Commemoration of Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr, 1012 So long as we are full of self, we are shocked read more

Commemoration of Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr, 1012 So long as we are full of self, we are shocked at the faults of others. Let us think often of our own sin, and we shall be lenient to the sins of others.

Feast of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Teacher, Martyr, 1945 During the last year or so, I have come to appreciate the read more

Feast of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Teacher, Martyr, 1945 During the last year or so, I have come to appreciate the "worldliness" of Christianity as never before. The Christian is not a homo religiosus but a man, pure and simple, just as Jesus became man... It is only by living completely in this world that one learns to believe. One must abandon every attempt to make something of oneself, whether it be a saint, a converted sinner, a churchman, a righteous man, or an unrighteous one, a sick man or a healthy one... This is what I mean by worldliness -- taking life in one's stride, with all its duties and problems, its successes and failures, its experiences and helplessness... How can success make us arrogant or failure lead us astray, when we participate in the sufferings of God by living in this world?

Commemoration of Wulfstan, Bishop of Worcester, 1095 As for the miseries and sins he heard of daily in read more

Commemoration of Wulfstan, Bishop of Worcester, 1095 As for the miseries and sins he heard of daily in the world, he was so far from wondering at them that, on the contrary, he was surprised that there were not more, considering the malice sinners were capable of... For his part, he prayed for them: but, knowing that God could remedy the mischiefs they did, when He pleased, he gave himself no further trouble.

Feast of Oscar Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador, Martyr, 1980 Commemoration of Paul Couturier, Priest, Ecumenist, 1953 Clear shining read more

Feast of Oscar Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador, Martyr, 1980 Commemoration of Paul Couturier, Priest, Ecumenist, 1953 Clear shining from God must be at the bottom of deep labouring with God. What is the reason that so many in our days set their hands to the plough, and looked back again? -- begin to serve Providence in great things, but cannot finish? -- give over in the heat of the day? They never had any such revelation of the mind of God upon their spirits, such a discovery of His excellence, as might serve for a bottom of such undertakings.

Continuing a short series on education: What are the gifts of biblical faith to the secular university? Education read more

Continuing a short series on education: What are the gifts of biblical faith to the secular university? Education can receive from the Bible a faith concerning man far more realistic than the naive faith by which education has tried to live. Not man as "pure reason": his reason is not pure. Not man as incipient angel: he can turn any structure... to good or to demonic purpose. Not man with his steps on the highroad called evolution: he is relatively free and, therefore, can and does wreck any evolution unless some Grace constantly renews his onward journey. Not man who by his science is sure to fashion a "brave new world"; by science he can destroy the world. Not man as centrally and characteristically a reasonable creature who needs only that his mind shall be educated to build a reasonable world. Not man regarded in any naive faith, but man as potentially divine and potentially unworthy, who stands always in need of help from beyond the confines of the natural order. If education confronts this faith, education will know that the mind's adventure also, like all things human, stands in need of redemption; and it can then proceed with lowliness, and thus with the power and light which are the reward of the lowly.

Feast of Janani Luwum, Archbishop of Uganda, Martyr, 1977 Continued from yesterday: He, then, whose action is governed by read more

Feast of Janani Luwum, Archbishop of Uganda, Martyr, 1977 Continued from yesterday: He, then, whose action is governed by mere desire is not free to attain the satisfaction which alone gives meaning to that desire. There is no breaking through this law of our being. Every attempt to do so proves itself in experience to be futile. Hence we are in a more helpless state of bondage than that which materialistic determinism holds; for the tyrant is established within our own consciousness. One way, and one way only, out of this bondage remains. If we can discover how to make our own immediate desire, and the act of will springing out of it, accord with the supreme law of our being, then to "do as we like" will no longer be to run our heads against the stone wall of necessity which shuts us out from the heaven of satisfaction. For we shall only "like" doing what we "ought". This introduces a new sense of the word "freedom". It does not now mean freedom from restrains to follow our desires, but freedom from the tyranny of futile desires to follow what is really good. (Continued tomorrow).

Let us not forget the humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us not think of it vaguely, and fall read more

Let us not forget the humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us not think of it vaguely, and fall into the heretical fancy that the Son of God became man merely to transact certain things which were necessary to secure the salvation of men, and that after this object was achieved His human nature recedes into the background and impenetrable obscurity. No, it is not so; all-important as His work on earth was -- the only foundation of our hope and blessedness -- let us adore the revealed mystery that God gave us His Son, never to recall Him, as it were, and take Him away from us; He spared Him not and gave Him to us, allowing Him to become man, exalting Him as the Son of Man, enthroning Him because of his obedience unto death, and giving unto Him as the Son of Man all power in heaven and earth.

Commemoration of Felix, Bishop, Apostle to the East Angles, 647 [May] the Lord lead further and further those who read more

Commemoration of Felix, Bishop, Apostle to the East Angles, 647 [May] the Lord lead further and further those who do in earnest want to live the Joshua [i.e., transformed] life. It means a daily dying to self and what self wants; a daily turning to our Master with a "Yes, Lord" to everything, even to what is most against the grain. May He quicken those who have not yet begun to live this life to see what they are missing, before it is too late.

Feast of Joseph of Nazareth Continuing a Lenten series on prayer: Jeremy Taylor gives us some fundamental rules for read more

Feast of Joseph of Nazareth Continuing a Lenten series on prayer: Jeremy Taylor gives us some fundamental rules for prayer. And the chief of them is this: "Do not lie to God." And that curt piece of advice, so bluntly thrown down for us, is indeed all-important. Do not burn false fire upon God's altar; do not pose and pretend, either to Him or to yourself, in your religious exercises; do not say more than you mean, or use exagerated language that goes beyond the facts, when speaking to Him whose word is truth.