Oblate Formation 
Posts concerning Oblate and Novice formation. These include articles which are also applicable to most Christians, whether Oblate or not. Additional articles on instruction of various parts of the Rule can be found under that category.
The Ascension causes men’s minds and hearts to ascend
Had Christ remained on earth, sight would have taken the place of faith. In heaven, there will be no faith because His followers will see; there will be no hope, because they will possess; but there will be love for love endureth forever! His leave-taking of the earth combined the Cross and the Crown that… Read More ›
True prayer is not at all foreign to reality
True prayer is not at all foreign to reality. If prayer should alienate you, remove you from your real life, be on your guard it would not be true prayer! On the contrary, dialogue with God is a guarantee of truth, of truth with ourselves and with others and hence of freedom. Being with God,… Read More ›
How does one recognize God’s call?
How does one recognize God’s call? Well, the secret of the vocation lies in the capacity for and joy of distinguishing, listening to, and obeying his voice. But to do this it is necessary to accustom our hearts to recognizing the Lord and to having an awareness of him as a Person who is close… Read More ›
Discover your deep self, in Christ
. . .it is precisely because it is public in the classical or “political” sense of the word, that the liturgy enables us to discover and to express the deepest meaning of Christian personalism. We must first emerge from the private realm, the “household” which is the realm of necessity and the proper domain of… Read More ›
Do You Belong?
Hospitality is more than following the Rule or serving dessert — it may affect a person’s health as well… An important driver for a lifestyle of optimism is a sense of purpose. There’s much truth in Nietzche’s “If you know the why, you can live any how.” Ultimately, what creates purpose is the experience that… Read More ›
Amazing stories of the moment of death
What happens at the moment of death? Many have experiences to relate. Recently, we spoke to a home-care aide, Mary Ann Buchan, of Western New York, who told us how common it is for folks to wait for some sense of completion before turning serene and making the passage. Most deaths are that way: peaceful…. Read More ›
Holy Saturday: The Lord’s descent into hell
“What is happening? Today there is a great silence over the earth, a great silence, and stillness, a great silence because the King sleeps; the earth was in terror and was still, because God slept in the flesh and raised up those who were sleeping from the ages. God has died in the flesh, and… Read More ›
Believers are called to follow Christ in the “desert”
1. Last Wednesday, with the rite of the imposition of ashes, we entered Lent, a penitential journey of preparation for Easter, an occasion for all the baptized to renew the spirit of faith and to reinforce their commitment of evangelical consistency. As today’s Gospel suggests (Mk 1,12-15), during the 40 days of Lent, believers are… Read More ›
Even the tiniest Lenten sacrifice is valuable
The Catholic Herald (28/2/14): . . .There was a time when the concept of penance was widely understood even if the practice of it was in decline but that was also the time when biblical literacy was prevalent and there was some corresponding understanding of the concepts of sin, judgment and offending Infinite Goodness. Yet… Read More ›