Sir, we should like to see Jesus (Jn 12:21). “Of course we don’t mean we want to see him merely as one of the crowd; merely externally. What we should like, with your help, is to contemplate...

Some years before the Caldey conversion, Abbot Aelred Carlyle wrote his essay Our Purpose and Method. In that he passes on advice he himself once received: “Paint your picture in strong colours, keep it ever before you...

The Collect or Opening Prayer of today’s Mass is the one given in the Gelasian Sacramentary for the First Sunday of Lent. The Gelasian Sacramentary is a collection of Mass prayers, compiled some time around the...

Oh come to the water, all you who are thirsty! (Is 55:1) Water is such a commonplace element! It falls abundantly out of the sky; it rises up from the ground; it surrounds us in the sea; it fills our rivers and lakes; just now it clothes our landscape with a coverlet of snow: and all...

May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord let his face shine on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord uncover his face to you and bring you peace (Nb 6:24). It was Blessed Pope Paul VI who decreed that the Solemnity of Mary Mother of God would also be kept as a World Day of Prayer...

“The day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then with a roar the sky will vanish, the elements will catch fire and fall apart, the earth and all it contains will be burnt up.” A striking feature of prophecy in Holy Scripture is its tendency to pass back and forth between...

“When St. Andrew was brought to the place of his martyrdom and saw the Cross set up, while still some distance away, he began to cry out: ‘Salve crux pretiosa - Hail, precious Cross, consecrated by the Body of my Lord, and adorned

When the Son of Man comes in his glory, escorted by all the Angels, then he will take his seat on his throne of glory. Today’s Gospel, today’s feast, is full of paradox. We have just heard the most dramatic claim to Kingship, to...