Category: Death
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Jesus on the Resurrection of the Dead
About the Work: In the Gospel of Matthew (22:23-33), we find Jesus engaged with the Sadducees, one of the four schools of Jewish thought at the time. The Sadducees were sympathetic to – and in time, would be absorbed into – the Greek culture around them. They denied that there would be a Resurrection and…
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Augustine, Confessions
About the Author: Augustine of Hippo was born in Roman North Africa in the year 354. After spending several years as a Manichee, he was led to the Catholic faith by Neo-Platonist philosophy and the preaching of St. Ambrose of Milan. All the while, Augustine’s mother, St. Monica, was praying for his homecoming. Augustine tells…
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From the Book of Revelation, Chapter 20, Verses 11 – 12
11 Then I saw a great white throne and him who sat upon it; from his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. 12 And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Also another book was opened, which is the book of life.…
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A Last Word
We close this edition of Tradition Magazine by giving the last word again to the poet Richard Crashaw (1613–49). Lord, when the sense of thy sweet graceSends up my soul to seek thy face.Thy blessed eyes breed such desire,I dy in love’s delicious Fire.O love, I am thy Sacrifice.Be still triumphant, blessed eyes.Still shine on…
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“Death’s Lament” by Ephrem the Syrian
About the Author: Ephrem the Syrian was born around 306 in the city of Nisibis in Syria. He served as a deacon and is credited as the founder of the School of Nisibis, which would later become a centre of learning for Eastern Syriac Christianity. Ephrem is known as the “Harp of the Spirit” on…
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To Die Is Gain
About the Author: Aaron P. Debusschere is the husband of one and father of three. He holds degrees in philosophy, theology, and education, and is currently completing a dissertation on the Augustinian roots of Vatican II’s ecclesiology. He blogs with his wife at www.theromanticcatholic.wordpress.com. — Persons of the dialogue Socrates, Paul, Luke, Crito Scene The Prison…
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The Great Miscalculation
About the Text: The Apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus contains an account of the harrowing of Hell, Christ’s triumphant entry into the underworld after the crucifixion. In the Gospel of Nicodemus, we view Hell and Satan from an unusual perspective. Hell speaks to Satan and rebukes him for his foolishness in his part in the death of Christ, which…
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“An Epitaph upon Husband and Wife”
About the Author: Richard Crashaw, born in London around 1612 and was the son of the rabidly anti-Catholic Puritan polemicist, William Crashaw. Drawn to the beauty of Catholic doctrine and practice, Richard became a High Church Anglican priest, known for his devotion to Mary and penchant for Catholic vestments. When Oliver Cromwell seized power in…
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“The Recommendation”
Richard Crashaw (1613–49) These houres, and that which hovers o’re my End,Into thy hands, and hart, lord, I commend. Take Both to Thine Account, that I and mineIn that Hour, and in these, may be all thine. That as I dedicate my devoutest BreathTo make a kind of Life for my lord’s Death, So from…
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Pascal, Selections from the Pensées
About the Author: Blaise Pascal was born in Clermont, France, in 1623 to a devout Catholic family. Though his father and sister dabbled in Jansenism, Pascal himself had something of a mystical experience at the age of thirty-one, which prompted something of a “conversion.” T.S. Elliot describes him as “one of the greatest physicists and…