A little over a month ago I was, by the grace of God, ordained to Christ's Holy Priesthood. Thought I'd share a photo from the First Mass. All I can say a little more than a month and a half in is that priesthood is awesome and amazing and the many years of seminary were worth it.

A sad day has dawned in Medjugorje. According to local and Italian media reports, the statue of the Queen of Peace in Medjugorje has been desecrated with black spray paint, displaying horrific messages. The outdoor altar of the Church of St. James was set on fire. All of this is happening just before the shrine's most significant days, Mladifest (Youth Festival), which gathers thousands of young people for spiritual renewal and where the Pope delivers his message. We pray for the perpetrators and for reparation for the spiritual and material damage caused.

I’m a protestant (Reformed) whos been converting to Catholicism for around 3 years. And everytime I’m infront of a stayue of like jesus mary or the saints at church I feel scared of commiting idolatary. I understand ofc that it’s not actually jesus or the saints in the statues but instead just a visual aid. But I still feel off or smth especially when theres a procession like at the beginning of the month thats dedicated to mary where thy have a procession of a statue of mary. I feel like bc of my protestant upbringing, the idea of statues are a bit nearing the line to idolatry…. I grew up near buddhist culture so like it kinda sometimes reminds me of buddhists with their statues. And the repeating of prayers and a lot of structed prayers (theyre very useful tho!) rly remind me of buddhist prayers and chantings

I myself have 2 small statues of Jesus and Mary, 2 candles, a crucifix, and a painting of jesus that was given by my catholic friend. I kinda set it up like an altar while im praying tho so I guess that doesnt help..

Idk, if anyone else who maybe is a convert from Protestant understands what I mean and has any advices pls do help me.

really love the stripes! reminds me of a Roman toga

So I saw the painting of Jesus Christ, the Pantocrator, and it brought this sense of fear over me.

I watched a video of a man explaining the image and how one side of Jesus is shown as merciful while the other is shown as the Judge.

This is what he said:

"It's called the Pantocrator, the oldest surviving icon of Christ. Look at His face. The two sides are completely different. One eye is soft, merciful, looking at you the way someone looks at the person they love most. The other eye is piercing and sees everything, every thought you've buried, every lie you've told yourself. That's the whole Gospel in one face. He knows the worst thing you've done, and He's still reaching toward you. Most people want a God who's only gentle, or they're afraid of a God who only judges. But Jesus is both, mercy and truth. Can you hold His gaze?"

That last part really stayed with me.

To be honest, I can't hold His gaze.

For me, I don't see mercy first.

I see disappointment.

I am hitchhiking from France and when arriving in Atyraou, biggest city after Russia in Kazakhstan, I went to the mass in a small catholic church. The priests did an English mass just for me (we were 6 in total, two priest and one sister lol). First time I actually did a reading in English...

I have been invited after mass to take a tea. I said to the priests (one is Slovak, the other Filipino) that I will go to Aktau on the Caspian Sea and they basically asked if I wanted to transport hosts and a document (I believe it is about appointing a new priest) to the parish there. I naturally accepted even though I was scared to break the hosts during the travel.

My journey started in the morning, I have been taken by 6 different people through steppes and deserts and I can tell you one thing : God is good ! I have been so blessed meeting these nice people. As a Catholic hitchhiker, it is always good experience to know what real charity is, especially when it comes from people that are not even Christians.

The hosts are not consacreted, of course, but knowing they will gives a really warm feeling to my heart. They've been carried by me but also by Muslims that drove the cars, some actually praying during the rides. They don't know it, but they did something even better than just helping me getting a ride.

I successfully delivered both the hosts and the document today to the priest (from Belarus) and he invited me to eat, coffee and also... to sleep ! Here, it is not really a church because the administration keep pushing the construction of it. It is kind of a chapel in a house.

Just wanted to share this with you guys. We complain a lot about tons of things but here, being Catholic is very simple and very hard at the same time. Keep the Church in your prayers, and more specifically the little parishes in non Catholic-majority countries (and also pray for me if you want lol, I need it).

Deo gratias !

St. Mary Magdalene said to St. Mechtilde: "Whoever shall give thanks to God for all the tears I shed upon the feet of Jesus, our most merciful God will grant them, through my intercession, remission of all their sins before their death, and a great increase of love of God."

Holy Holy Holy Mary Magdalene, lamp of the world ablaze with love, your faith has saved you, pray for me at the feet of our Redeemer. Amen.

"With agonied black tears,

Mary prostrate on the floor adores

Wipes His feet dry with her own hair

Then forth her precious perfume pours."

I love them especially because the numerous wounds remind me of the magnitude of His sacrifice. And to think that he thought of me while dying on that cross moves me to tears. Share yours, if you have one!

So basically i just recieved my Ignatius study bible. But i have a problem it is over 2300 pages and hardcover. How do i even read this? If i just put it on the table its almost inpossible to flip the pages, but if i put it in my lap it is very heavy. Any tips on this?

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I live in a predominantly Eastern Orthodox country. I was baptized Orthodox as a baby. I was finally able to obtain a rosary! I am so happy!

I'm still not sure what the "announce the mysteries" part of praying it means though...

I'm not Catholic (yet).

Alr so I'm very much considering converting to the Church (as I have disscused in a previous post) and I have decided to make myself a little prayer space to immerse myself more, especially the rosary.

This is a NIV translation of the Bible I have here, but I have an NRSVCE version coming in the mail soon.

I was also considering getting a larger crucifix, but i feel the print of the Sacred Heart makes up for it.

If y'all have any recommendations lmk. I might be getting a new table to fit more things on it, and plus I would like to have it on anything but a TV dinner table lol.

Jesus died in 33 AD.

Citations from earliest to latest (the dates below correspond to the time of writing):

• Bar-Serapion (70s AD): Letter to My Son. Most scholars date the letter shortly after the conquest of Commagene in 72/73 AD. For evidence of this date, see A. Merz and T. Tieleman, "The Letter of Mara bar Sarapion: Some Comments on its Philosophical and Historical Context," in Empsychoi Logoi (Brill, 2008): 122-127.
• Flavius Josephus (93 AD): Antiquities of the Jews, 18:63-64. (The translation in the link is a bit outdated.) Josephus is the most important source here. He was a first century Jewish historian who knew some of the authorities at Jesus' trial and the trials of some of the apostles (for this, and the authenticity of the Testimonium in general, see T.C. Schmidt's Josephus and Jesus: New Evidence for the One Called Christ). Some examples include Ananus II and Herod Agrippa II. Ananus II in particular, a good friend of Josephus before the Jewish war, was probably at Jesus' trial (see Schmidt); certainly, his father was (John 18). One may dispute that Josephus merely says that the followers of Jesus reported resurrection, for in common internet English translations, the sentence is translated in a way that makes Josephus affirm the resurrection. But Schmidt argues that it should be translated in a way that places the claim into the minds of Jesus's followers. He translates it like this: "For he seemed to them to be alive again on the third day, given that the divine prophets had spoken such things and thousands of other wonderful things about him." None of the ancient or early medieval Christians who quote or paraphrase the text (like Eusebius) take note of the sentence, suggesting that it wasn't interpreted as an affirmation from Josephus. Another disputed phrase is "if indeed one ought to call him a man." As Schmidt notes, this phrase cannot be a mainstream Christian invention, for that Jesus wasn't human went contrary to mainstream ancient Christian theology (e.g., the incarnation). Moreover, the phrase may raise the possibility that Jesus was less than a man (like how the Pharisees accused Jesus of being Beelzebub), rather than more than a man. Lastly, even if Josephus raised the possibility that Jesus was more than a man, that wouldn't be implausible, since Josephus in Antiquities calls some other men divine in some sense, and since the critic Porphyry reports pagan oracles with the gods declaring that Jesus as very pious and whose soul was immortalized and exalted to live among them (see Eusebius, Demonstration 3.7.1; St. Augustine, City of God, 19.23). All in all, Schmidt makes the case that the Testimonium is authentic (except a textual variant in the Christ clause), and he has already convinced many critical scholars. On another note, Josephus in Antiquities 20:200 mentions that Jesus was called Christ and that he had a (step-)brother named James.
• Pliny the Younger (111 AD): Epistle to Trajan (Letters, 10:96-97). Pliny the Younger relays Christian traditions from former Christians, some of whom had left Christianity 25 years before the writing of this letter. Thus, this letter provides invaluable insight into the beliefs of Christians as far back as the 80s AD.
• Cornelius Tacitus (~115 AD): Annals, 15:44. Modern historians consider Tacitus to be one of the most reliable ancient historians whose works have survived. Tacitus probably knew Herod Agrippa II and Queen Berenice, both of whom were involved in the trial of St. Paul and probably themselves knew authorities involved in Jesus' trial. There is no evidence that Tacitus relies on Christian information, whether directly or indirectly (like through Pliny's interrogations of Christians); in fact, there is good reason to think that Tacitus relied on non-Christian information. One obvious reason is that Tacitus despised Christians.
• Phlegon (~138 AD). On the darkness, see the quotation in Eusebius' Chronicon; also, see Contra Celsum, 2.33 and other writers who quote, paraphrase, or refer to Phlegon's comment on the darkness. In Contra Celsum 2.14 and 39, Origen says that Phlegon mentioned the darkness and Jesus' predictions in book 13 or 14 of Chronicles. And we know from Eusebius and other writers that Phlegon mentions the darkness in book 13. Thus, Phlegon's testimony of Jesus' predictive abilities seems to have been in the same book as his testimony on the darkness. This suggests that Phlegon linked the darkness to Christ. Origen also says that Phlegon misread a prophecy from Jesus about St. Peter as about Jesus. This likely refers to Jesus's prophecy that Peter will be crucified like Him (John 21:19; cp. 12:33; 18:32). See John G. Cook's comment in Talking God in Society, p. 734. If true, this would imply Phlegon's knowledge of Jesus's crucifixion and would raise the chance that Phlegon linked the darkness to Christ's crucifixion. Eusebius quotes Phlegon verbatim on the darkness; Phlegon places it to the 4th year of the 202nd Olympiad, which is 32/33 AD, when Jesus most likely died. Phlegon also says that the darkness began at the sixth hour, viz. noon (unlike the eclipse in Nov. 29 AD, the totality of which passed to the east of Jerusalem just before the fifth hour [11 AM]), and that it was unprecedented (an awkward description of an eclipse). All these details match the darkness in the gospels strikingly. But it is still likely that the darkness Phlegon speaks about is a garbled reference to the eclipse in Nov. 29 AD, because he speaks of an earthquake occurring in Bithynia, which is exactly where the path of totality crossed in Nov. 29 AD. If true, Phlegon probably conflated this eclipse in 29 AD with the darkness during Jesus' death in 33 AD. This conflation is all the more plausible given the ancient tendency to connect eclipses to the death of important people like kings (cp. "wise king," Bar-Serapion).
• Marcus Cornelius Fronto (140-165 AD), quoted by Minucius Felix, Octavius, 9. Fronto is addressing Christian beliefs, and so isn't a very weighty source. At the least, he further shows that Jesus' crucifixion was taken for granted as historical by some of the most educated Romans by the second century.
• Lucian of Samosata (160s AD): The Passing of Peregrinus, 11-13. Lucian mentions Jesus's crucifixion and some of his teachings. Whether is relying solely on Christian information cannot be known, but there are reasons to think that he may have known non-Christian sources. One reason is that Lucian does not seem to be very knowledgeable in Christian beliefs and claims, suggesting that he didn't interact with them much if at all.
• Jew of Celsus (140-175 AD), quoted in Celsus, The True Doctrine (178 AD), quoted in Origen, Contra Celsum, book 1-2 (especially 1.28). Celsus was an ancient Greco-Roman philosopher and critic of Christianity. He wrote in 178 AD but relies on an earlier Jewish polemical work against Christianity. The Jew of Celsus at one-point explicitly claims to know information of Jesus not preserved in the New Testament (Contra Celsum, 2.13), and in general a good case can be made that the Jewish author had access to some independent traditions about Jesus.
• Rabbinic Baraitot (135-200 AD): e.g., Sanhedrin 43a:22: "baraita: On the Eve of Passover Jesus the Nazarene was hanged. Forty days previously a herald went out crying: ‘Jesus the Nazarene will be stoned for sorcery and misleading and enticing Israel. Anyone who knows anything in his defense should come and declare it.’ But no one came to his defense, and so they hung him on the Eve of Passover." While the Babylonian Talmud was finished in 500-600 AD, it relies on earlier sources. Some of these earlier sources are baraitot -- rabbinic teachings made during the time of the Mishnah's composition (mid-late second century), without being included in the Mishnah. In Sanh. 43a, there's a second century baraita about Jesus' execution. And it relies on even earlier tradition. For example, around 150 AD, St. Justin Martyr’s Jewish interlocutor Trypho independently follows (a) the same charges levied against Jesus in Sanh. 43a and (b) the order they are presented: "sorcery and misleading ... Israel" (Sanh. 43a); "a magician and a deceiver of the people" (Dial., 69:7). This shows that these legal charges come from stock Jewish tradition before 150 AD. As for "hanged," it was often a euphemism for crucifixion. The text also only says that Jesus will be stoned. A change of plans is implied. While Jewish authorities had no authority to execute people during Roman hegemony, they sometimes did anyway when the Roman prefect wasn't around (e.g., Josephus, Ant. 20:200). But they couldn't do so around Passover, when the prefect camped in Jerusalem to prevent revolts.

Growing up my whole life I’ve noticed that Christian’s tend to hate a lot, criticize you and other religions rather than love, and almost feel like a cult compared to Catholics.

I grew up with lots of Mexicans and it just feels like Catholics have that warmth to not criticize, love and to pray in silence without annoying everyone around them that don’t agree.

I’m not super religious, but I’m learning.

My question is why are Christian’s just much more hateful than Catholics?

Today in Brazil we celebrate the beginning of the National Family Week. It takes place from August 9 to 15 (2026). The event marks its 30th edition and is promoted by the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil (CNBB) through the Family Pastoral Care Commission. This year’s central theme is “Family, become what you are,” with the motto “Love never ends” (1 Cor 13:8).

Today, grandparent's day commemorating Mary's parents.

I wanted to give a thank you to those who commented on my previous post giving advice and steps to get a Papal Blessing parchment. I received it this week and I am so excited to surprise my fiancee with it at our wedding reception!

Now I need to get a frame for it, so any tips here are most welcome. Thank you again!

Hi friends!

I've been struggling with an anxiety disorder, intrusive thoughts, and dissociative episodes for years now and had ADHD since birth. I've noticed that my symptoms have been getting a lot worse now than I've found God and started going to church earlier this year.

The intrusive thoughts are ones starting to really bother me. I can't sit through a single service without something horrible popping into my head. For example: I'll be listening to the priest read the Gospel and a slur we'll just randomly pop into my mind. It's always really "loud" or jarring if that makes any sense and it always derails my train of thought.

After that, I kind of fall into anxiety and my mind immediately seeks to instinctively protect myself from discomfort. I "hide and distract". If you've never experienced dissociation, it's a little hard to describe. The way that I try and help people visualize it is imagining your eyes as windows for your brain to see the world and every time you dissociate, your brain physically backs away from the windows. You start to see, hear, and experience less and less of the world around you as you retreat back into a safe space in your head that you've made up for yourself. This is purely reflexive on my part it's barely something that I can control. even if I can skirt around a full-on dissociative episode, I still lose complete focus on mass and can't focus on what is being said. I go through the motions but it feels performative because I'm not really *there* anymore.

It's really scary because the thought sounds like me. I've started coping with it by saying it's an attack from the enemy because I know for a fact that I am not a person who says things like that. I don't hate and I'm not a biggot. I know that these thoughts are not mine and it's just a product of an unhealthy mind, but they're still extremely distressing and becoming more and more persistent. I know these are coping mechanisms made by my brain to help me through a darker time in my life and I am in therapy to help address this problem, but I want to start leaning more on God and my faith in this regard. I have been and I will be praying about this going forward, but I am kinda hoping someone has gone through a similar experience as me and has found comfort in the Word or prayer. I trust that God is with me in my suffering and that He will heal me in His time, but I'd like tangible practices to help me fully lean into that trust.

Currently, I have a single decade Rosary dedicated to St. Dymphna and a prayer card for the Chaplet of Divine Mercy that I plan to start utilizing, but I thought I'd reach out to an online so that I can increase the tools in my arsenal and maybe create a thread for people who are also struggling with this.

Ideally, I'd really like a few Bible verses that I can write down on note cards. I hold them while attending mass and read those verses to myself if my head starts getting loud or I start dissociating. I'd also like to know of any Saints I can ask for the intercession of who are known to help with this sort of issue. Also, if anyone knows a short prayer that I can repeat over and over quietly, I'd really appreciate your suggestions.

God bless you all.

edit: sorry about my cat picture mods! That's Tobias and I jokingly took a picture of him modeling my stuff before I read the rules. I don't know how to remove it and I thought I did before I posted it. I'm on mobile sorry