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By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. ANGER AND OUR SOCIAL RELATIONS In his Letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul writes, If you are angry, let it be without sin. The sun must not go down on your wrath; do not give the devil a chance to work on you. These words are part of a larger […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. THE GOOD OF SENSATION Our sensitive appetite, that part of our nature that governs our physical feelings, directs our longing for the good things we lack. Our Catechism employs a very concrete example when it mentions our appetite’s turning us toward food when we are hungry, or toward warmth when […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. PRIDE REVISITED In our last reflection we considered the sin of Pride, which St. Gregory the Great named the father and foundation for all other sins. So fundamental was the place of pride in St. Gregory’s moral theology, he did not bother to number it among the Capital sins. Rather, […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. Our recent reflections have considered God’s commandments, as well as the immense gift He has extended to us in this Jubilee Year of Mercy. Our consideration of the commandments led us to reflect upon some specific actions which promote or obstruct our progress on the way to God’s kingdom; our […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. THE CORPORAL WORKS OF MERCY As we drew our last reflection to a close we identified the corporal works of mercy as feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, welcoming strangers, clothing the naked, healing the sick, and visiting the imprisoned. Some of these are doubtless beyond our capacity, […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. A JUBILEE YEAR On April 15 of this year Pope Francis announced an Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy, a Holy Year that will commence on the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, December 8, 2015 and draw to its close on the Solemnity of Christ the King, November 20, 2016. The year will […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. COMPLETING THE DECALOGUE In our last reflection we observed the Ninth and Tenth Commandments sound so similar – “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife…Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods” – we may wonder what distinguishes them. Concupiscence, which our Catechism defines as “…any intense form of human desire,” (CCC, No. 2515) is the distinguishing […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. The Ninth and Tenth Commandments sound so similar – “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife… Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods” – we may wonder what distinguishes them. Our theology teaches that concupiscence is the distinguishing characteristic. CONCUPISCIENCE In Latin, the word “concupiscence” means “to desire strongly,” and […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. BEYOND THE NEGATIVE PRECEPT As we have seen in our reflections on the fifth, sixth and seventh commandments, these precepts are presented as negative rules, but they urge us to embrace positive attitudes and actions in our relations toward one another. Our Baptism is a Baptism into Christ’s Body, the […]

By Father Reginald Martin, O.P. LOOKING PAST THE NEGATIVE In our last reflection we observed the necessity to look beyond the negative prohibition of the Sixth Commandment and recognize it as a practical illustration of the chaste social relations our Baptism establishes among God’s People and calls us to respect, cherish and nourish. We may […]