Blessed Sabbath and Happy Saturday to all of you digital neighbors scattered across the internet. In Cath-O-landia we are celebrating the Solemn Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Since about the 5th century the devotion has been recognized in various communities within the Church. By the time of St. Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, and Bonaventure it was a widespread devotion and belief among the faithful.
In short, at the moment of her death, the Blessed Virgin Mary was assumed body and soul into Heaven. Our Orthodox brothers and sisters speak of the Dormition (the “falling asleep”) of the BVM, whose soul was received into Heaven at death and whose body was translated there and reunited with her soul. I am not sure how many, if any, outside of Catholicism and Orthodoxy celebrate it, since it is not explicitly in the Bible. Some see it as “Mary worship,” and sadly there are disciples who mistakenly or errantly place too much emphasis on the BVM and lose sight of the fact that all good things come from God, who alone can answer our prayers. We are Christians after all, and to bear the name of the Redeemer is our greatest and most humble honor. The saints—those walking among us and those walking with God—pray for us, but we do not pray to them so much as with them.
Anyway, happy feast day to any celebrating today, and blessed Saturday to all of you. A little sonnet from Malcolm Guite to finish off the post:
You bore for me the One who came to bless
And bear for all, to make the broken whole.
You heard his call, and in your open ‘yes’
You spoke aloud for every living soul.
Oh gracious Lady, child of your own child,
Whose mother-love still calls the child in me,
Call me again, for I am lost and wild
Waves surround me now. On this dark sea
Shine as a star and call me to the shore.
Open a door that all my sins would close
And hold me in your garden. Let me share
The prayer that folds the petals of the Rose.
Enfold me too in Love’s last mystery,
And bring me to the One you bore for me.
Sounding the Seasons - One Hundred and Ten Sonnets for the Christian Year -Enlarged Edition - Malcolm Guite
Today marks the three hundred and thirtieth birthday of the Frenchman François-Marie Arouet, better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire (1694-1778).
Born into a bourgeois family during the reign of Louis XIV, the “Sun King” (r. 1643-1715), Voltaire suffered tragedy at a young age when his mother died. Never close with his father or brother, Voltaire exhibited a rebellious attitude toward authority from his youth. His brilliant mind was fostered in the care of the Society of Jesus, who introduced him to the joys of literature and theater. Despite his later criticisms against the Church, Voltaire, throughout his life, fondly recalled his dedicated Jesuit teachers.
Although he spent time as a civil servant in the French embassy to the Hague, Voltaire’s main love was writing—an endeavor where he excelled in various genres, including poetry, which led to his appointment as the royal court poet for King Louis XV. Widely recognized as one of the greatest French writers, and even hyperbolically referred to by ...
Padre - Tom Miller invites you to a Coffee Talk, Speakeasies, Schmoozes, Tea Times, Afterhours and other gatherings.
https://teams.live.com/meet/93792382189049?p=DiBHsYfuECPgDrG7vO
2026 Coffee Talk with the ADD Irregulars
Thursday, January 1, 2026
6:00 AM - 8:00 AM (CST)
Occurs every day starting 1/1 until 12/31/2027
Coffee Talk - Daily beginning at 6:00 AM Central Time Zone - USA
White Pilled Wednesday - A break from the heaviness of news and current events to focus upon things more personal & positive for the first hour of Coffee Talk.
Afternoon Chats - Most Tuesday, Friday & Sundays 2:00 PM Central
Other chats as posted in the community.
The Beautiful
Said the Disciple to the Lover, “Sir, before I left the world I heard certain men who were held in high esteem and thought to know the will of the Beloved say that those who loved the Beautiful did not love the Beloved but loved idols, yet in the Garden of the Beloved we are ever striving to create beauty for the pleasure of the Beloved. Were they then speaking the truth?”
The Lover answered, “Those who said this had never glimpsed the form of the Beloved nor ever truly sought Him, for all beauty is but the reflection of the beauty of the Beloved, although seen very dimly as in a dark and faulty mirror, even as all goodness is a dim reflection of the goodness of the Beloved. So it is that those who love beauty and goodness recognize dimly in them the form of the Beloved and though often in ignorance those who are seeking the Beautiful and the Good are seeking after the Beloved.”
