"We are travellers…not yet in our native land" – St. Augustine
A couple of weeks ago I shared a quotation which is attributed to St. Francis de Sales and I thought given the events of the American Presidential election, it was time for another quotation…
“Never be in a hurry; do everything quietly and in a calm spirit. Do not lose your inner peace for anything whatsoever, even if your whole world seems upset.”
– St Francis de Sales
I’ve got a longer article in progress on the subject of abortion, but today’s post is an extremely short entry on a point I’ve been wanting to mention for some time…
Whenever you see an abortion debate, either in a formal setting or on Facebook, it’s not long before you hear someone, typically from the pro-choice side, talk about “fertilized eggs”. I only note this because I think it’s always worth pointing out that “fertilized egg” is something of a misnomer…
I say this because once an egg is fertilized, it ceases being an egg. It is now a new, distinct human organism. Calling it a “fertilized egg” is rather like referring to a man as a “married bachelor”. It’s nonsensical since, once married, a man ceases to be a bachelor. Likewise, we would never refer to someone being a “born fetus” because once the child is born it ceases to be a fetus.
That’s all for today 🙂
Today’s music is the Catholic classic, “O Sanctissima”:
O sanctissima, o piissima, dulcis Virgo Maria!
O most holy, o most loving, sweet Virgin Mary!
Mater amata, intemerata, ora, ora pro nobis.
Beloved Mother, undefiled, pray, pray for us.
Tu solatium et refugium, Virgo Mater Maria.
You are solace and refuge, Virgin, Mother Mary.
Quidquid optamus, per te speramus; ora, ora pro nobis.
Whatever we wish, we hope it through you; pray, pray for us.
Ecce debiles, perquam flebiles; salva nos, o Maria!
Look, we are weak and deeply deplorable; save us, o Mary!
Tolle languores, sana dolores; ora, ora pro nobis.
Take away our lassitude, heal our pains; pray, pray for us.
Virgo, respice, Mater, aspice; audi nos, o Maria!
Virgin, look at us, Mother, care for us; hear us, o Mary!
Tu medicinam portas divinam; ora, ora pro nobis.
You bring divine medicine; pray, pray for us.
I spent some time today planning my travels for the next few months and I was delighted to look in my calendar and remember that the West Coast Biblical Studies Conference is on the horizon!
The two-day conference is at the end of January (27th and 28th) in San Diego. Once again it is being held at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church, with the usual line-up of excellent speakers: Scott Hahn, John Bergsma, Michael Barber and John Kincaid. This year the focus will be on The Book of Acts: How the Holy Spirit leads the Church through hard times.
Tickets are $50, but if you buy yours before 15th December, the price is reduced to $40. If you’re coming from out-of-town, be sure to let me know!
Since getting back from Spain, I’ve been catching up on my blog reading. Today I read an article by Maggie Kim, published on her husband’s website PJK Music, which is entitled “I lost all my hair but found the meaning of beauty”:
In the article Maggie, who has a head of hair which would put a L’Oreal model to shame, explains that while she was pregnant with her second child, her hair started falling out. She describes how she struggled with this and how her beliefs concerning beauty were challenged as she came to terms with the fact that before the preganancy would be complete, she would have lost all her hair…
In the movie Back To The Future 2, Michael J Fox’s character, Marty, travels to the future to save his son. In so doing, Marty gets to experience the technological wonders of the year 2015. Among audiences, the most popular invention of this imagined future was, without a doubt, the hoverboard:
If only we had paid closer attention to the iconography of the Eastern Churches…
Now that I’ve finished the Camino, the most common question I hear is: what are you going to do now?
I still have a couple more weeks in England, but after that I will be flying back to the United States in time for Thanksgiving. I’m going to be based in San Diego but I’m planning to do a little more travelling. I don’t have the moniker of “Restless Pilgrim” for nothing…
I’m intending to travel around the States, seeing friends and revisiting some of my favourite cities, as well as exploring some of the places which have remained too long on my “To Do” list…
The goal of these trips isn’t simply to be a tourist. I will have to get a job again at some point, so I will be talking the opportunity to meet with local companies and possibly do some job interviews. However, the thing I’m really looking forward to is serving at local churches along the way.
In the past I’ve spoken at “Theology On Tap” (Example #1 | Example #2), led Bible studies and organized swing and salsa evenings. I’d love to make myself useful and offer my services in these areas, free-of-change, as I travel around the States. I don’t need a stipend or travel expenses.
So, if you’d like me to come to your parish, please forward this link to the relevant person at your parish and send me an email. It could be at Diocese Young Adult event. It could be at a parish mission or at your parish’s Bible Study or discussion group. Let me know where you are in the States, and I’ll do my best to make sure that I can be in your part of the country at the right time! References are available upon request.
Mass Appeal: The Liturgy is the greatest thing ever!
Do you find Mass dull? In this talk I explain why the Mass is amazing and what you can do to get more out of it.
Social Media & Your Soul
How can we use Social Media and the Internet without being used by them?
How I met your (Blessed) Mother (Listen)
I will be talking about how I came to know Mary, even after years of struggling with the Church’s teaching on the Blessed Mother. In this talk I will be offering some suggestions on how we might grow in our love for Mary and come to understand her role in Salvation History more deeply.
Catholics Come Home: Drawing the lapsed back to the Church
Based on a previous blog series, here I tell a little bit of my own story and discuss what you might do to try and draw people back to the Church.
Evangelization for the terrified (Listen here)
Jesus told his disciples to go out to the whole world and share the Good News. If it’s “Good News”, why does that seem so scary?! In this talk I explain why we shouldn’t be shared of doing evangelization and give some very practical tools for speaking to your friends and family about the Faith.
Apologetics for the confused
What do you say when someone asks you why you’re Catholic? In this talk I go through a few key principles to employ when being called upon to defend what you believe.
Knock, knock. Who’s there?
What do you do when a Jehovah Witness or Mormon comes to your door? Over the course of this talk, I explain the origins of these groups and give some guidance on how to speak with them in a constructive way.
No God but God: An introduction to Islam
Approximately 23% of the world’s population identify as Muslim, but many Christians know relatively little about Islam. In this talk I provide an overview of the religion, as well as its similarities and dissimilarities to Catholicism.
The Worship of the Early Church (Listen here)
What did the first Christians do when they gathered together? If you could travel back in time to the end of the First Century and attend a Christian gathering, would you feel out-of-place?
Was the Early Church Catholic?
I’ll trace the roots of Catholic thought, theology and practice in the first few centuries of Christianity.
Blood & Ink: How the Early Church conquered the world (Listen here)
How did a small Jewish sect, started in the First Century, whose founder was publicly executed, manage to conquer the might of the Roman Empire? In this talk, I explain how the first Christians witnessed to Jesus both in their writing, lives and martyrdom, thereby winning the world for Christ.
Solving today’s problems with ancient wisdom
In this talk, I look at how the problems which face the Church today can be addressed using the wisdom of the first Christians, the Early Church Fathers.
Mary and the Early Church
Come to appreciate the Mother of God through the witness of the Early Church.
Women in the Early Church
We often hear about the Church Fathers, but were there mothers too? In this talk I look at the lives of some of the most important female figures in the Early Church.
Reading Sacred Scripture for all its worth (Listen here)
How do Catholics read the Bible? What can you do to get the more out of Scripture at Mass? If you want to grow more familiar with the Biblical texts, where do you start?
Big Picture Bible: Salvation History in 60 minutes
If someone asked you to explain the overarching story of the Bible, what would you say? In the space of an hour I run through the story of salvation history and help give a framework for making sense of individual stories.
Hidden Treasure: How the Old Testament is unveiled in the New (Listen here)
This is an exploration of “Biblical Typology”, the way of reading Scripture which was developed by the Early Church Fathers, seeing in the Old Testament foreshadowings of the events of Christ, His Mother and the Kingdom of Heaven.
References are available on request