Who is the Holy Spirit?

On the feast of Pentecost, the Church celebrates the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles. Who is the Holy Spirit? What was the descent of the Holy Spirit like? How does He act in the lives of Christians? What are the gifts of the Holy Spirit? Tags: Holy Spirit, Prayer, Blessed Trinity

Why do we love our Lady?

To come into the world, God chose to rely on the free cooperation of a human being, Mary, to be the mother of his Son through the work of the Holy Spirit. How did God choose Mary? How did she conceive the Son of God? Why do we call Mary Virgin and Mother? Tags: Doctrine, Holy Spirit, Church, Jesus Christ, Our Lady, Year of Faith

Why 40 days of Lent?

St Josemaria said: “Lent should suggest to us these basic questions: Am I advancing in my faithfulness to Christ, in my desire for holiness, in a generous apostolate in my daily life, in my ordinary work among my colleagues? Each one of us, silently, should answer these questions, and we will see that we need to change again if Christ is to live in us, if Jesus’ image is to be reflected clearly in our behaviour.” Tags: Prayer

Why did the Son of God become man?

In the Creed, we say “I believe in Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary…” But why did God the Son become man? Why is he called Jesus Christ? What does the mystery of the Incarnation mean? Does it make sense to venerate pictures and figures of Jesus in the Crib? Tags: Doctrine, Year of Faith

Who and what is man? Why was he created, and what for?

We know from the Book of Genesis that “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; man and woman he created them”. But what does being created “in the image of God” mean? Who is man in actual fact? Why were human beings created, and what are we for? Are we just one kind of creature among many? Where are our souls? Tags: Doctrine, Faith

Why is the Pope Peter?

As Catholics we profess obedience to the Pope as the legitimate successor of St Peter, and we see him as our Lord Jesus Christ’s representative here on earth. Some people today ask, “Why should we obey the Pope? He’s just a human being, isn’t he?” “Does being infallible mean that the Pope can’t make a mistake?” This article is a collection of answers to questions like these, and other quotations from St Josemaria explaining the love Catholics should have for the Head of the Church: “Love for the Roman Pontiff should be a beautiful passion in us, because in him we see Christ.” Tags: Pope, Pope Benedict XVI

What does "I believe in God, One and Three" mean?

What is God like?
The Blessed Trinity is the mystery of God in himself, the central mystery of Christian faith and life. What does it mean in practice to say “I believe in God, One and Three”? How can we relate to each of the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity individually? Tags: Faith, God

What do we celebrate at Christmas?

Francisco Varo

This day shall light shine upon us; for the Lord is born to us. This is the great announcement which moves Christians today... What do we celebrate at Christmas? What do we really know about Jesus? When and how was he born? A team of theologians and historians at the University of Navarre (Spain), answer these questions. Tags: Doctrine, Jesus Christ, Holy Family

Why was Jesus condemned to death?

Francisco Varo

Jesus of Nazareth was becoming a more and more controversial figure as his public ministry progressed. The religious leaders in Jerusalem were uneasy about the commotion that had been aroused among the people by the arrival of this teacher from Galilee for the Paschal feast. Tags: Doctrine, Holy Week

What happened at the Last Supper?

Francisco Varo

Joachim Jeremias says that this is one of the best-testified episodes in his whole life. At the Last Supper, Jesus was alone with his twelve Apostles (Mt 26:20; Mk 14:17, 20; Lk 22:14) Tags: Doctrine, Church, Jesus Christ

How can the Resurrection of Jesus be explained?

Francisco Varo

Christ’s resurrection is a historically documented event. The Apostles bore witness to what they had seen and heard. Around the year 57 AD, St Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve” (1 Cor 15:3-5). Tags: Doctrine, Jesus Christ

Who was Caiaphas?

Francisco Varo

In 1990 two ossuaries were discovered in the Talpiyot necropolis at Jerusalem. One of them bore the inscription “Yosef bar Kayafa”, the name attributed to Caiaphas by Josephus. Tags: Doctrine, Easter, Holy Week

What was the Sanhedrin?

Francisco Varo

The Sanhedrin was the supreme court of the Jewish Law, whose function was to administer justice by interpreting and applying both the oral and written tradition of the Torah. At the same time it represented the Jewish people before the Roman authorities. Tags: Doctrine, Holy Week

How did Jesus die?

Francisco Varo

Jesus died, nailed to a cross, on the 14th day of Nisan, Friday April 7 in the year 30 AD. This can be deduced from a critical analysis of the Gospel accounts compared with the allusions to his death contained in the Talmud (cf. Sanhedrin 6, 1; fol. 43a). Tags: Doctrine, Faith

Could Jesus’ body have been stolen?

Francisco Varo

When people who did not want to accept that Jesus had risen from the dead saw that the tomb where his body had been laid was empty, the first thing that occurred to them to think and say was that his body had been stolen (cf. Mt 28:11-15). Tags: Doctrine