Death of legendary Latinist leaves the Church a grayer place
Father Reggie Foster was living proof that being indispensable is the ultimate get-out-of-jail-free card.
ROME – When I first arrived in Rome to cover the Vatican in the 1990s, every time I’d meet an English-speaker around town, sooner or later they’d all ask the same question, inevitably with an amused twinkle in their eye: “Have you met Reggie Foster yet?”
They’d tell me he was the pope’s Latinist, which didn’t exactly seem to make meeting him the most riveting prospect. At first I thought maybe it was some kind of nerdy ex-pat form of hazing, to gaslight the new guy into meeting the biggest bore around just for kicks.
Catholic Caucus: Daily Mass Readings, 12-14-2020, Memorial of Saint John of the Cross, priest and doctor of the Church
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Altar of Westminster Cathedral, London, UK Lectionary 187 the spirit of God came upon him, and he gave voice to his oracle:
The utterance of Balaam, son of Beor, the utterance of a man whose eye is true, The utterance of one who hears what God says, and knows what the Most High knows, Of one who sees what the Almighty sees, enraptured, and with eyes unveiled: How goodly are your tents, O Jacob; your encampments, O Israel! like the cedars planted by the LORD.
Modern Saint: Maria de las Maravillas de Jesus
Something true and wondrous
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by Melanie Rigney
It was a long name for an infant: Maria de las Maravillas Pidal Chico de Guzman. But her mother had a special devotion to Nuestra Señora de las Maravillas (Our Lady of Wonders, or Marvels) … and there was, of course, that family pedigree. When the child they nicknamed Mavi was born, her father was serving as the Spanish ambassador to the Holy See.
Reading the works of St. Teresa of Ávila and St. John of the Cross surely fueled Mavi’s interest in becoming a Carmelite. All those saints stories her beloved grandmother read to her had an impact, as well. But as Mavi’s certainty about her vocation solidified, her top priority was helping to care for her ailing father. He died a few weeks after Mavi’s 22nd birthday, and her grandmother died soon thereafter. The young woman’s spiritual director advised her to wait to enter religious life until her mother embraced the idea; tha