Author: Paul Zalonski

The Importance of the Desert to the Inner Life


A recent post by Orthodox Abbot Tryphon on Poustinia is helpful to those who frequently practice silence and have a “hermit day” to keep focus on preferring God above all things. The Abbot writes,


The Russian word, “Poustinia”, means “desert”, and the importance of the poustinia to the inner life can not be dismissed. If we are to hear the voice of God speaking to us, we must listen to His silence.

If we are to learn to hear His voice, we must learn to be silent. Without recollection and silence, the inner life is impossible, and we will not make spiritual progress.

The desert must be a part of our daily living, for without entering into the desert of the heart, nothing can be gained. With the noise of the Internet, and the world of computers, iPods, laptops, and iPhones, the noise of the world threatens our soul like nothing in the previous history of humanity.

The world of cybernetics has its place, but we must not allow it to overwhelm the spiritual dimension of our humanity.

***As a side note and related, Catherine Dougherty popularized the idea of Catholics taking up the practice of Poustinia in her book on the subject.

Saint Benedict: A Wise Guide for Living Well Today

In preparation for the feast of Saint Benedict today, Sunday, July 11, the Benedictine Primate of the Confederation of Benedictines, Abbot Gregory, reflects on the wisdom of Saint Benedict.

It was published in today’s Osservatore Romano: https://bit.ly/3AOTlPS

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Saint Benedict: A Wise Guide for Living Well TodayAbbot Primate Gregory Polan, O.S.B.

Can a text which dates back 1,500 years be practical for living well today? The Rule of Saint Benedict stands as a classic text of spiritual insight and humane behavior. Such classic texts often give us a brief word which has much to say to us. We live in a world and a culture that bombards us with words. Often there are so many words that shower and flood us each day that we have little or no time to take in their meaning and impact. The early monastic tradition understood the value of well-chosen and well-spoken words, as well as silence. In a moment of excitement or reaction to the comments of someone, how often have we regretted our immediate or less measured response? While we may have a well cultivated language, we often have a less cultivated sense of what is best left unspoken, or said in a measured and reflective way.

The opening words of The Rule of Saint Benedict offer an instruction that calls for an interior discipline. The text of the Prologue to the Rule reads, “Listen carefully, my child, to the master’s instructions, and attend to them with the ear of your heart.” As language has developed through the centuries, so have the number of words and their distinct nuances. The more words that bombard our hearing, the less intent we are in carefully appreciating their meaning, their impact, and their power. Yet in contrast to this, a few words, well spoken can touch the heart, lift the human spirit, transform the mind, give direction in life’s choices, and remain within us as a guide to fruitful Christian living.

We can carefully distinguish the difference between “hearing” and “listening.” We can hear words that are spoken; and they quickly pass on, often unnoticed and hardly considered. In contrast to this, when we truly listen to what a person is saying, this act implies our reflection on the impact of what is said, a careful consideration or rumination on the impact and meaning of these words. If we are truly listening with the ear of the heart, these words pass from the ear to the mind and to the heart. Often when we honestly listen to what is said, it asks something of us. Should I ponder these thoughts more seriously, question my motivations for what I am doing, reconsider what I am doing? And sometimes this contemplation assures me of the values I am trying to live. That command to ponder seriously is how Saint Benedict begins his Rule; this initial command serves as motto for the monastic life, “to listen with the ear of the heart.” But isn’t that also an invitation to anyone of us in the movement of our lives, our daily living?

In the Scriptures, particularly in the Old Testament, the heart was understood to encompass a process and reflection of both the mind and the heart together, working in tandem. This was understood to be an endeavor of the whole interior of a person. Too often our reactions arise from an initial thought that comes to mind; rather, to begin with thoughts of the mind and then to reflect from the posture of the heart brings together a better and fuller expression of what is best. “What does this mean … what are the implications of what is being said … how does this challenge me to think differently?” Saint Benedict could challenge us in our own day to take on this process of “listening with the ear of the heart” in our decision making, in our relations with one another, and in our responses to the variety of situations and questions that come before us. What a difference this would make on every level of our human existence: within the family unit, within a business operation, among families and friends, among world leaders, among warring nations, among countries seeking peaceful resolutions.

Pope Francis presents to us an important challenge with his announcement of the forthcoming Synod of Bishops; the focus will be on creating a synodal process for the Church as it moves into the future. One of the key elements which can have an impact on this process of involving the whole Church in this endeavor is the act of listening. And Saint Benedict has something very worthwhile to offer to this – that this process will include a “listening with the ear of the heart,” as he begins his Rule. This calls for a great humility and openness to what another has to say, to offer as a suggestion, to seek a peaceful resolution. Could this person be an instrument of God’s will being manifested to us? A synodal process calls for great sincerity and a true sense of listening deeply, profoundly, lovingly, openly, and receptively.

This year the feast of Saint Benedict, one of the patrons of Europe, falls on Sunday, 11 July. His teaching in the Rule offers us a profound way of renewing our hearts through the manner of our listening – that is, whole heartedly. Imagine the blessings of peace and hope that could resound throughout the world if his instructions on the manner of our listening to one another could become a reality. Whether this special kind of listening is between struggling nations, warring political parties, religious leaders, and even within families, our ability of listen with a depth of respect for one another as children of God holds the promise of peace and blessing for all. Even in our day-to-day lives, “listening with the ear of the heart” holds out to us the promise of peace and hopes as we move forward into each new day. Saint Benedict, pray for us; help us to listen to one another with the ear of our heart (“Prolog 1, The Rule of Saint Benedict).

Portsmouth Institute 2021

The Portsmouth Institute is beginning today. “As I Have Loved You” is the them taken from Fourth Gospel and commented upon by saints and theologians alike for centuries. Regrettably the 2021 iteration is virtual but worthy of our attention, as always. Allow me to share a prayer that I think will capture the trajectory of the work to be done. The opening prayer for the Portsmouth Institute is composed by Prior Michael Brunner, OSB, Prior of Portsmouth Abbey and Chancellor of Portsmouth Abbey School.

We pray,

Almighty Father, you sent your Son to save us and demonstrate to us the infinite depth of your love for us. Your son gave us the new overarching commandment to love one another in the same radical manner by which he loved us. Give us, Lord we pray, the grace, courage and strength to love as he did, meek and humble of heart.

Help us to not strike back at those who strike out at us. Help us to love those we do not like, those with whom we disagree, those who vilify us. Help us to respond to them by loving as Jesus did and not with harsh words. Help us to love our country by showing it the way of love by our living it. Help us to actively love the loveless, the hopeless and the faithless.May the way, the truth and the life be visible to the world in us.

Guide us, Lord, on this path of love so that we do not deceive ourselves by following the path of our own loves. Forgive us our failures and consider our right intentions as we live and work and build in the ways of your kingdom. May everything we do be according to your will and for your greater glory, as we follow Jesus Christ the King of hearts. 

In His name we pray, Amen.

The Institute is a collaborative work of the monks of Portsmouth Abbey and St Louis Abbey with key laypeople offering a great program on faith and reason for 2021. Remember, faith and reason go hand-in-hand and is particularly catholic in scope and depth (think of Benedict XVI).

I have known some of the presenters at this year’s Institute for some time, and recommend that you dive deeply with them into the content they offer. I am particularly excited to hear John Cavadini, a friend I met at UND but who is a native of North Haven, Connecticut (a suburb of New Haven). He’s a stellar scholar and a man with a great, loving humanity.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, 2021

The devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is based on the truth that Jesus Christ is one divine person (the Second Person of the Trinity) in two natures, human and divine. Our Lord Jesus had (and, in his glory, still has) heart, blood, and everything that goes with being fully and truly human. Because our Savior is God-made-man, every part of Christ’s humanity is worthy of supreme worship and adoration. Our Redeemer recapitulates (that is, sums up) all salvation history—the entire biblical story—in himself, in his sacred humanity. The Catechism of the Catholic Church tell us that “Scripture is a unity by reason of the unity of God’s plan, of which Christ Jesus is the center and heart, open since his Passover” (CCC 112). St. Thomas Aquinas put it this way:


“The phrase ‘heart of Christ’ can refer to Sacred Scripture, which makes known his heart, closed before the Passion, as the Scripture was obscure. But the Scripture has been opened since the Passion; since those who from then on have understood it, consider and discern in what way the prophecies must be interpreted” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Expos. in Ps 21, 11) (quoted in CCC 112).


In chapter 9 of St. Matthew’s gospel, we read that Jesus saw the crowds and that his heart was moved with pity for them “because they were troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd” (Mt 9.36). In Christ, God fulfilled his promise given through the prophet Jeremiah: “I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding” (Jer 3.15). Yet the Lord has promised even more than this: he has promised to transform us in Christ’s likeness; and he likens this conversion is to a heart transplant. Through the prophet Ezekiel, the Lord promised,


I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will take out of your flesh the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh (Ez 36. 25-6).


St. Matthew’s gospel tells us that Jesus heart was moved with pity for the crowds, and this is a good translation. The Greek word that is often translated as “heart” is splanchna. It means literally the inward parts, the viscera, the very guts: it’s not an especially pretty expression. Often in the Bible, it refers especially the inward parts of a sacrificial victim. The expression “heart of Jesus” is a symbolic way of speaking of his entire humanity, which he received in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary.


God has willed “to reconcile to himself all things, on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross” (Col .120). The Sacred Heart image represents Christ’s love for us, even unto death on the Cross, for Christ Crucified is the only effective reparation and atonement for the sins of mankind. Jesus’ heart—his sacred humanity— is the only locus of reconciliation and peace with God, and of hope and unity for mankind. On the Cross, our Redeemer’s side was pierced by the lance: from the pierced heart of Jesus’ humanity flowed both blood and water. In Catholic Tradition, the water represents baptism and the blood symbolizes the Eucharist: the two streams of salvation (CCC 766, 1067, 1225; Jn 19.34).


To make reparation to the Sacred Heart is to offer faith and adoration and repentance to our Lord, especially in the Blessed Sacrament. We do so for ourselves and on behalf of sinners and unbelievers (CCC 478), imploring an outpouring of grace that will open their hearts to receive him. As the Catechism says, the Catholic spiritual tradition “emphasizes the heart, in the biblical sense of the depths of one’s being, where the person decides for or against God” (CCC 368). St. Paul writes to the Philippians that he is to be poured out “as a libation [a drink offering] upon the sacrificial offering of your faith” (Phil 2.17). In making reparation, we are offering our very selves in faith, body and soul, with all our human relationships, for one another in the Body of Christ. St. Luke tells us that, regarding the mystery of her divine Son, Mary “kept all these things, pondering them in her heart” (Lk 2.19; cf 2.52). The Immaculate Heart of Mary is the human heart purified and transformed by the grace of Christ.


The devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus as we now know it owes much to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque. It was to the private revelations given to her that we owe the feast of the Sacred Heart in the octave following Corpus Christi. In June 1676, St. Margaret Mary received the greatest of the visions:


One day, kneeling before the Blessed Sacrament during the octave of Corpus Christi, I was deluged with God’s loving favors… He disclosed his divine Heart as he spoke: “There it is, that Heart so deeply in love with men, it spared no means of proof, wearing itself out until it was utterly spent! This meets with scant appreciation from most of them; all I get back is ingratitude—witness their irreverence, their sacrileges, their coldness and contempt for me in this Sacrament of Love. What hurts me most is that hearts dedicated to my service behave in this way. That is why I am asking you to have the Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi set apart as a special feast in honor of my Heart—a day on which to receive me in Holy Communion and make a solemn act of reparation for the indignities I have received in the Blessed Sacrament while exposed on the altars of the world. I promise you, too, that I shall open my Heart to all who honor me in this way, and who get others to do the same; they will feel in all its fullness the power of my love.


Our Lord asked in a special way through Margaret Mary for Catholic France and her king to be consecrated to the Sacred Heart. The Heart of Jesus wills for political rulers and states to acknowledge publicly Christ’s Kingdom as the basis of rightful authority and the common good. Where Catholics are in the minority, we are still called to offer prayers of consecration and reparation, for our country and for its conversion and for the freedom of Holy Church. In addition to the Feast of the Sacred Heart, Catholics are encouraged to observe the First Friday of each month by attending Mass if possible, by making visits to the Blessed Sacrament, and by the use of prayers such as the Litany of the Sacred Heart. St. Margaret Mary was assured by our Lord that the faithful who did this for nine consecutive months would receive special graces in this life (such as peace and conversion in families) and especially at the hour of death. Priests would be given the ability to touch even hardened hearts. St. John Vianney, the patron of parish priests, expressed this truth plainly: “The priesthood is the love of the heart of Jesus” (CCC 1589). Through the faith and love and penance of the faithful remnant, the way of salvation and conversion may yet be opened for the many who do not yet know or follow the Lord Jesus, our Redeemer.


Dom Ambrose, OSB, homily for the feast, 2021

Blessed Otto Neururer

Today is the feast of Blessed Otto Neururer: Austrian Catholic priest, opponent of Nazism, and martyr—tortured to death at Buchenwald concentration camp on this day in 1940, for performing a baptism but also for defending the sacrament of Marriage. He endured 34 hours hanging upside down, during which he prayed continually.

Though unknown to many in the USA, Blessed Otto stands out not only because of his opposition to Nazism, he is a clear witness to the truth of Jesus Christ and doing the right thing for the sheep under his care. Blessed Otto showed himself a pastor in to his fellow prisoners even baptizing a man due to die. Otto was killed in odium fidei (in hatred of the faith). He was beatified by St John Paul II in 1996.

Read this brief biography of Blessed Otto Neururer.

Will we Reclaim Christian Charity?

Somehow I stumbled upon Dorothy Day’s 1949 essay, “The Scandal of the Works of Charity,” and found it challenging enough to ask if it is possible for 21st century Christians to reclaim a life of charity based on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Can we who profess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, worship the Blessed Triune God through the Divine Liturgy (or the Sacrifice of the Mass) assist our brothers and sisters in need?

According to Day, Peter Maurin has an answer for us to consider and to enact. In part he says,

To get to the people, he pointed out it was necessary to embrace voluntary poverty, to strip yourself, which would give you the means to practice the works of mercy. To reach the man in the street you must go to the street. To reach the workers, you begin to study a philosophy of labor, and take up manual labor, useful labor, instead of white collar work. To be the least, to be the worker, to be poor, to take the lowest place and thus be the spark which would set afire the love of men towards each other and to God (and we can only show our love for God by our love for our fellows).

Striking is Day’s comment that “WE ARE ALL devoured by a passion for social justice today” given all the talk and public demonstration for racial justice today. I tend to think that secular and church people alike have an anemic even wrong sense of what constitutes justice and social reform. Much of the rhetoric is pure fantasy –shallow at best. What is missing in the conversation and in action is Jesus Christ. What is missing is having, knowing, loving the Savior at the center of everything. What is missing is prayer: the sacred Liturgy (Mass and Divine Office, personal and corporate). What got my attention in Day’s essay is her mentioning of the Catholic spirituality she fostered:

We have daily Mass at the Farm, and we are permitted by the Chancery Office to have the Blessed Sacrament at all times while a priest is with us and we are blessed in having an invalided priest visiting us these past fifteen months or so. We have Prime and Compline, we have sung Masses for all the big feast days, we have reading at the table during retreats, and sometimes when there is no retreat but a feast day to be celebrated.

The loss of the Center means the acceptance of alternative forms of centering; if Christ is not the center then the vacuum will be filled by something counterfeit. It seems to me that Catholics have forgotten the source and substance of Day and Maurin and the cloud of witnesses (saints). The people who have really forgotten the Day-Maurin source and substance are those who run Catholic Worker Houses with their secular agenda and no Christ-center. Of course, there are a few exceptions like the Catholic Worker House operated by Larry Chapp and his wife in Pennsylvania.

The works of Charity, spiritual and corporal, are revealed in the Gospel but are also found in the Old Testament. But sticking with the Christian dispensation I notice that there is typically no mention of Jesus’ Good Word in the sermonizing of the clergy. The Catholics of East and West have neglected to preach on Matthew 25 while giving good witness to the scope of what of is revealed. The result is that real face of the faith community’s “performance of the works of mercy” has become bourgeois and has virtually vanished. This neglect has contributed to the crazy-talk of what justice really means and why we all need to have a concern for matters of justice.

If we are going to be serious about the recovery of Works of Mercy we need allow our hearts and minds and hands be moved by the Gospel and good worship of God. Nothing fake and scandalous. The true scandal of the Works of Mercy is that it forces us to move from being self-made persons to the recognition that we are the Lord’s. The injustices we face today, then, are resolved in true faith in the Heart of Christ. It is there we know to whom we belong.

Mary, Mother of the Church

Today’s Marian feast is relatively new to the Latin Church. Those familiar will recognize that it was St Paul VI who established the title for Mary as “Mother of the Church” but it was Popr Francis who established the liturgical memorial to be celebrated on the Monday following Pentecost. Hence, it is a moveable memorial.

Theologically the Magisterium indicates that the title of Mother of the Church recognizes the fact that the Holy Theotokos, Mary, Mother of God, was praying in the Cenacle with the Apostles at the Pentecost.

Biblically, it is revealed that Mary is the Mother of God, the mother of Jesus who was with Her Son as many key moments of of the Savior’s ministry and at the Cross when Jesus gave His instructions to Her and the Apostle John, establishing a relationship within the Kingdom of God. Jesus said to Mary, “Woman, behold thy son,” and to St. John (who mystically represents all His disciples), “Behold thy mother.”

The Collect

Lord our God, through your power and goodness the Blessed Virgin, the fairest fruit of your redeeming love, shines forth as the perfect image of the Church; grant to your people on their pilgrim way on earth that, with eyes fixed on Mary, they may follow closely in the footsteps of her Son until they come to that fullness of glory, which now they contemplate in his Mother with hearts filled with joy. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Pentecost centers the Gospel

The message of Pentecost is the language of universality, of how the Gospel overcomes the divisiveness of Babel by speaking in a manner that can be understood by every human heart, regardless of race, gender, or spoken language. Throughout the Gospels people comment that no one has ever spoken like Jesus, that he speaks with authority and not like the scribes and Pharisees. It is this same authority that is now passed on to the disciples by the Spirit at Pentecost, whose purpose will be to gather in all of the lost children of Eve in the kingdom of God.

Good news on Blessed Margaret of Città di Castello

Today, 24 April 2021, Pope Francis received in audience Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

The Vatican News states: “During the audience, the Supreme Pontiff confirmed the conclusions of the Ordinary Session of Cardinals and Bishops, Members of the Congregation, and decided to extend the cult of Blessed Margaret of Città di Castello, of the Third Order of Friars Preachers Friars, to the universal Church; born around 1287 in Metola (Italy) and died in Città di Castello (Italy) on 13 April 1320, inscribing her in the catalog of the Saints (Equivalent Canonization).”

As one wrote, this is excellent news not only for the Order of Preachers, but also for the ProLife Movement. St. Margaret was born blind, deformed in face, a hunchback, with one leg shorter than the other, a dwarf (her incorrupt body is amazingly small), finally abandoned by her parents in her teenage years, She died at 33 a saintly woman beloved by so many … she is a reminder of the value of all lives and the power of faith and hope in the face of immeasurable suffering and abandonment.

St Margaret, pray for us.