,” meaning the “Anointed One.” “Jesus the Christ” was the original formula for describing the Son of Mary. But over time, “The Christ” became simply “Christ,” as if it were His last name. The name of the God of the Old Testament was holy, not to be written out, nor to be casually spoken. Invoking “Yahweh” could be so egregious a sin as to provoke the tearing of the hearer’s shirt in protest and repentance. Jewish law on God’s holy name is enshrined in the second commandment: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord Thy God in vain.” This commandment prohibited the swearing of false oaths, that is, calling upon God as your witness and then making false statements. The opposite of a solemn oath is invoking the name of God to damn someone or something: a curse—the inversion of a blessing.

    Saint Bernardine of Siena, an electrifying Franciscan preacher of the early fifteenth century, was the saint who most spread devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus. He ingeniously depicted the Holy Name with the well-known monogram “IHS,” derived from the Greek letters forming the word “Jesus.” In the sixteenth century, the Jesuits built on this tradition and utilized the “IHS” to embellish their churches, even making it the emblem of their Society. The mother church of all Jesuit churches, in Rome, is officially named in honor of the Most Holy Name of Jesus, although its name is commonly shortened to simply “The Jesus.”

    There is raw power in the name Jesus. It makes polite company cringe. It divides families. It floats across the dinner table, letting everyone know exactly where you stand. A comfortable, vague euphemism like “the man upstairs” or “the big guy” just won’t do. “Jesus” does not convey an idea that everyone can interpret as they wish. It’s someone’s name. And that someone taught, suffered, died, rose from the dead, ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven.

    Some people don’t like their names and seek to legally change them or to use a nickname instead. Names convey meanings. “Thor” sounds like a mythical god carrying a hammer, “Vesuvius” sounds like a boiling volcano about to erupt, and a “ziggurat” sounds like a zig-zaggy desert temple. The name “Jesus” sounds like a God-man beyond reproach. A child, when once asked to define love, said that “when someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. Your name is safe in their mouth.” The Holy Name of Jesus should be safe in our mouths even when we’re not receiving Holy Communion.

    Son of Mary, may our same tongues that receive Your Holy Body and Blood prepare themselves for Your visit by saying Your Holy Name with great reverence. And may we not refrain from invoking that same Holy Name in our daily conversations with all whom we meet.
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    6 mins
  • January 2: Saints Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen, Bishops and Doctors

    January 2: Saints Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen, Bishops and Doctors
    Jan 2 2025
    January 2: Saints Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen, Bishops and Doctors
    St. Basil: 329–379; St. Gregory: c. 329–390
    Memorial; Liturgical Color: White
    Patron Saints of Russia, monks, hospital administrators, and poets

    Obvious truths are hard to explain, but smart theologians can explain them

    The persecution of the Church in the first few centuries, sometimes aggressive, more typically passive, starved her skinny biblical frame of nourishment. When the Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity in 313 A.D., the Church’s bones finally stretched, grew, and added muscle on muscle. Churches opened. Bishops preached. Schools taught. Theologians wrote. And, most significantly, Councils met. Three hundred years after Jesus Christ ascended into heaven, these large gatherings of bishops and theologians sought to end theological confusion, to settle thorny questions, and to establish a standard Christian doctrine. In the vast halls and churches of these councils, the great cast of theologians of the fourth century put their prodigious talents on full display. We commemorate two of the greatest of these bishops and theologians in today’s memorial.
    Saints Basil and Gregory lived so long ago, were so prolific, and played such crucial roles in so many areas of Church life, that they could each be remembered for any number of contributions to liturgy, theology, ecclesiology, Church history, monasticism, and even popular customs, especially in the Orthodox East. Yet perhaps their greatest contributions were as theologians who defined, fundamentally and decisively, what the word Trinity actually means; how Jesus is both fully God and fully man; and how the Holy Spirit is related to God the Father. Such definitions and distinctions may seem technical, abstract, or remote. But it is always the most obvious things—the most necessary things—that are the most difficult to explain. Why do things fall down instead of up? Why does the sun rise in the east instead of the west? Why are there seven days in a week instead of nine?
    The most fundamental doctrines of our faith, understood now as perennial, were not always perennial. They originated in the minds of certain people at certain times in certain places. To today’s saints we owe the decisive words that the Holy Spirit “proceeds” from the Father and the Son. These words fall simply and familiarly from our lips. But the word “proceeds” was the fruit of intense thought and prayer. The Father generated the Son, but the Holy Spirit “proceeds” from them both. Interesting. Dozens of millions of Catholics say reflexively every Sunday that the second Person of the Trinity is “consubstantial” with the Father. Not equal in origin. Not equal in role. But “consubstantial,” or equal in nature. Thank you, Saints Basil and Gregory! Thank you, great Bishops and Doctors of the early Church! Thank you for pulling aside the veil of mystery for a peek into the Godhead.
    Without the teachings of the fourth century on the Trinity and Christ, there would be no Christmas trees. Think about that. Why celebrate the Christ child if He were not God? But He is God. So carols are composed, mangers are set up, lights are hung, and gifts are exchanged. Culture happens, culture flourishes, when theology makes sense. Thank you, Saints Basil and Gregory, for… everything!

    O noble Bishops and Doctors Basil and Gregory, we ask for your continued intercession to enlighten our minds and to remove the dark shadows that cause confusion. Assist us to recognize that good theology understands God as He understands Himself. When you gave us good teaching, you gave us God. We seek nothing more.
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    5 mins