Catholic Culture Audiobooks

"If the lost word is lost, if the spent word is spent If the unheard, unspoken Word is unspoken, unheard; Still is the unspoken word, the Word unheard, The Word without a word, the Word within The world and for the world; And the light shone in darkness and Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled About the center of the silent Word."

Written in 1930, Ash Wednesday is a six-part "conversion poem" written by Eliot after his own conversion to Anglicanism. With references ranging from Dante to Shakespeare to the Bible, Ash Wednesday is a moving poem of theological and philosophical depth that speaks to both the struggles and the consolations of spiritual growth.

Links

Ash Wednesday full text: https://www.best-poems.net/t_s_eliot/ash_wednesday.html

T.S. Eliot's own reading of the poem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEUlzDTGd44 Donate at http://catholicculture.org/donate/audio to support this podcast!

Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"Holy Church is both one in all its members and complete in each of them."

Have you ever wondered why the congregation responds to the priest's greeting, "The Lord be with you," with the response, "And with your spirit," rather than "and also with you"? Have you ever wondered why the Confiteor has us say, "and you, my brothers and sisters," even when we are alone?

Doctor of the Church St. Peter Damian (1007-1073) addresses this and other questions in a letter written 1000 years ago—an important work on prayer and ecclesiology, and powerful affirmation that the Church is present in her individual faithful.

Links

Translation courtesy of Holy Family Hermitage in Bloomingdale, Ohio, as found in their volume Camaldolese Spirituality: https://www.faithandfamily.pub/camaldolese-spirituality/

Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"Holiness and prayer are simple. God's Mother taught me so."

St. Bernadette's own autobiographical account of the apparitions at Lourdes, narrated by Karina Majewski.

Full Text: https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/short-life-of-bernadette-5238

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Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"Hypocrites seduce souls in order to have followers and honors."

The Angelic Doctor's very own sermon on how to detect false prophets. Beware!

Links

Article on Aquinas' preaching style: "What Lessons Do Thomas Aquinas' Sermons Hold For Modern Preachers?" https://www.hprweb.com/2017/06/what-lessons-do-thomas-aquinass-sermons-hold-for-modern-preachers/

Translation courtesy of Catholic University of America Press: https://www.hfsbooks.com/books/the-academic-sermons-aquinas-hoogland/

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Theme music: "2 Part Invention", composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"When you are obedient to the bishop as you would be to Jesus Christ, you are living, not in a human way, but according to Jesus Christ…"

St. Ignatius was the third bishop of Antioch and one of the chief figures among the Apostolic Fathers. The only extant writings by St. Ignatius are the seven letters he wrote as a prisoner on his way to Rome to face martyrdom. The two short letters featured in today's episode both address the question of obedience to the bishop.

Links

Translation courtesy of Catholic University of America Press: https://verbum.com/product/120401/the-apostolic-fathers

Letter to the Trallians alternate translation at CatholicCulture.org: https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/fathers/view.cfm?recnum=1630

Letter to the Philadelphians alternate translation at CatholicCulture.org: https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/fathers/view.cfm?recnum=1632

Way of the Fathers, Ep. 4—Ignatius of Antioch: To Know "Jesus Christ Our God" https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/episode-4-ignatius-antioch-to-know-jesus-christ-our-god/

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Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"The only cure for sagging or fainting faith is Communion."

J.R.R. Tolkien—the English writer, poet, philologist and academic best known for being the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings—was Catholic. After the untimely deaths of his father and mother, Tolkien was raised under the guardianship of a priest. Later in life, Tolkien's friendship with C.S. Lewis would be instrumental in Lewis' conversion from atheism to Christianity.

The collection of The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien was originally published in 1981 by his son, Christopher, and biographer, Humphrey Carpenter. It contains 354 letters written between 1914 and 1973, the year of J.R.R. Tolkien's death. This episode features part of a letter written by Tolkien to his second son, Michael, in 1963, when Tolkien was 71 years old.

It is a remarkable letter of fatherly encouragement, touching upon the challenge of scandal in the Church.

Links

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Theme music: "2 Part Invention", composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"When He began to cry / she got up and gave Him milk; / she embraced Him as she sang to Him, / swaying her knees until He became still."

Born in the year 306, Ephrem lived in Nisibis (in modern-day Turkey), at what was then the border between the Roman and Persian empires. Ephrem was a deacon and a prolific writer. To this day, he remains among the most notable hymnographers in Eastern Christianity. He has been called "the lyre of the Holy Spirit", and in 1920 he was declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Benedict XV.

St. Ephrem is best remembered for his hymns on Christmas and Epiphany, including this Marian hymn on the Nativity.

Links

Ep. 28—Ephrem, Symbolist—Way of the Fathers with Mike Aquilina: https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/27ephrem-symbolist/

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Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"My Brethren, it is plain that, when we confess God as Omnipotent only, we have gained but a half-knowledge of Him: His is an Omnipotence which can at the same time swathe Itself in infirmity and can become the captive of Its own creatures... We must know Him by His names, Emmanuel and Jesus, to know Him perfectly."

First preached on the Sunday after Epiphany in 1857, Omnipotence in Bonds remains one of St. John Henry Newman's most celebrated sermons. In it, Newman meditates on the subject of the Incarnation, and how by His Incarnation God makes Himself subject to His creatures — even before the Nativity, and even after the Crucifixion.

Links

Omnipotence in Bonds full text: https://newmanreader.org/works/occasions/sermon6.html

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Theme music: "2 Part Invention", composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

"True, we should esteem the things that make for the glory of God, but we should show the greatest esteem for those that concern the will of God."

St. Alphonsus, a Doctor of the Church, was an Italian bishop who lived from 1696-1787. He is the patron saint of confessors and perhaps one of the most widely read Catholic authors in the world (translations of his works exist in over seventy different languages). St. Alphonsus was a prolific writer who wrote over one hundred works on spirituality and theology.

This text was written in 1755 and represents a topic that was dear to St. Alphonsus' heart. It is said that, in a similar way to how St. Ignatius stressed "all for the greater glory of God," St. Alphonsus gave central importance to "the greater good pleasure of God." After writing this work, St. Alphonsus frequently read it himself, and even had it read to him when his eyesight began to fail.

Uniformity with God's Will is a truly timeless spiritual classic.

Links

Uniformity with God's Will Full text: http://www.catholictreasury.info/books/uniformity_with_Gods_will/un3.php

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Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.

A sermon by the seventeenth-century French theologian and bishop, Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet. Bossuet reflects upon the hidden life of St. Joseph and looks ahead to Christ's Second Coming when Joseph's hidden greatness will finally be known.

Meditations for Advent, Sophia Institute Press: https://www.sophiainstitute.com/products/item/meditations-for-advent

SUBSCRIBE to Catholic Culture Audiobooks https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/catholic-culture-audiobooks/id1482214268

SIGN UP for Catholic Culture's newsletter http://www.catholicculture.org/newsletter

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Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.