Articles for formation package

In Christianity, the primary purpose of marriage is not the birth of children-- St. Augustine says it aptly, and it is also the doctrine of Tertullian, who has been called "the father of Latin Christianity" and "the founder of Western theology." The main purpose of...

You have accustomed us to look upon you as the meeting point, the counselor and the friend of the young Christians; your past goodness has given us the right to count on your future goodness; those you have had with me make me expect similar ones for my friends....

At that time, a number of philosophical and heterodox doctrines were stirring around us, and we felt the desire and need to strengthen our faith amid the attacks that came from the various schools of false science. Some of our young friends were materialistic; some...

When I say "Let us go over to the barbarians," I am asking that we do as Pope [Pius IX], that we [...] deal with the people, who have too many needs and few rights, who rightly demand a greater part in public affairs, guarantees for work and against the misery, that...

It's time to share and retrieve our good; I mean: the old and popular ideas of justice, charity, fraternity. It's time to show that we can defend the cause of the proletariat, engage in relief classes suffering, and pursue the abolition of pauperism, without agreeing...

I believe in the progress of Christian times. I do not fear the falls and the gaps which may interrupt it: the chilly nights which follow the hot days do not prevent the summer from following its course and ripening its fruits. [.] When the barbarians levelled the...

In those times we found ourselves invaded by a avalanche of heterodox doctrines and philosophies that were confronting us all around, and we felt the need to strengthen our faith in the midst of the assaults made upon it by the various false systems of knowledge. Some...

God did not make the poor. […] It is human liberty that makes the poor. […] We have put crushing taxes on salt, meat, and all necessaries of life. […] When it was a question of crushing out the last embers of the insurrection, there was no need of delays and...

Help is humiliating when it appeals to men from below, taking heed of their material wants only, paying no attention but to those of the flesh, to the cry of hunger and cold, to what excites pity, to what one succors even in the beasts. [...] It humiliates when there...