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Daily Reflections
Looking in the Wrong Direction
They ask Jesus when the kingdom is coming. He tells them to stop looking where they're looking.
Deacon Michael Halbrook
Faith, family, work, and life - all intertwined.
Permanent deacon of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois. Husband, father of four sons, builder of Catholic technology, and writer of essays, fiction, and homilies.
The Flemish Room
I am writing this chapter before anyone has gone to Bruges, which means that most of it is inference.
Faith & Life
November Lessons
On falling leaves, the four last things, and what I learned at a bedside.
Ad Alta ↗
Reflections
Six Months In
What leaving Adobe to do mission-based work for the Church has actually looked like, so far.
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Daily Reflections
Ten Were Healed. Only One Came Back.
Ten people receive the same healing. Nine keep walking. One turns around.
The Ungraspable Willed to Be Grasped
Tuesday of the Thirty-Second Week in Ordinary Time | Memorial of Saint Leo the Great | Titus 2:1-8, 11-14 | Psalm 37 | Luke 17:7-10
The Letter from Rome, 2023
What follows is a recovered email correspondence between Teodor Maren and Dr. Mara Leclerc of the Vatican Apostolic Archive, conducted between February and August of 2023.
Prague, 1942
What follows is drawn from a set of handwritten notes found inside a chalice case in the possession of Teodor Maren at his death, and from a partial journal kept by Father Josef Novák between 1938 and 1942.
The Dissolution, 1540
What follows is reconstructed from three sources: a letter from Prior Edmund Holt of Rievaulx to an unknown recipient, dated October 1539; a probate inventory from the estate of Richard Askham, wool merchant of York, dated 1571; and a brief entry in the household accounts of the Askham family covering the years 1540 to 1544.
Mara's Proposal
He packed on a Sunday evening, the night before his flight, with the specific care of a man who had been thinking about what to bring for three weeks.
The Argument Building
He wrote to Mara from the kitchen table on Sunday evening, the October dark fully arrived outside the window, the house quiet around him.