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Los Angeles, Calif., Nov 6, 2015 / 12:24 am (CNA).- The miraculous image of Our Lady of Guadalupe is centuries old and her message to St. Juan Diego has been translated into numerous languages over the years. Countless books have been written about the apparition, and the tilma itself has been intensely scrutinized by scientists. So what more can we learn about Our Lady of Guadalupe and her message? Plenty, says Supreme Knight Carl Anderson, who along with postulator for St. Juan Diego's cause for canonization, Msgr. Eduardo Chavez Sanchez, has produced the new documentary, "Guadalupe: The Miracle and the...

Archdiocese of Washington The Paradox of Poverty -- A Homily for the 32nd Sunday of the Year Msgr. Charles Pope • November 7, 2015 • The first reading in today's Mass, from 1st Kings, speaks to us of the paradox of poverty. And the paradox is this: it is often our poverty, our neediness, that provides a doorway for God to bless us with true riches. It is our emptiness that provides room for God to go to work.Yes, in our riches we have "too much to lose." To the rich and worldly minded, the Gospel seems too demanding. But...

In 1905, twelve years before Emperor Nicholas II’s abdication and three years from his own repose, St. John of Kronstadt, who had served as confessor to Nicholas II’s father Emperor Alexander III (r. 1881-94, d. 1894), spoke these prophetic words: We have a Tsar of righteous and pious life. God has sent a heavy cross of sufferings to him as to His chosen one and beloved child, as the seer of the destinies of God said: ‘Whom I love, those I reproach and punish’ (Rev. 3.19). If there is no repentance in the Russian people, the end of the world...

A higher calling The Bible doesn’t denigrate marriage; it acknowledges marriage can’t compare to the joy of heaven Msgr. Charles Pope 11/4/2015 Question: I cannot escape the conclusion that the Bible denigrates marriage. We are told by Paul by that we should live as though we had no spouse (1 Cor 7:29), and Jesus says that in heaven there will be no marriage. The Church also calls priesthood and religious life “higher callings.” What am I to make of all this negativity?— Joseph Harris, Washington, D.C. Answer: The solution is to understand the statements you reference in their wider context....

Brooklyn has just one saint, and his name is Raphael Hawaweeny. Stories from Our Advertisers He was not Catholic. Or of European descent. He was Syrian, and at the turn of the 20th century he helped build the Eastern Orthodox Church in this country. He founded a cathedral in Brooklyn’s Little Syria and crisscrossed the country tending his scattered flock. To the Orthodox, he is St. Raphael of Brooklyn (not to be confused with St. Raphael of Lesbos, martyred by the Turks in 1463). And on Friday night, the saint’s icon will be adorned with red and white flowers and...

Papyrus in the Rylands Library, Manchester UK One of the things that maddens and amuses me about Protestants is something called “primitivism”. I’ve written about it here. “Primitivism” is the ambition to return the church to the simplest form as it was in the “early church”. The little fundamentalist church in which I grew up worked on this assumption. They were going back to basics and getting rid of all those “man made traditions”. They were cutting out the denominations and prayers read out of books and all that fancy stuff and it would be just the Bible. Their idea...

Parables Aren’t Just Stories, Many Are Riddles – Here Are Two Msgr. Charles Pope • November 5, 2015 • To most of us, parables are stories told by Jesus to illustrate and clarify what He teaches. We have read the parables in the context of two thousand years of a tradition that interprets them in a certain way. But in their original context, parables are really more like riddles. The apostles noted that while Jesus would speak to the crowds in parables, when He retreated into the house with the apostles He would explain the meaning (cf Mat 13:36). Plain...

The Dormition of our Most Holy Lady Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary: After the Ascension of the Lord, the Mother of God remained in the care of the Apostle John the Theologian, and during his journeys She lived at the home of his parents, near the Mount of Olives. She was a source of consolation and edification both for the Apostles and for all the believers. Conversing with them, She told them about miraculous events: the Annunciation, the seedless and undefiled Conception of Christ born of Her, about His early childhood, and about His earthly life. Like the Apostles, She helped...

An interview with Matthew Cullinan Hoffman about his new translation of a treatise against sodomy, pederasty, and clerical corruption penned nearly a thousand years ago by a great reformer and Doctor of the ChurchPope Benedict XVI, in his September 9, 2009 general audience, noted that the Benedictine monk, cardinal, and Doctor of the Church, St. Peter Damian (1007-72), was "one of the most significant figures of the 11th century ... a monk, a lover of solitude and at the same time a fearless man of the Church, committed personally to the task of reform, initiated by the Popes of the...

Sinner, Please Don’t Let This Harvest Pass – God’s Plan to Save Us, as Seen in the Book of Malachi Msgr. Charles Pope • November 4, 2015 • In the posts of the past two days, we’ve looked at the sins of the priests and those of all the people. Clearly, we all have a lot on which to reflect.The prophets do not write merely to denounce, but rather to draw people back to the Lord, who alone can save them. Malachi is no exception.God wants His people to be ready for the Day of Judgment. That day is coming...

The Sins of God’s People As Stated in the Prophet Malachi Msgr. Charles Pope • November 3, 2015 • In yesterday’s post, we considered the sins of the priests (and they were numerous enough). Today we examine the sins of the people that the Lord sets forth in the Book of Malachi. Here, too, please understand that not everyone is guilty of all of these things. However, they are common human sins and sinful attitudes. So consider this inspired list (for it is from the Lord) and pray for conversion and repentance, for the picture here is all too familiar.I....

On Monday afternoon, the Israeli Antiquities Authority (IAA) sent a newsbrief to reporters in Jerusalem, calling for a press conference the following day to announce the “solution to one of the greatest questions in the history of Jerusalem.” Tuesday’s announcement did not disappoint: On site, in Jerusalem’s City of David, archaeologist Doron Ben-Ami announced that the famed Akra (citadel) of Antiochus Epiphanes had been discovered. Up until that announcement, little had been found testifying to the massive Hellenistic intrusion into the city early in the second century B.C. Yet here, at the northwestern portion of the City of David, a...

Bethlehem - for more than two years, one of the world's holiest churches has been undergoing restoration work. In this report, we would like to give a historical background about the wooden door and the mosaic covering the walls of the nave.The wooden doorsFrom the humility door, heads of believers and visitors bow down in reverence to the child in the manger. Just in front of the door, we face tall wooden doors that separate the narthex and the nave, covered through the centuries by layers of dust and smoke coming up from oil lamps. Now, the restoration comes and...

We all know where priceless ancient manuscripts should be found: somewhere remote, preferably a desert, and we need a good hiding place; caves are perfect. In terms of creating a stereotype, the Dead Sea Scrolls are the model case, followed by the ancient Christian and Gnostic texts found at Nag Hammadi, in Egypt, around the same time. Yet one of the greatest such discoveries in modern times broke all those rules, which might explain why it remains so thoroughly unknown outside quite a narrow specialist world. And we still are only beginning to come to terms with the implications.The...

Today is All Soul’s Day, in which Catholics pray for the faithful departed. And this practice of praying for the dead has clear Scriptural roots: it’s encouraged in 2 Maccabees 12:43-45. The only catch is that this citation comes from the Deuterocanon, the set of seven Books accepted as Scripture by Catholics but rejected by most Protestants (who tend to refer to these books, erroneously, as “Apocrypha”). It’s also in the Deuterocanon (specifically, 2 Maccabees 15:12-16) that we find the clearest example of praying to the Saints. We can go so far as to say that if Catholics are...

'It's a whole other world': religious pilgrims venture deep into Alaska forest Pilgrims from as far as Russia descend up the small town of Kodiak to honor a Russian Orthodox saint who lived and died in the archipelago centuries ago Celeste Englehardt has traveled all over the world to pray. A Russian Orthodox Christian from Washington, DC’s Virginia suburbs, Englehardt’s faith has taken her to Jerusalem, Ukraine, Moldova – even to the ruins of ancient Orthodox monasteries in Ireland. And now an island in Alaska’s Kodiak Archipelago is among the holy sites she has visited. “Sometimes you can’t describe things,”...

Sins of the Priests Msgr. Charles Pope • November 2, 2015 • The Book of the Prophet Malachi is set forth as a kind “riv” (a Hebrew word for a lawsuit, indictment, or controversy) by God. The Lord sets forth a legal case of sorts, which convicts ancient Israel of numerous deficiencies and calls for their repentance. The case that God presents shows a body of evidence that is just as true today as it was then. God has plenty to say and we have much to hear, much to repent of.I am going to examine the Book of the...

Despite having “stomach pains” at having to do it…the peaceful little town of 5,000 inhabitants who make their bread and butter from tourism and come together to put on the world-famous Passion Play of Christ will now accept 300 refugees in a vacant shopping building near the train station. Buchenwald, Dachau, youth hostels, churches have been turned over to the invading force. And now this. Nothing is sacred.Eight hours long, Oberammergau’s Passion Play is an epic performance that still attracts audiences from around the world. Passion Play (thanks to Faustina):The Oberammergau Passion Play was first performed in 1634 and...

Purgatory is Based on a Promise of Jesus’ Msgr. Charles Pope • November 1, 2015 • All Souls’ Day by Jakub Schikaneder, 1888I have blogged before on Purgatory. Here is a link to one of those blogs: Purgatory – Biblical and Reasonable. I have also written more extensively on its biblical roots here: PDF Document on Purgatory.On this Feast of All Souls, I want to reflect on Purgatory as the necessary result of a promise. Many people think of Purgatory primarily in terms of punishment, but it is also important to consider it in terms of promise, purity, and perfection....

Local prosecutors are investigating a pastor in Germany who referred to migrants as "predatory hordes" and claimed they were creating conditions that could trigger a civil war. The pastor of the Evangelical Free Church in Riedlingen, southwest Germany, spoke of an "illegal, sometimes even violent invasion" and said that German Chancellor Angela Merkel wanted to control the population through "civil war-like conditions". The Stuttgarter Zeitung reports that the pastor - who has not been named - said: "Jesus has definitely not said that we should let our land be plundered by invading predatory hordes." The mayor of Riedlingen, Marcus Schafft,...