Blogposts

The Sacred Heart and the Political Order

06-25-2023Weekly Reflection

Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, to which the entire month of June is consecrated, carries with it undoubtedly socio-political meanings which, although everything possible has been done in the last half century to condemn them to oblivion, are indelibly part of the history of this worship and are rooted in it. The worship of the Sacred Heart is a worship of adoration of the Lord Jesus with particular emphasis on his holy and true humanity, hence the hostility with which the Jansenists opposed it in the eighteenth century, considering it not very "spiritual" and even idolatrous.

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The Deadly Sin of Pride and Its Healing

06-18-2023Weekly Reflection

The nature of pride

Pride is a sin of the spirit, which in itself is less shameful and less degrading than sins of the flesh, but is much more serious than they (though they are also "mortal sins"[1]), since it distances us much more and diametrically from God (S. Th., I-II, q. 73, a. 5). Carnal sins are not found in the devil, who is a pure spirit and was damned by his pride, which prompted him to cry out "non serviam!" (“I will not serve!”) Divine Revelation very often repeats that pride is the principle of every other sin (Eccli., X, 15), since it excludes any true and healthy relationship with God, that is, the submission of the person created to the Creator. Therefore, it interrupts all our relationship with God and irreparably separates us from Him. Even original sin was a sin of pride (S. Th., I-II, q. 84, a. 2), that is, wanting to “be like God” (Gen., III, 5) and claiming for oneself the "knowledge of good and evil" (Gen., III, 6), in order to be able to rule himself without being submissive to anyone, not even to God.

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The Sacred Heart: the Warmth of God

06-11-2023Weekly ReflectionBlessed Rupert Mayer S.J., Apostle of Munich

And they looked on Him Whom they have pierced. John 19:37 Warmth must come from us, which puts people at ease in our presence, and they must sense that the reason for this lies in our union with God.
Christ the center of our lives, there can be no half-measures.

Blessed Rupert Mayer S.J., Apostle of Munich

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Why Communism/Socialism is harmful to the human person, and society

06-04-2023Weekly Reflection

Every question under discussion, every revolutionary idea and every conservative reaction—all boil down to the question, How should man be treated? … (W)e can only answer this in the light of our view of what man is. No society can be united, if it is not united about this fundamental question Society and Sanity (p. 9).

Catholics who wish to understand the Church’s teaching warning about the evil of communism ought to read the landmark encyclical of Pope Pius XI On Atheistic Communism. What is the attraction of communism today, not to mention socialism?

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