Aflame for Christ

A monstrance is a golden vessel with a clear center meant to make God visible to the world. So it is with Christ - He is a window into the divine. But every Christian is called to become like a monstrance - a vessel with Christ at the center, revealing Him to the world.

Joseph is the quiet, little-known member of the Holy Family. Yet his virtues shine brightly as a witness to all Christians: virtues such as mercy, reverential awe, embracing his vocation, and prompt obedience. Hear how his example is worth meditating on for every Christian!

Every man is created in the image and likeness of God, Who is strength. As such, he is called to use his strength for laying down his life. Our world is full of men who are aggressive or passive, but strength is something different - it is an ability to protect, lead, defend, and provide for those under us - especially in the spiritual realm against the Evil One and sin.

The Christian Life lives between two feasts - the Feast of the Eucharist, commemorating the great work of our Redemption, and the Wedding Feast of the Lamb, when God returns victorious to destroy sin and death forever. Advent straddles both feasts - helping us celebrate what God has already done and looking forward to what God will do when He comes again in majesty!

An ancient and beloved prayed to Our Lady is the "Salve Regina" ("Hail, Holy Queen"). We pray it at the end of the Rosary and sing it at the end of the Liturgy of the Hours. But where does it come from? Who wrote it, and how is it borne out of tragedy - and still a prayer of hope and glory? Tune in to find out more about this powerful prayer!

We live in enemy-occupied territory - the Evil One has oppressed and enslaved us since the beginning of time. But a rescue mission is afoot - a Man has come in disguise, behind enemy lines, to rescue us by dying in our stead. Advent celebrates the beginning of this great sabotage, where our Enemy is defeated by his own tactics (by death), leading to our great liberation!

St. Jude lived a unique, unrepeatable life with both blessings and challenges: an Apostle, a missionary, a martyr. Your life, too, is unique and unrepeatable. As much as we may look at others with envy, we ought to embrace our own unique path to holiness and find God's Hand in both the blessings and the challenges - for we have an unrepeatable role to play in the Kingdom!

How quickly does the glamour and pride of the world vanish! All the vanity, the riches, the fame of the world means nothing in light of eternity. This is a truth that should be pondered frequently by Christians: how the world as we know it is passing away.

Why do we build beautiful churches? Is it necessary since God is everywhere...and after all, shouldn't the Church be poor and simple? Ah, but beautiful Churches are important - they are a visual demonstration of our Faith, a foretaste of Heaven, and a powerful recognition that it houses God Almighty in the Holy Eucharist. Beautiful Churches glorify God, make incarnate our love for Him, and help us desire to be with Him!

November is the month dedicated to praying for all the holy souls in Purgatory. But what is Purgatory? Is it in the Bible? Why is it a great act of God's love? And how can we help the souls - and ourselves - with this difficult but graced time in the afterlife? All the questions you ever wanted to know about Purgatory!

All of us need friends. But the deepest kind of friendship, according to Aristotle, is the friendship of virtue - seeking holiness together. This means that our first and primary friendship must be with Jesus Christ, Who has already called us "friends"!

It is a great thing for God to perform a healing miracle for us. But it is an infinitely more important thing for God to heal our souls of sin, and give us spiritual health (aka holiness). Sometimes God will not do the physical miracle we want, because instead He wants to make us holy through our sufferings. Trust Him, whether we receive the gift we want or not, because He will always give us the graces we need.

"I love my faith," people say. But what to they mean by faith? Rituals and sentiment? The Catechism is clear on what faith means: believing in God, trusting His promises, and believing all He has revealed in Scripture and through His Church. All three are necessary if we are to have the saving faith that makes us pleasing to God!

Our media thrives on outrage. Most of it is silly, but outrage and anger are actually the proper responses to injustice in the world. Christians need to use healthy anger and outrage to motivate them both to prayer and to action.

Once Christ has changed our life, what is our response to the power of the Cross? Living the disciplines of discipleship - prayer, virtue, service and sacrifice, and offering our life to the Lord!

This feast celebrates when St. Helen discovered the Cross of Christ in the early 300s. But more than that, it celebrates all that Christ's Cross has done for us: paying back the debt we owed God but were unable to pay; showing us the depths of God's love for us; teaching us how to love; and giving meaning to our suffering and death. Blessed be the Holy Cross of Christ!

St. Paul discusses slavery in today's second reading. Although the Church has always officially been against slavery, sadly it is all too prevalent in today's world - both physical slavery and human trafficking, and also the spiritual slavery of addictions. How can we do our part to experience the freedom Christ has won for us, and help others do the same?

The virtue that God loves the most is humility, because it mirrors His own economy of salvation - a God Who humbled Himself to become man and die for us can only be received by people who are humble enough to accept Him. He continues to come to us in the Eucharist, a hidden humility to lift up the lowly!