Thoughts for the Day

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Lent Will Soon Be Upon Us!

Very shortly, it will be Lent! This is a much-needed time to summon all of the generosity we can muster and to make extra efforts to remove our “moral flab” and to “scrape the barnacles” of sin and bad habits off of the “hull” of our soul.

We need to do much penance in order to save our souls. This is true throughout the year but especially during Lent. The Devil is behind the modern elimination of virtually all requirements of fasting and abstaining.

This is not the time to do the minimum! Catholic Candle recommends that you use the pre-Vatican II rules for fasting and abstinence which are found here: https://catholiccandle.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Traditional-Rules-for-Fast-Abstinance.pdf

Let us not be stingy with God! He is never outdone in generosity!

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Words to Live By – From Catholic Tradition

Our Life on Earth is Warfare!
We Must Fight Tirelessly for Christ the King!

Nothing is so incongruous in a Christian, and nothing so foreign to his character, as to seek ease and rest. To be engrossed in the present life is foreign to our profession and enlistment [as Soldiers of Christ]. Thy Master was crucified, and dost thou seek ease? Thy Master was pierced with nails, and dost thou live delicately? Do these things become a noble soldier?

St. John Chrysostom, Doctor of the Church, quoted from his sermon #13 on Philippians, 3:18-21 (bracketed words added to show the context).

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Words to Live By – From Catholic Tradition

If We Wish to Choose Christ,
Then We Must Wish to Receive the Hatred of the World

A person refuses to be in the Mystical Body of Christ if he does not wish to receive, along with Christ our Head, the hatred of the world. We ought to patiently receive the hatred of the world out of the love for Christ. For it is necessary for the world to hate us because we resolve to reject what the world loves.

St. Thomas Aquinas, Greatest Doctor of the Church, Quoting St. Augustine, Doctor of the Church, in the Catena Aurea on St. John’s Gospel, ch.15, §5.

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Words to Live By – From Catholic Tradition

Spiritual Blindness Characterizes Our Times – Let Us Beware!

The sin of impurity brings with it blindness and obstinacy. Every vice produces darkness of understanding; but impurity produces it in a greater degree than all other sins.

St. Alphonsus de Liguori Sermon 45 – 16th Sunday after Pentecost – On Impurity, Point 1, section 2.

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

We Must Have Self-knowledge!

He who knows himself well is mean in his own eyes and is not delighted with being praised by men.

My Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, (c)1982, Confraternity of the Precious Blood, 5300 Fort Hamilton Parkway, Brooklyn, N.Y. 11219, Bk.1 ch.2.

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

Let Us Be Manly Men!

The crisis in society and in the human element of the Church is principally caused by men much more than women or children. Men are the evil “fathers” of feminism and each of the principal evils of civil society and of the human element of the Catholic Church.

God made men to lead society, much more by their greater strength of mind than by their greater strength of body. Here is one way Catholic Candle stated this fact in the past:

A manly man must not be selfish, nor carried away by his emotions or passions. He must control himself and always live according to his reason. That is why a man can be a manly man and can show the truth of manliness even when he is 106 years old and is wheelchair-bound.1

Here is how St. John Chrysostom, Doctor of the Church, teaches this same truth:

Because we have strength of body, we are not therefore manly men. For he alone hath this virtue [viz., manliness] –yes, though he be confined to his bed — whose strength is from within; since without this, though a man should tear-up a mountain by his strength of body, I would call him nothing stronger than a girl.2

1 Quoted from: The Crisis in Society is Caused by Unmanly Men, which can be found here: https://catholiccandle.org/2024/07/22/the-crisis-in-society-is-caused-by-unmanly-men/


2 St. John Chrysostom, on the Epistle for the Feast of St. Lawrence, part of sermon 19 on 2nd Cor. 9:6-9 (bracketed words added to show context).


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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

 

Whenever We Complain We Offend God, Harm Our Souls, and Scandalize Our Neighbor

 

St. John of the Cross, great Mystical Doctor, reminds us to never complain.  Here are his words:

 

Anyone who complains or grumbles is not perfect,
nor is he even a good Christian.


Words of St. John of the Cross, quoted from his work called Other Counsels, #4.

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

 

Bad leaders in the Church and in Society are a Punishment for Sin

 

We are suffering from bad leaders in the Church and civil society as Divine retribution for the sins of people in the human element of the Church and in civil society. 

 

Here is one way that St. Thomas Aquinas, greatest Doctor of the Church, teaches this truth:

 

To deserve to secure from God the blessing of a good ruler, the people must desist from sin, for it is by Divine permission that wicked men receive power to rule as a punishment for sin, as the Lord says by the Prophet Osee [13:11]: “I will give you a king in my wrath” and it is said in Job [34:30] that he “makes a man that is a hypocrite to reign for the sins of the people.” Sin must therefore be done away with in order that the scourge of tyrants may cease.

 

St. Thomas, On Kingship, ch.7 (emphasis added).

 

Catholic Candle note: Of course, the fact that God punishes people for their sins by giving them bad rulers, does not exonerate those bad rulers from their own culpability for their sins.  God is merely using the sins of bad rulers as a tool to punish the sins of the people.

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

We Must Live According to Reason – Not According to Inclination

Here is the teaching of St. John of the Cross, the Mystical Doctor of the Church:

Blessed is he who, setting aside his own liking and inclination, considers things according to reason and justice before doing them.


Quoted from his work, Prayer Of A Soul Taken With Love, #42.


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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

We Must Never, Ever Tell a Lie

To tell a lie is always evil and sinful.  No end ever justifies a sinful means.  Even if we were to suppose that a person had the very highest of all motives – which is to promote the glory of God – that would still never justify a lie.

Here is the very striking way in which St. Thomas Aquinas, greatest Doctor of the Catholic Church, teaches this truth:

A lie must be shunned to such an extent that, even if it seemed that the lie would increase the glory of God, we should still not tell a lie.[1]

Let us consider an example:  Suppose a pagan were on his deathbed with only minutes to live.  Suppose also that we happen to know that he would convert to the Catholic Faith and agree to baptism if we were to tell him a small (so-called) “harmless” lie, such as that the dog he loved would go to heaven.  We can never justify even such a (so-called) “white” lie even to save his soul.


[1]           Here is the Latin:

Adeo enim vitanda sunt mendacia, ut etiam si cedere videantur ad landem Dei, non sunt dicenda.

St. Thomas Aquinas’ Lectures on St. John’s Gospel, ch.13, lecture #3, section #1776.

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

 

Let Us Be Always Faithful to Our Faithful Divine Friend!

 

Concerning Our Lord Jesus Christ, My Imitation of Christ urges us in these words:

 

Love Him and keep Him for thy Friend, Who, when all go away, will not leave thee nor suffer thee to perish in the end.

 

My Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, (c)1982, Confraternity of the Precious Blood, 5300 Fort Hamilton Parkway, Brooklyn, N.Y. 11219, Bk.2 ch.7.                                                                          

 

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

 

Let Us Fight Darkness of Mind by Fighting Self-Indulgence!

 

Nothing so darkens the mind as being made soft by earthly things.

 

St. Thomas Aquinas, greatest Doctor of the Catholic Church, quoting St. John Chrysostom, Doctor of the Church, in The Catena Aurea on St. John’s Gospel, on Ch. 1, v.10.

 

 

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

 

Let Us Not Be Self-Indulgent and Impulsive!

 

Blessed is he who, setting aside his own liking and inclination, considers things according to reason and justice before doing them.

 

Quoted from Prayer Of A Soul Taken With Love, #42, by St. John Of The Cross, Mystical Doctor of the Church

 

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Words to Live by – from Catholic Tradition

 

The Mystical Doctor of the Catholic Church reminds us that God Protects Us during the Darkness of our Times.

 

Words of St. John of the Cross:

 

Live in Faith and Hope even though you are in darkness, because it is in these darknesses that God protects your soul.  Cast your care upon God, for He watches over you and will not forget you.  Do not think that He leaves you alone; that would be an affront to Him.

 

St. John of the Cross in a letter to a Discalced Carmelite nun shortly before Pentecost, 1590.