Catholics set themselves apart from many other Christians through their practice of praying for the deceased. This practice stems from the belief that the souls of the departed may be in purgatory, and the prayers and sacrifices of the living on Earth can aid their journey to Heaven.

“Another angel with a golden censer came and stood at the altar; he was given a great quantity of incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar that is before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the hand of the angel” (Revelation 8:3-4).

Last week I attended the canonization Mass of now Saints Carlo Acutis and Pier Giorgio Frassati. St. Peter's Square was packed with hundreds of thousands of people, most of them young people from all over the world, waving their country's flag back and forth in the air.

Today I am in Rome, attending the Canonization Mass of Pier Giorgio Frassati and Carlo Acutis, where Pope Leo XIV proclaims through his capacity as Vicar of Christ that these two men are officially members of the Heavenly Kingdom; in other words, Saints.

In the Nicene Creed that we profess at Sunday Mass, we come across a word that is rather challenging: “consubstantial.” This is an indirect translation of the most controversial word in the history of Christianity — the Greek term homoousios.

The Church, especially in the English language, has multiple I nstances where the same word has multiple meanings. It's very similar to how lead and lead, while spelled the same, are two very distinct things. For the Church, the word “catholic” has multiple meanings, and which meaning is being used is commonly distinguished by the use of capital letters: Catholic and catholic.

In many Catholic churches, flowers are the most commonly used decorations in the sanctuary. They can be found near the altar at Mass, or in front of statues and other prominent works of art. Flowers serve the purpose of reminding us of God's creation and the beauty of his handiwork. Nikolaus Gihr, in his book The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, elaborates on this spiritual meaning.

Last weekend, many thousands of youth attended celebrations in Rome as part of the 2025 Jubilee celebrations. In 2001, during his 1,000th general audience as the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II addressed youth, in particular altar servers, while remarking on World Youth Day in Rome during the Jubilee of 2000. He said:

Each month on the second Sunday at 5pm, we offer a special candlelight Mass where the sanctuary is lit primarily by a multitude of candles surrounding the altar. The music is different from the other masses with a beautifully contemplative and prayerful mood to draw us into the wonder of the Eucharistic Mystery that unfolds before us on the altar. Incense is burned throughout the Mass to engage another of our senses. This engagement of our senses tunes us to enter the contemplation of the things of Heaven and our relation to them, in the very place where Heaven comes down to touch the Earth.

In 2022, Pope Francis wrote an Apostolic Letter entitled Desiderio desideravi, addressed to the Bishops, Priests, Deacons, and the Lay Faithful on the topic of the liturgical formation of the People of God (i.e. all baptized members of the Church). In this letter, our late Holy Father asks the everyone to join in rediscovering the beauty and truth of the Liturgy of our Lord, and emphasizes to the clergy the importance of offering the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the exact manner that our Lord and his Church has commanded us to offer it, for not doing so would be “robbing from the assembly what is owed to it; namely, the paschal mystery celebrated according to the ritual that the Church sets down” (D.d., 23). He calls for celebrating a Mass that is filled with rich symbolism that points to the paschal mystery and invites us to engage with this transcendent liturgical action. He says, “Wonder is an essential part of the liturgical act because it is the way that those who know they are engaged in the particularity of symbolic gestures look at things.” (D.d., 26)

A couple of weeks ago, I attended a conference hosted by the Archdiocese of San Francisco entitled “Fons et Culmen”, which is a manner that the document Sacrosanctum Concilium from the Second Vatican Council used to describe the Sacred Liturgy. "Fons et Culmen”, Latin for "Source and Summit”, designates the liturgy as the "summit toward which the activity of the Church is directed" and the "font from which all her power flows." This means that the liturgy is central to the Church's mission and life, serving as the primary means through which the faithful encounter God. It is through the Eucharistic celebration that believers are united with Christ and each other, receiving grace and strength to live out their faith.

“We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness…” 249 years ago, these words were inscribed in our Declaration of Independence from Great Britain.