"After his death, Eva Payne had a Day of Recollection "with Father Hardon". Father Hardon was the "spiritual director." The event was extraordinarily successful.

"Deacon, from the Greek διάκονος; diakonos (servant), is a member of a lower branch of the Christian ministry, below the priest (or presbyter) and bishop. The institution of the diaconate is traced to the laying on of hands described in the Acts of the Apostles (6:1-6). Answering to complaints about partiality in the care of the poor, the Apostles ordained seven men, including Stephen, the first martyr, to serve under the presbyter-bishops. In St. Paul's pastoral letters, deacons are a separate class of officers who were mainly charged with the material cares of the apostolate." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"Our meditations for today will be understandably sobering ones. Our present reflection is on death, judgment and hell. Over the years our modern Jesuit Generals have warned us never to give the spiritual exercises without speaking on death, judgment and hell. As an obedient son of St. Ignatius, I am sharing these three important reflections with you this evening." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"Among the religions of the world, the concept of the deity differs considerably. One of the main objects of the study of comparative religion has been to clarify the different ideas of God or the deity professed by the major religious cultures of mankind." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"Our faith tells us that God created the invisible world of angels at the beginning of time. We further believe that none of these angelic spirits was estranged from God." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"Our Lord teaches the Apostles, His first bishops, what it means to love; this love is manifest especially in the institution of the Holy Eucharist. Man encounters the enormous love of God by frequent reception of Christ in Holy Communion…"

By now we should all be developing, consciously or instinctively, a personal spirituality. This personal spirituality will in large measure direct how we pray and how we relate to God in our daily lives. Our own personal spirituality is a determinant of how we approach, and therefore how we love, Christ. One who sees Christ primarily as a healer might seek to follow in His footsteps by being a good and God-filled doctor. Christ has so many aspects, that there is some aspect to which anyone can relate as a primary focus. Naturally, we will recognize the other aspects of Christ, but the one which is dominant for us is how the Holy Spirit inspires us to direct our lives.

Let us be clear about two things. The existence and activity of the devil are part of divine revelation. It is an article of irreversible faith that the devil exists as a legion of evil spirits who fell from God’s friendship by their disobedience to His will. It is further part of our faith that God allows the devil to exercise His malevolent will. From God’s perspective, this is to enable us to be more generous in loving and serving the divine majesty.">

The prince of this world is the devil. When Christ speaks of this world, He means the world of sin. He means the world for which, as He mysteriously declared, "I pray not for the world." The world of which the devil is prince or king is the world of unrepentant sinners.

A new stage is developing in the devotion of the faithful to St. Thérèse of Lisieux. In 1947, the fiftieth anniversary of her death, a congress of theologians was held in Paris with the object of studying the theological implications of St. Thérèse’s spiritual doctrine and of tracing her relationship to the other ascetical writers of the Church. Among the phases of Thérèse’s spirituality, her devotion to the Mother of God deserves special attention. For if, according to sound theology, all graces are given to us through Mary, the extraordinary graces which made Thérèse, in the words of Pius XI, "a miracle of virtue" should be no exception, as even a summary analysis of her life will fully confirm.

There is no subject in Catholic devotion more extensive than the Blessed Virgin Mary. This is only to be expected, since the Mother of God is so basic to a correct understanding of her Divine Son. With the break in Catholic unity which took place in the sixteenth century, the Western world was deeply affected by those who considered themselves Christians, but had reservations about the Mother of Christ. It is not commonly known that faith in her Divine Son is logically dependent on faith in His mother as the Mother of God.

Devotion to the Blessed Virgin is one of the cardinal features of not only professing to be, but being a Catholic. You might say a Catholic is one who is devoted to Mary. What I will suggest for our reflections is that we look at and check our devotion to Mary on six norms. The one who is devoted to Mary thinks of her, reads about her, talks about her, speaks to her, invokes her and tries to imitate her.

I do not hesitate to say that devotion to the angels is one of the hallmarks of being a true Christian. It was an angel who first appeared to our Lady to announce her conception of Jesus Christ at Nazareth. It was an angel who appeared to the shepherds at Bethlehem to tell them that the Messiah had been born. It was an angel who consoled our Lord in His agony in the Garden of Gethsemane. It was an angel who told the women who visited the tomb in which Christ had been buried, that the Savior was risen from the dead. It was angels who told the disciples staring into the sky at Christ’s ascension that He would return from heaven to earth even as He had ascended from earth to heaven. It was an angel who delivered Peter from prison where he was chained for his proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah. It will be angels who will announce the coming of Christ on the last day of time and the first day of eternity to judge the living and the dead.

Devotion to the Holy Eucharist Advances Devotion to Jesus' Person (Alt)

"When we speak of the Holy Eucharist, we can mean the Eucharistic Liturgy or the Mass; we can mean Holy Communion as the sacrament of the`Lord; or we can mean the Real Presence of Christ…we concentrate on the third of these aspects, namely, the Eucharist as the abiding presence of`Jesus Christ on our altars after the Sacrifice of the Mass is over and between receptions of Holy Communion." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

Devotion to the Poor Souls (Alt)

"During this homily, I would like to ask three questions and share with you a short answer on what our Catholic faith teaches about devotion to the Poor Souls in purgatory. Who are the Poor Souls? Why are the Poor Souls in purgatory? How are we to practice our devotion to the souls in purgatory?" - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

St. Peter gives us the revealed foundation for our devotion to the Precious Blood. "You were redeemed," says the Apostle, "not with perishable things like silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ as the Lamb without blemish or stain" (1 Peter 1:18-19). Given this foundation of faith, we ask ourselves what exactly do we mean when we say we were redeemed by the Blood of Christ?  We mean that unless Christ had shed his blood for us, we would not be redeemed.

"The Real Presence, because it is a sacrament, confers the grace that is proper to this sacrament. What is the grace? The grace to love. So why is devotion to the Real Presence so important? Because it is especially through faith in the Eucharist that we obtain an increase of the virtue of charity, both towards God and towards our fellow man." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"My plan for this paper is to do three things: first, to identify some of the prevalent errors in modern Christology which threaten to undermine the Sacred Heart Devotion; then to point out some of the legitimate developments of doctrine on the person and work of Christ, and again show how they bear on this Devotion; and finally to draw some practical conclusions." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"We may say that devotion to the Sacred Heart began on Calvary. When the Heart of Christ was pierced on the Cross, it opened the door to realizing how deeply Jesus loves us. In return, He wants nothing more than for us to love Him with all our hearts. There is nothing that God wants more than for us to love Him without reserve." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"True devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus can strengthen Christian communities against the onslaughts of unbelief, just as it did in 17th-century France. It can also counter the spreading of forms of meditation that 'only mask a tragic spiritual emptiness,' said Pope John Paul II at the canonization of St. Claude La Colombiere, S.J."

"In a feature article published in Education Digest in 1950, we read: "It is conceded on all hands that John Dewey is our outstanding educational philosopher; his influence on American education has been immense." This, in one sentence, is a summary of the Dewey legend. For, although it is true that Dewey’s influence on American education has been immense, it is only in a very qualified sense that we can call him an outstanding philosopher. Certainly a philosopher’s real greatness is not to be estimated by the mere extent of his influence, but also and especially by the effects, good or bad, which his philosophy has had on contemporary civilization and will have on subsequent civilization. Measured by this standard, Dewey’s title to fame must be balanced by the extent of the evil which his principles of social naturalism and pragmatic experimentalism have produced in the United States." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

Dictionary of terms associated with Eucharistic Adoration.

"Mysterium Fidei is Pope Paul VI's battle cry to all faithful Catholics, calling us to gather around Christ's Real Presence in the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist. Have you the spiritual conviction to respond?"

Online directory of thousands of Eucharistic Adoration locations throughout the United States and Canada, with maps, addresses, phone numbers, and hours of adoration.

"I might begin by observing that the full rendering of this statement is, "Discernment of Spirits" implying a plurality and especially implying a distinction between one kind of spirit and another. We know from both the teaching of the Church and by now our own experience that serving God and following Christ is not all just a straight, easy, smooth path." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

During the election campaign of 2004 in the United States of America, some Bishops found themselves under question by other Bishops regarding the application of can. 915 of the Code of Canon Law in the case of Catholic politicians who publicly, after admonition, continue to support legislation favoring procured abortion and other legislation contrary to the natural moral law, for example, legislation permitting the cloning of human life for the purpose of harvesting stem cells by the destruction of the artificially-generated human embryo, and legislation redefining marriage to include a relationship between persons of the same sex. The gravity of the sin of procured abortion and of the sins involved in the commission of other intrinsically-evil acts seemed to place the Catholic politicians among those who obstinately persevere in manifest grave sin, about whom can. 915 treats. - Archbishop Raymond L. Burke

"One of the most providential developments in the Catholic Church, through the Second Vatican Council, has been the extraordinary emphasis on the Liturgy in the life of the faithful: priests, religious and the laity. Unfortunately this liturgical renewal has not always been wisely interpreted. Not the least problem affecting the Church today is the misreading of what the Council taught and, in some instances, a positive indifference to, by now, the extensive teaching of the Holy See on how the Sacred Liturgy is to be celebrated and what norms are to be followed if the inspired directives of the Church's latest and most comprehensive ecumenical gathering are to bear the fruit desired by the Holy Spirit." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

"But we return to our original postulate: that there is special need to see how the Divine Office is indeed a form of the Divine Liturgy. So concerned is the Church to have us know this that she has now consciously given us two equally valid names for the same spiritual exercise, namely, the Divine Office and the Liturgy of the Hours." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

Divine Office as a Form of Sacrifice (Part 3 of 3)

"There is more than passing value in reflecting on the Divine Office as a form of sacrifice. For one thing, we know that for anything to be pleasing to God it must be sacrificial; it must cost us something. A self-satisfying gift is a cheap gift. And the Divine Office should not be a cheap gift to God." - Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J.

Recitation of the Divine Mercy Chaplet during Eucharistic Adoration for the Intentions of the Sick and Dying. The Divine Mercy Chaplet for the Sick and Dying booklet explains Jesus' magnificent promise that one could obtain mercy for the dying by means of praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet. All adorers should have one, as well as those involved in parish work as an Eucharistic Minister, and nursing home or hospital visitation.

In speaking with several folks lately, an interestingly common pattern in their spiritual lives seems to have emerged over time. It begins with having no truly meaningful relationship with God, sort of a Sunday-only kind of Catholic. Following a period of spiritual awakening there is a swing almost to the opposite extreme. Finally, if the person survives the swing, there seems to be a leveling of the seesaw, but with some strong spiritual underpinning. We can look at each of these phases separately, and see how they come together.

Most of us know that Devotion to the Sacred Heart is part of our Catholic religion. We have known from childhood about the nine first Fridays. We often recite the Litany of the Sacred Heart. Annually we celebrate the solemn feast of the Sacred Heart. I am sure that we know several aspirations, like: "Sacred Heart of Jesus, I place my trust in thee." Over the years, every time I pick up the telephone, before I talk to whoever called, I make an aspiration to the Sacred Heart. It helps; you never know who is on the other side.

When we speak of the souls of the just in purgatory we are referring to those that leave the body in the state of sanctifying grace and are therefore destined by right to enter heaven. Their particular judgment was favorable, although conditional: provided they are first cleansed to appear before God. The condition is always fulfilled. The poor souls in purgatory still have the stains of sin within them. This means two things. First, it means that the souls have not yet paid the temporal penalty due, either for venial sins, or for mortal sins whose guilt was forgiven before death. It may also mean the venial sins themselves, which were not forgiven either as to guilt or punishment before death.

At the crucifixion, a young soldier, Longinus, thrust a spear into the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Water spilled forth, washing Longinus, and Blood followed, giving Longinus the grace of conversion. Having been touched by the healing contents of Our Lord's Sacred Heart, Longinus became a martyr, giving up his own life for the One he helped crucify.