Alice von Hildebrand once offered Father Benedict Groeschel a striking way of contemplating the mystery of Bethlehem. The Blessed Virgin did not suffer the ordinary physical pains of childbirth when she brought forth the Son of God, yet this did not mean that the Nativity was without sorrow for His Mother.

Fr. Scott A. Haynes High on the Holy Mountain of Athos, within the ancient walls of the Serbian monastery of Hilandar, there is an icon unlike almost any other in the Christian world. The Mother of God holds the Christ Child close to her, just as she does in countless Byzantine images, yet anyone who pauses to look carefully will soon notice something extraordinary: beneath the familiar image appears a third hand. That additional hand belongs to an ancient story of persecuti

As a patron of confessors, St. Raymond Nonnatus is a saint who suffered greatly for God's kingdom.

The miraculous image of Our Lady in Czestochowa, Poland, is believed to have been created by St. John sometime after the Crucifixion.

Annually, on August 29, we remember how St. John the Baptist was beheaded under Herod's order.