How Do the Saints Help Us?
Pat McCloskey, OFM
May 9, 2020
Do you think that saints can help us out? Can you be sure that they are there and that sometimes they talk to you?
Posts from:
Pat McCloskey, OFM
Pat McCloskey, OFM, is the Franciscan advisor for St. Anthony Messenger and the writer of its "Ask a Franciscan" column.
How Are Mass Readings Chosen?
Pat McCloskey, OFM
April 29, 2020
A non-Catholic friend asked me how the Scriptures at Mass are selected. Who started this and when was the present system adopted?
Vatican II’s 1963 “Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy” called for a wider selection of biblical texts to be used at Mass. The current Lectionary (book of those readings) was prepared by an international committee of experts and went into use in 1970.
A Deep Wound
Pat McCloskey, OFM
February 26, 2020
How could God take my precious son at age 43 and yet allow rotten people who have stopped believing in God to keep on living? My son was a great Catholic and spent eight years in Catholic schools.
Why Bother with Confession?
Pat McCloskey, OFM
February 26, 2020
When I became a Catholic at the age of 20, I loved the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Now, more than 40 years later, my behavior is morally acceptable, but I am tortured interiorly by inappropriate thoughts, lacking focus and concentration. While polite and kind outwardly, I get irked or offended by others’ behavior. I am impatient, judging inwardly in my mind.
Why Israel?
Pat McCloskey, OFM
January 29, 2020
Our Bible study group is reading the prophet Hosea. Someone asked, “Why did God choose Israel to be the chosen people? “
Listening to Our Better Angels
Pat McCloskey, OFM
December 27, 2019
When Abraham Lincoln was sworn in as president on March 4, 1861, he focused his inaugural address on the seven states that had already seceded from the Union.
‘Readings and Homilies Hinder My Faith ‘
Pat McCloskey, OFM
December 27, 2019
How can I attend Sunday Mass when the readings and homilies make me question my faith? I love the Catholic Church, the faith in which I was brought up, the Eucharist, the hymns, buildings, and statues. As soon as the readings begin or the homily starts, however, I begin to struggle with my faith. I want to believe and be a good Catholic. I have not been attending Mass for some time now, but I would like to return. What can I do?