Tested

“Sometimes men are tested by pleasure, sometimes by distress or by physical suffering. By means of His prescriptions the Physician of souls administers the remedy according to the cause of the passions lying hidden in the soul.”

-St. Maximus the Confessor

Christ is Born - Χριστός Γεννάται - Xristos Genate - All Odes - 1st Tone

The Nativity

Happy Feast of the Nativity to all those who follow the Julian Calendar!

Christ is Born!  Glorify Him!

Well done, Younis Khan

With his century against Australia today, he is the only person who has achieved a century in all eleven test nations.


https://twitter.com/CricketAus/status/816889986486181888

The Correct Faith

“This expression, however, ‘the Word was made flesh’ [John 1:14], can mean nothing else but that he partook of flesh and blood like to us; he made our body his own, and came forth man from a woman, not casting off his existence as God, or his generation of God the Father, but even in taking to himself flesh remaining what he was. This the declaration of the correct faith proclaims everywhere. This was the sentiment of the holy Fathers; therefore they ventured to call the holy Virgin, the Mother of God, not as if the nature of the Word or his divinity had its beginning from the holy Virgin, but because of her was born that holy body with a rational soul, to which the Word, being personally united, is said to be born according to the flesh.”

-St. Cyril of Alexandria to Nestorius

On the Sacred Liturgy

"Such pronouncements usually reach only a few and the more learned among the faithful; feasts reach them all; the former speak but once, the latter speak every year - in fact, forever. The church's teaching affects the mind primarily; her feasts affect both mind and heart, and have a salutary effect upon the whole of man's nature. Man is composed of body and soul, and he needs these external festivities so that the sacred rites, in all their beauty and variety, may stimulate him to drink more deeply of the fountain of God's teaching, that he may make it a part of himself, and use it with profit for his spiritual life."

-Pope Pius XI, Quas Primas, #21

I have been thinking about these words especially since after Pius XI we lost many Octaves, Vigils, traditional Holy Week, the old classifications, etc...

Why do these things matter?  Are those who want to see the Roman liturgy in all of her glory simply wasting our energy on what may seem trivial to many.  No!  We are told in Matins of Corpus Christi that God became man so that men might become gods (St. Thomas).  We are supposed undergo the process of Theosis and the liturgy is the primary vehicle for this to occur.  When we engage in the Church's Sacred Rites, we give our hearts and souls to God so that a process of deification can occur.

This is why all of this matters.  This is why the work of restoration must go on.

Happy Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus!

Blissful

"Paradise! Paradise! Paradise! O, blessed are the disciplines, blissful the night-watches!  Blessed the penances, the self-will sacrificed!  O, the blessing of fasting, and acts of obedience!  How great is the blessing of religious life well lived!"

-St. Bernard of Corleone on his deathbed