Occasional Writings, Reviews, and Irrelevancies from the Heart of the Church
One of the fun things about summer assignments is that I get to take my ministry on the road, which means that I am able to both meet new OCDS communities and deliver my "greatest hits" in terms of spiritual conferences. This summer in Boston I have been giving this conference on my favorite Carmelite, …
Continue reading The Praise of Glory – Themes in Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity
A lot about life in Carmel can be captured by the storylines and aesthetics of WARHAMMER 40K. Because in the grim darkness of the far future, there is only prayer. When you're chanting recto tono and each side of the choir has different ideas as to where the pitch ought to be When that one …
This spiritual conference was delivered to a Secular Carmelite community in Northern Virginia on January 21, 2018. That the month of January falls in the wake of Christmas and the turning of the calendar year makes it, in my mind, an excellent occasion for reflecting anew on the transformative effect that the Incarnation has had …
The short story, written close to two years ago, is the product of a writing prompt from a creative writing class. The prompt was to write a story in which two characters are making a trip by car, stop three times without turning off the engine, and do not reach there destination (at least during …
This is a piece that was recently published in the Carmel Clarion, a publication for the Secular Carmelites of the Washington Province, based on a previous talk delivered as part of a "men's day of recollection". Authentic masculinity: Many of you who are reading this have an idea of the tremendous amount of ink that …
Continue reading Praying Like Saint Joseph – The Authentic Heart of Masculine Prayer
The following is a conference that I delivered in the spring of 2017 to several groups of Secular Carmelites. This was the first conference that I wrote specifically for this purpose, so the authorial voice and pedagogical technique is a bit underdeveloped. Nevertheless, it holds up well enough to merit sharing to a broader audience. …
Continue reading The Missionary Heart of Carmelite Spirituality
