“A common soldier dies without fear; Jesus died afraid.” Iris Murdoch wrote those words which, I believe, help expose an over-simplistic notion we have of how faith reacts in the face of death. There’s a popular notion that believes that if we have strong faith we should not suffer any undue fear in the face

I recently learned how to offer Mass in the Extraordinary Form. Often referred to as the Latin Mass, it uses the Missal of 1962, which in the period after the Second Vatican Council was on the verge of extinction. Then, in 2007, Pope Benedict XVI issued Summorum Pontificum, an apostolic letter granting permission to all

Joanna Southcott (1750-1814) was born in Devon to a small farming family. She went into service at a gentleman’s house in Exeter and worked there for some time, until a fellow servant began to make unwanted advances; she refused him – and the footman in turn claimed that she was “growing mad”, and had her

Cryptic across 3 A gumboil not treated here is the end for Saul (5,6) 7 First to come from ancient synagogues in a region around Ephesus (4) 8 Past it, covered in bloodstains, in the end will flag (3,5) 9 Atlas girl, one involved in petition (6) 10 Cleaner type of hero at Troy? (4)

Ordinary Form Divine Office Week IV Sunday, June 9: Pentecost Acts 2:1-11; Ps 104; 1 Cor 12:3B-7, 12-13; Jn 20:19-23 Monday, June 10: Mary, Mother of the Church Gn 3:9-15, 20; Ps 87; Jn 19:25-34 Tuesday, June 11: St Barnabas Acts 11:21B-26; 12:1-3; Ps 98; Mt 5:13-16 Wednesday, June 12: Weekday in Ordinary Time 2

The Church is about to enter 34 weeks of “Ordinary Time”. But “ordinary” doesn’t have to mean boring or run-of-the-mill. Catholics can, if they wish, live this period in extraordinary, fruitful and fascinating ways. The early part of Ordinary Time covers summer, the high season for pilgrimages. Many dioceses will be organising pilgrimages to Marian

It was only recently that I discovered the Servant of God Don Dolindo Ruotolo, a Neapolitan priest and a Franciscan tertiary, through his beautiful prayer of surrender to the Divine Will. He was a near contemporary of Padre Pio, who said on meeting Don Dolindo that he “could see paradise in his soul”. Don Dolindo’s

On the Hebrew Shavuot or Greek Pentekosté the Jews commemorated the descent of God’s Law on Mount Sinai, wreathed in fire, 50 days after the Exodus. Fifty days after Our Lord’s Resurrection, and 10 days after His Ascension (10 symbolising perfection), the fiery Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles and first disciples to breathe life

Pentecost Sunday Acts 2: 1-11; 1 Cor 12:3-7 & 12-13; Jn 20:19-23 (Year C) “When Pentecost day came round, the Apostles had all met in one room, when suddenly they heard what sounded like a powerful wind from heaven, and something appeared to them that seemed like tongues of flame; these separated and came to

In the Shadow of Vesuvius: A Life of Pliny By Daisy Dunn, William Collins 324pp, £20/$29.95 Every schoolchild used to know something about Pliny. He left behind a huge corpus of letters and speeches, but is famous for two things: years after the event, he wrote a description of the eruption of Vesuvius, which killed

Troublemakers By Dieter Thoma Polity Press, 400pp, £30/$45 Two recent events have made German philosopher Dieter Thoma’s wide-ranging book Troublemakers: A Philosophy of Puer Robustus even more topical than it must have seemed when he was writing it – an unexpected development for a book about Thomas Hobbes’s political theories. The first is the removal

Jane Haining: A Life of Love and Courage By Mary Miller Birlinn, 240pp, £14.99/$20 We know, hear, think and speak a lot about the horrors of the 1930s and 1940s, about Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s Soviet Union, the Holocaust and the gulags. It is right that we continue to do so. But we pay less