Showing results by narrator "Kevin OBrien" in All Categories

Hell and how to avoid it are perennial topics of interest for believing Christians and others. With good reason. Entire libraries have been written on the subject. Most people, even those familiar with his classic, do not realize that Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, chock-full as it is of history and politics, is a masterpiece of spiritual writing. The most famous of his three volumes is the Inferno, an account of Dante's journey through the underworld, where he sees the horror of sin firsthand.

TO DIE WELL, ONE MUST FIRST LEARN how to live well. In this timeless guide, St. Robert Bellarmine offers a clear and orderly path to preparing the soul for its final passage: the daily practice of virtue, the discipline of prayer, and fidelity to the sacraments. Dear Listener, in this comforting book, you will find instruction in detachment from earthly goods, counsel on cultivating sobriety, justice, and piety, and encouragement to embrace fasting, almsgiving, and works of mercy.

Dr. Whitfield is looking forward to a sabbatical year of peace and quiet, gardening in his backyard, and tinkering with what he calls his latest "unpublishable book". As the year begins, he is drawn by a series of seeming coincidences into involvement with a group of characters from across Europe, including a family that has been the target of assassination attempts by unknown powers. During his journey to Romania, the situation in which he finds himself becomes more sinister than it first seemed.

The Messiah of the New Age. His coming is prophesied by more than a dozen major religions. Cloned from live cells of Jesus Christ found on the Shroud of Turin, Christopher Goodman was born into the most turbulent time in human history. Already two nuclear holocausts have shaken the planet - the first destroying much of the Russian Republic, and the second killing nearly a billion people in China, India, and Pakistan. Unknown to the world's inhabitants, an even greater threat is waiting just beyond Earth's horizon - that may annihilate the entire human race.

Is truth knowable? If we know the truth, must we hide it in the name of tolerance? Cardinal Ratzinger engages the problem of truth, tolerance, religion and culture in the modern world. Describing the vast array of world religions, Ratzinger embraces the difficult challenge of meeting diverse understandings of spiritual truth while defending the Catholic teaching of salvation through Jesus Christ. But what if it is true? is the question that he poses to cultures that decry the Christian position on man's redemption.

By the Rivers of Babylon presents the early life of the prophet Ezekiel, from his childhood to his service in the Temple to the Babylonian Captivity, where he was enslaved among the exiles along the River Chebar.

Joseph M. Scheidler has fought for the unborn since the Supreme Court allowed abortion on demand with its 1973 Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton rulings. He was the target of a lawsuit brought by the National Organization for Women under federal racketeering laws. Found guilty in 1998, Scheidler triumphed twice in appeals before the Supreme Court in 2003 and again in 2006.

Stephen LaPointe believed in Jesus. For him, the Bible was the only sufficient, firm foundation for his life. He wanted to obey God in all things, and had given up a career to become an ordained minister. He loved to preach the Word and knew that one day he would stand before God, accountable for everything he preached.

Rich in humor and culture, as well as passion and love for the cause of God and of man, Milestones is the early autobiography of Pope Benedict XVI, Joseph Ratzinger. It tells the fascinating and inspiring story of his early family life, the years under Nazi oppression in Germany, and his part in World War II—including how as a teenager, he was forced to join the Hitler Youth and German army, from which he risked his life to flee.

It is of vital importance that each individual soul recover this lost sense of sin and to begin the struggle to conquer the deadly sins that threaten his or her salvation. The Manual for Conquering Deadly Sin will help you do just that in your own life. As Fr. Kolinski makes clear, the truest medicine is found in the sacramental life of the church. But, in addition to the graces found in frequent confession and reception of the Eucharist, the Manual for Conquering Deadly Sin will be an indispensable aid in your fight.

Continuously popular since it first appeared in 1977, The Incorruptibles remains the acknowledged classic on the bodies of Saints that did not undergo decomposition after death, many remaining fresh and flexible for years, or even centuries. After explaining both natural and artificial mummification, the author shows that the incorruption of the Saints bodies fits into neither category but constitutes a much greater phenomenon which is unexplained by modern science even to this day.

In the 1960's, a French nurse, Marie Carré, attended an auto-crash victim who was brought into her hospital in a city she purposely does not name. The man lingered there near death for a few hours and then died. He had no identification on him, but he had a briefcase in which there was a set of quasi-autobiographical notes. She kept these notes and read them, and because of their extraordinary content, decided to publish them.

On a balmy day in April 1863, Union Colonel Abel D. Streight, at the head of a brigade of federal infantry, set out on a 220-mile ride to destroy the Western and Atlantic railroad at Rome, Georgia. The most fascinating thing about the raid is that Streight's brigade of four infantry regiments, almost 1,800 soldiers, was mounted on mules, a huge problem in itself; few of his men had ever ridden a horse, let alone a mule.

In this new revised edition of his groundbreaking work, Professor J. Budziszewski questions the modern assumption that moral truths are unknowable. With clear and logical arguments he rehabilitates the natural law tradition and restores confidence in a moral code based upon human nature. What We Can't Not Know explains the rational foundation of what we all really know to be right and wrong and shows how that foundation has been kicked out from under western society.

Saint John the Baptist: Priest, Prophet, and Martyr shows how, through Divine Providence, one man was uniquely destined to pave the way for the coming of Christ. In a world steeped in darkness, St. John emerged as a beacon of light, challenging the Pharisees and Sadducees and pointing those around him to “make straight the way of the Lord.

The sacrament of Matrimony is under diabolical attack. While it is easy to blame the outside world for the demise of marriage, we must look at what has been happening inside the Church. The number of marriages have dwindled over the past five decades and annulments have skyrocketed. Many in Church leadership have been indifferent to these alarming trends and to marriage itself. Matrimony is rarely referenced during homilies, pre-Cana programs are often disastrous, and seminaries spend little time studying the sacrament of Matrimony.

The "Rule" of St. Benedict was written in the sixth century by the father of monastic life, St. Benedict himself. It towers in the great tradition of Christian Monasticism. Its leading characteristics are its wonderful discretion, moderation, and keen insight into the capabilities and weaknesses of human nature. Here is a common sense approach to arranging life so that Christian spirituality and virtue can be lived out in any community settings - monastic or familial.

Mainstay author Fr. Paul O'Sullivan offers in The Wonders of the Mass an astounding guide to the meaning and reality of the sacred liturgy, quoting the saints and our Lord (via revelations to mystics). There is no capacity in which Fr. O'Sullivan fails to extol the Mass—for truly, because it is Jesus himself present in the Sacrament, we may offer the same praise to the Mass as to God.

Benedict surveys the social issues that confront the human race today—assaults on the dignity of the human person such as the attack on human life, poverty, issues of war and peace, terrorism, globalization, and environmental concerns. Benedict provides sound moral principles to address these social and economic problems, and to promote a culture of life and genuine peace. In this outstanding work, Pope Benedict shows us why so many observers regard him as the world's leading moral voice, as well as one of the most insightful and profound social/political thinkers of our day.

Meet young José and his friend Trino as the war breaks out in their hometown of Sahuayo. Follow José through his own struggles as the violence escalates, up to his joining the Cristero army in 1927 to fight for freedom of religion. Captured by government forces, José refused to deny his faith in exchange for his freedom.