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My Name is Jonas

A 30-something Catholic single guy carrying the wheel

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Journey

Catholic Jonas in My Name is Jonas

Jul 24, 2017

Mortification

St. Gregory the Great recounts a story about St. Benedict in his Life and Miracles of St. Benedict regarding Benedict’s being besieged with lustful thoughts while in seclusion. Determined to defeat them, he cast himself, naked, into a thorn bush and rolled around until his pleasure had turned to pain.

Catholic Jonas in My Name is Jonas

Jul 14, 2017

Civility

I wrote a bit about my thoughts on Fr. James Martin’s approach to handling the issue of gay and lesbian Catholics in the Church a couple weeks ago. I was somewhat critical of the Jesuit spiritual writer’s more recent work in that regard, but I believe I maintained a tone that was constructive and respectful…

Catholic Jonas in My Name is Jonas

Jul 8, 2017

Memory

I just returned home from a week in the mountains, visiting family for the Fourth of July holiday. It was incredibly relaxing, and the cooler temperatures were a welcome respite from the muggy heat we’ve been afflicted with so far here at home. I was fortunate to spend some good quality time with my grandmother…

Catholic Jonas in My Name is Jonas

Jun 26, 2017

Gay

Two years ago today, on June 26, 2015, I picked up my phone to see multiple alerts from news outlets announcing that the Supreme Court of the United States had issued its ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, the “gay marriage” case. The Court surmised, unsurprisingly, that the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States…

Catholic Jonas in My Name is Jonas

Jun 22, 2017

Loser

I recently started a rewatch of the Denis Leary firefighter series Rescue Me on Hulu. In one episode in season 3, one of the characters, Lt. Ken “Lou” Shea, has fallen on the hardest of times and, full of equal parts despair and vodka, decides to take his own life. He stumbles onto some train tracks, planning to use…

Catholic Jonas in My Name is Jonas

Jun 20, 2017

Hours

I was in the back seat of a car on a 8 hour drive to a mission trip in Appalachia. I pulled out my copy of Christian Prayer, and my new friend asked me, “Why did you start praying the Liturgy of the Hours?”

”Because daily Mass isn’t enough,” I responded.

Catholic Jonas in My Name is Jonas

Jun 17, 2017

Corpus

Today is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ. It is this (liturgical) weekend 2 years ago that I, for the first time in roughly 15 years, returned fully to the Church through the Sacrament of Reconciliation, and in that regard it is the anniversary of a watershed moment in my life.