St. Paul writes: “Pray without ceasing. In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you." ( 1 Thessalonians 5:17) How is this possible? How can we pray all the time? First of all, the Church has monastics, people who have made prayer their daily work. St. Silouan the Athonite writes: “Thanks to monastics, prayer continues unceasing on earth, and the whole world profits, for through prayer, the world continues to exist, but when prayer fails, the world will perish.” Claire Brandenburg's lovely picture book The Monk Who Grew Prayer illustrates the beauty of the monastic life for children as young as pre-school age. Secondly, there is the Jesus Prayer, wh

There must be a universal love for the Cinderella story in the heart of humankind because we can find so many versions among the peoples of the world. They all tell the same basic plot: a poor, downtrodden girl who is beautiful in spirit as well as in appearance gets to marry the prince who has perceived her beauty. Beyond the universal core, each individual story represents the colorful character of its culture. Ella's Big Chance, written and illustrated by Shirley Hughes, is a modern jazz-age tale. It is our family's favorite and not only because of Hughes' true to life character illustrations. All the classic elements, the evil stepmother and sisters, the fairy godmother and the lost slip

A Russian Cinderella Story: How the Tsar Chose His Bride Read this fascinating story from Russian history translated from the Russian by Nicholas Kotar, the young Russian American author of a fantasy series inspired by Russian folk tales: The Raven Son Series Kotar names Tolkien as one of his influences. I must say that the novelette The Rusty Blade which I received for subscribing to his blog comes very close in quality to Tolkien who is my measure for the best. Kotar's writing is strong, rich and strikingly beautiful. In my opinion, its sensual quality and violence make it unsuitable for young adults. Read his free sample story, free chapters of his new novel or listen to the free audio v

How I longed for the beautiful old hymns of the Roman Catholic Church to come back. We are Byzantine Catholics and are blessed with our Divine Liturgy which is entirely chanted and does not allow 'musical creativity', thanks be to God. However, on visits to Roman Catholic masses, I found that even when the old hymns were sung, most parishioners did not know them well. Here is a wonderful site helping to remedy the situation: If you sign up - for free - , the Traditional Catholic Living website and facebook page will teach you one traditional Catholic hymn per month with a beautiful PDF print out and audio to for those who don't read music. It cannot get any better than this. What a great hom

The Forerunners of Christ with Saints and Martyrs (about 1423-24) by Fra Angelico: What does the Catholic Church teach about Halloween? This question comes up every year when the pumpkins and spiders appear on grocery store shelves. The question is often avoided because we all know how much our kids love to dress up and go trick or treating. Are they worshipping Satan as many fellow Christians warn us? The Church teaches about Halloween as a feast day of the Roman Catholic liturgical year. Halloween is the abbreviated name of All Hallows Eve. The word 'Hallows' is a synonym for ''Saints. The modern translation for Halloween would thus be the Vigil of All Saints Day. Halloween is a feast day