Tag Archive for virtue

Mercy Is Not Accidental

July 23, 2016 Intellectual Formation, Moral Action No comments

Mercy as it is here contemplated is said to be a virtue influencing one’s will to have compassion for, and, if possible, to alleviate another’s misfortune. It is the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas that although mercy is as it were the spontaneous product of charity, yet it is to be reckoned a special virtue adequately distinguishable from this latter. … Its motive is the misery which one discerns in another, particularly in so far as this condition is deemed to be, in some sense at least, involuntary. Obviously the necessity which is to be succoured can be either of body

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Chump Change

March 1, 2016 Intellectual Formation, Moral Action 3 comments

Is it finally official?  That short of divine intervention, this grand old republic is a goner?  It seems so.  Oh, we may continue our slow fade from world power into relative obscurity (may we join you, Great Britain?), or we may suffer a more catastrophic collapse (move over, Ceausescu), but the political rhetoric about restoring America’s greatness is more than ever form without substance.  Exhibit #1 (the only one we need, as it turns out), is Donald Trump’s candidacy.  It doesn’t matter whether he wins the Republican nomination or not, his status as Republican frontrunner this far down the pike

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Charity Is Hard

August 28, 2015 Intellectual Formation, Obedience No comments

“You don’t serve God by saying: the Church is ineffective, I’ll have none of it. Your pain at its lack of effectiveness is a sign of your nearness to God. We overcome this lack of effectiveness simply by suffering on account of it. To expect too much is to have a sentimental view of life and this is a softness that ends in bitterness. Charity is hard and endures. I don’t want to discourage you from reading St. Thomas but don’t read him with the notion that he is going to clear anything up for you. That is done by

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Sanctifying Your Work With The Angelus

August 14, 2015 General Interest No comments

Last Sunday, I heard a very inspiring homily focusing on the first reading, 1 Kings 19: 4-8. It really cut directly into my attitude as I was preparing to enter a second work week that was going to be totally devoted to meetings. I’m sure a lot of people can relate to weeks where from sunup Monday to close of business on Friday, you are sequestered with a group of colleagues in an overly cooled meeting room. During these events, I try not be thoroughly rude and actually pay attention when someone else is the presenter. Of course I pay

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Still Time to Write Good Things On the Sky

August 1, 2015 Intellectual Formation No comments

During a long road trip this past week, I had the opportunity to listen to an audiobook version of The Wise Men Know What Wicked Things Are Written on the Sky, a volume of eleven lectures by Russell Kirk, sponsored by the Heritage Foundation and given delivered in the 1980s. The theme of the lectures was whether, on the heels of President Reagan’s election, our country was conceivably at the beginning of an “augustan age” which would see us reclaim the ideals and virtues of our forefathers and our sense of mission in this world. These lectures were a followup to an earlier series

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“The Bubble” and the Escriva Option

July 25, 2015 General Interest No comments

As a Junto, we’ve talked about and around the issue of to what extent we should circle the wagons and protect our beautiful Catholic bubble in the face of a hostile culture, versus answer the call to live, suffer, and possibly die as missionaries, bringing the Gospel to that culture. This past week, author and scholar Brad Birzer shared this thought-provoking article from Crisis Magazine, contrasting what’s been called the “Benedict Option” with  the vision St. Josemaria Escriva. Though my interest in the good saint has not diminished since I began to learn about him a few years back, the article has rekindled

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The Third Way Regarding Same-Sex Attraction

April 26, 2015 Intellectual Formation, Moral Action No comments

Some time ago, a friend recommended I check out the video below as a possible tool for reaching out to Catholics who have a hard time understanding, accepting, or living the Church’s teachings on same-sex attraction. I am embarrassed to say it has been many months, but it was again brought to my attention this week. The film, entitled The Third Way: Homosexuality and the Catholic Church, is a little less than 40 minutes long and includes personal testimonies of Catholics who have struggled with same-sex attraction, both outside of the Church and its teachings and now, answering the call

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Wherein Lies Love of Family?

March 9, 2015 Moral Action No comments

He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me…. (Mt 10:37) If I say to the wicked, “You shall surely die,” and you give them no warning, or speak to warn the wicked from their wicked way, in order to save their life, those wicked persons shall die for their iniquity; but their blood I will require at your hand.  (Ez 3:18) I speak from limited personal experience, but it seems that few Catholics take these teachings seriously.  Last year, when my Catholic niece got married in a civil ceremony on a

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Faking It?

February 15, 2015 Moral Action, Obedience No comments

As Meddlesome hinted in his most recent post, there is no shortage of articles and posts addressing the many troubling and morally offensive aspects of 50 Shades of Grey (the movie and the book). I do not share the more detailed, gut-wrenching accounts of the movie and books due to the language and content used to illustrate their points — suffice it to say the both victims of domestic abuse and “kink” enthusiasts who are “into” that sort of thing agree that the relationship portrayed in Grey is disturbing and dangerous. I’m more interested in the issue raised by our recent discussion of the

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Part of ‘the Problem’:
Five Practical Questions

February 8, 2015 Obedience No comments

Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, [love] is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. — 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 Not long ago a sudden transition occurred in these pages which, thus far, has gone unremarked. On August 3, Spaniard wrote a brief post asking the question, “Is the Pope Catholic?” — and answering more or less in the

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