As always, we’ve been working diligently to bring you new Catholic resources and so, without further ado, here are some great new items we are featuring this week -

We just added some beautiful Florentine Art, typically known as Florentine plaques, made in Italy. These “plaques” come in a variety of sizes and prices, so don’t be scared off by the price of the one we’re featuring - the St. Michael the Archangel Florentine Plaque:

This past week we added a new music supplier - they feature the work of the Santo Domingo de Silos monks - the same monks who had the blockbuster bestseller Chant CD come out a few years ago. Here is an example, the monk’s Ave Maria CD:

Although it still seems a bit early in the year for this, we received notification of the publication of 2009 Ordos from their publisher. The books will be shipping in early October, but its a good thing to pre-order your copy now. As they say, “he who hesitates is lost” and we did have quite a few customers order too late last year and they weren’t able to get a copy of the Ordo for their diocese. We also know “tempus volat” so get your copy while you are thinking about it. Each year the publisher, Paulist Press, sells out of Ordos quite early. That seems to be their plan - and, yes, the books are pink this year.

The Vatican Library Collection features a huge assortment of beautiful reproduction items, including jewelry, rosary boxes, bookmarks, key rings, and so very much more. This week we are featuring their key rings and key fobs. Here is the St. Christopher one:

Finally, more Catholic audio books are becoming available all the time and we applaud this effort on the part of the publishers! Audio books make a great gift for someone who has a long commute or for someone who may have vision problems. The grandmother of one of our staff members was an avid reader all her life - near the end of her life she was no longer able to read due to the loss of keen vision, so audio books were very important to her in her last few years. This week, Chesterton’s Orthodoxy was released as an audio book. If you’ve never listened to an audio book before, this would be a good one to start off with. You can’t beat Chesterton!

Thanks for reading. We hope you have a great week. Check back with us next Monday and we’ll go over more new products with you then. God bless.

I have heard the words obscene and excessive thrown around a lot in regards to his and other celebrities’ salaries and think that a couple of points need to be made to put this in perspective.

First, this isn’t a socialist country where wages are regulated to keep everyone on the same level. Democrats would like to move in that direction by taxing the “rich” so they can fund social welfare programs for the “poor”. But all in all, we live in a country where people are free to ask for as much as they want for a salary and as long as someone is willing to pay them, get what they ask for.

Second, the only people I hear talking about Rush’s “obscene” salary are those who make less money. I don’t hear any football players, Tiger Woods or George Strait complaining about Rush’s salary. What it really comes down to is simple envy.

The other problem with this mentality is the unspoken notion that “Somebody should DO something about this!” I mean, if it isn’t fair for someone to make so much money, isn’t it for the best that the government passes a law to keep things fair? If you think that is far fetched, just listen to the congressional hearings every time the oil companies are dragged in. Or better yet, listen to our presidential candidates talk about windfall taxes or the loony notion presented by Cynthia McKinney that the oil industry should be nationalized. Businesses don’t seem terribly bothered when this happens because it is the oil companies and they are in the unfortunate position of being needed and vilified at the same time. Just remember that if the government can seize oil company assets because the profits are “obscene” they have a precedent for seizing assets and can much more easily come up with reasons in the future. What if the government decides that your Catholic store is making too much money when compared to other religious stores in the area? If they can seize profits already, why not pass a law to make things fair by seizing your profits and giving them to another store or better yet, to your local Homosexual and Lesbian group that seems to be underfunded?

There are very few times where government interference in business matters is a good thing. Just remember that next time you think that someone is making too much money, because it won’t be long before the bar for “too much” gets lowered to include you.

Summer should be a time for you to work ON your business instead of IN your business. You know, focus on planning and improvement instead of the day-to-day of paying bills and ringing up sales. Here are some suggestions for Summer planning:

• Look at your bestsellers from the previous Christmas. What were they? Did you sell out?  Did you have more demand than supply? Do you need to update prices?
• Look at the list you created last Christmas of items / product lines that you didn’t carry. If you didn’t make a list last year, get in the habit now of keeping track of things people ask for that you don’t have. It will help you notice them as you look through vendor catalogs. If you can find them and carry them this year, it will also improve your sales.
• Go through your list of ways you gather customer contact information. If you don’t have a list, start one. Figure out how you are going to take advantage of the upcoming Christmas season to greatly expand your list of contacts. If you can get email addresses, all the better because sending email newsletters is almost free.
• Look at the marketing you did last Christmas. What worked? Do you have any way of telling what worked? If you don’t, make a plan for keeping track of every sale source. If the hundred dollars a month you spend on yellow page ads isn’t bringing in business, why are you spending $100 a month?
• Clean up your store. It is amazing how quickly a store can get in a rut. Years can pass before you know it and your shelves are dusty, the posters in your window are faded and customers get into a habit of skipping sections of your store because they “already know what’s there”.  Move things around. Replace burned out and dying lights. Fix your fixtures. Sort your bookshelves.
• Set goals for the second half of the year. How many pastors are you going to try and meet? What organizations are you part of that will let you promote your business? How many times are you going to contact local shoppers?

Hopefully, this list will help you treat Summer as a great time to strengthen your business instead of a time to sit back, or worse, wait in dispair for the end of Summer.

With the inauguration of the Pauline Year by Pope Benedict XVI, many are asking the question - what is a Jubilee year or a Holy year?  

The celebration of a Jubilee as a special year of remission of sins and universal pardon has its origins in the Biblical book of Leviticus, in chapter 25, verses 8-55. A Jubilee year is mentioned to occur every fifty years, in which slaves and prisoners would be freed, debts would be forgiven and the mercies of God would be particularly manifest. The year of Jubilee in both the Jewish and Christian traditions is a time of joy - a year of remission or universal pardon. In Mosaic law, each fiftieth year was to be celebrated as a jubilee year, and that at this season every household should recover its absent members, the land return to its former owners, the Hebrew slaves be set free, and debts be remitted. The same conception, spiritualized, forms the basis of the Christian Jubilee. Christian Jubilees, particularly in the Catholic tradition, generally involve pilgrimage to a sacred site, normally the city of Rome. At various times in Church history, they have been celebrated every 50 or 25 years.

To read more of this article, please click here.

A pallium is a little-known vestment bestowed on an archbishop by a pope. This year in Rome Pope Benedict gave a pallium to 43 new archbishops who were elevated within the last year, including three from the United States: the archbishops of Baltimore, St. Paul, and Mobile.

In the most ancient image we have of Jesus, He is depicted as the Good Shepherd with a lamb on His shoulders. And so the pallium is a wool garment worn around the neck like a scarf, symbolizing a lamb. Every year on the feast of St. Agnes two sheep are blessed and shorn and the wool is woven by nuns to make the material. Five red crosses are then embroidered onto the pallium representing the five wounds of Jesus. These crosses serve as a reminder that while an archbishop is to care for his flock, he must also be ready to suffer and even die in defense of the Faith.

Once the pallia have been made they are placed in a gold box and placed in the crypt of St. Peter’s on top of St. Peter’s tomb. Many people who visit the crypt think the gold box contains the bones of the saint, but his bones are actually in the larger tomb underneath. The box is placed on the tomb to signify the unity an archbishop must have with the See of Peter as well as faithfulness to the gospel.

When it is time to present the pallia to the archbishops, the Pope processes to the crypt and removes the gold box. As shown in the picture, Pope Benedict also wears the pallium. This vestment may be worn by the Pope at any time, but an archbishop may only wear it in his own diocese and only on special feasts designated as “Pontificale.”

For more information on the history of the pallium please visit the Catholic Encyclopedia.

We also hear from so many of you that you respect and appreciate our No Chinese Products policy, which means that we do not carry any items that are made in China. This sometimes makes it hard to find certain products, but we believe that as a Catholic retailer we simply cannot support a system (China) which is so blatantly and brutally anti-life and anti-Christian. 

With that said, we’d like to let you know about some great new items which we are offering here at Aquinas and More this week -

Lots of beautiful bookmarks from the Vatican Library Collection -

Hand-crafted genuine leather Bible covers from South America -

A wonderful new selection of chapel veils from Saint Francis Chapel Veils -

The official EWTN documentary DVDs of the Papal Visit to the U.S. -

And, finally, all the resources for the Pauline Year that you will need to make it as meaningful as possible for you and your family -

As always, thank you for reading and for your support of Aquinas and More!

Please check back with us next Monday for more exciting new product news.

On June 29, the Church celebrates the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul. These saints are venerated individually on other days such as February 22^nd, the feast of the chair of St. Peter, and January 25^th, the celebration of St. Paul’s conversion. However, the feast on June 29^th celebrates both saints as co-founders of the Catholic church. The feast is ancient, having been celebrated at least as early as the 4^th century.

The date of June 29^th marks either the date of their martyrdom, which occurred around 65 A.D. or the translation of their relics. St. Peter was crucified - upside down, as he protested that he was unworthy to die in the same manner as Christ - and Paul, being a Roman citizen, was slain by the sword. Their relics were transferred at some point, at least by the year 258, to the Via Appia catacombs near San Sebastiano. At a later date, the relics of both saints were moved back to their original resting places - Peter’s at the Vatican Basilica and Paul’s at the Via Ostiensis catacombs and ultimately to the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls…

St. Peter Visited in Jail by St. Paul - Fine Art Print

On this day, in the Roman Catholic liturgical year, newly-created metropolitan archbishops are presented with the primary symbol of their office, the pallium, by the Pope. The pallium, once specific to the Pope, is a vestment bestowed upon metropolitans and primates as a symbol of their jurisdiction over Christ’s “flock”, granted by the Holy See. It is a scarf-like band of wool cloth that sits on the shoulders on top of the chasuble. It is decorated with six black crosses, one on each tail and four on the loop, and is garnished with three jeweled gold pins; from the front or back, the pallium resembles the letter ‘Y.’

In both the Eastern Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches, the feast marks the end of the Apostles’ Fast, which began the second Monday after Pentecost. The evening before the feast, members of the Eastern church are recommended to attend the all-night vigil, or at least evening vespers, and then Divine Liturgy on the morning of the feast.

In more recent decades, the feast has also taken on ecumenical importance. The Ecumenical Patriarch of the Orthodox church will often travel to the Vatican to be received by the Pope and be invited to the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul. In turn, the Pope will sometimes travel to Constantinople on the feast of St. Andrew, patron of the church of Constantinople to be received by the Ecumenical Patriarch. This is to “emphasize the desire of the Eastern Church and the Western Church to continue along the way towards the full communion willed by the Lord, and to re-establish the unity which they enjoyed in the first millennium.”

Blessed and glorious Apostles, St. Peter and St. Paul, pray for us.

This article has been adapted from the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia articles on St. Paul and St. Peter, the wikipedia article on the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, and this document from the Vatican Press Office archives.

Letters of St. Paul

Citing St. Paul as an example of what Christians should strive to be - he was willing to give his life for his faith in Christ, ecumenically committed to sharing Christ’s word to everyone, and willing to sacrifice everything for harmony between all Christians - the Pope hopes that dedicating a year to the life and mission of St. Paul will encourage others to follow his example. One of the main focuses of the Pauline Year is unity for all Christians, for which St. Paul worked tirelessly after his conversion. Catholics are encouraged during the year to read St. Paul’s letters, learn what he taught the Gentiles, pray for the unity of Christians all over the world, and, if possible, make pilgrimages to his tomb and places where he visited and taught.

There are many pilgrimage opportunities available to those who are able, including to the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls where pilgrims can pass through the Pauline Door, go to confession, and participate in a liturgy. There is much to see and visit at the basilica, including St. Paul’s tomb. There are also pilgrimages to various places inside Rome that are connected to the life of St. Paul, such as the Church of St. Paul of the Three Fountains where he was beheaded, or to places around the world where St. Paul visited. People are also encouraged to journey to local churches dedicated to St. Paul.

The Pope announced that a plenary indulgence is available to those Catholics who make pilgrimages to the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls in Rome during the Pauline year. An indulgence is also available to those who attend any special liturgical ceremony honoring St. Paul either on the opening or closing day of the Pauline year. It can be applied also to those liturgical ceremonies held for the same purpose on another day. Those who cannot leave their homes because of a disability or need but who spiritually unite themselves to a celebration in honor of St. Paul are able to attain the indulgence as well. Read more about the indulgence at the official announcement here.

For those who are unable to make a pilgrimage, or anyone who wants to learn more about this thirteenth apostle, there are many resources available to do so - books of his letters, books about his life, prayer and Bible study guides, DVDs, and much more. Visit the Pauline Year specialty store at Aquinas and More Catholic Goods by clicking here, where there are also links to articles and other websites with information about the Pauline Year and St. Paul.

The hope of those involved in this Jubilee Year of St. Paul is that Christians all around the world will take up St. Paul’s mission and work towards the unity of the entire Christian church, and that more will become like St. Paul in his willingness to give up his entire life for the faith in which he so strongly believed.

For more information about the Pauline Year, visit the official Pauline Year website.

Before the conference started we had a few guest posts from other podcasters and bloggers talking about the conference and how technology has changed evangelization. We promised to let you, our readers, pick which post was the best. Please leave your votes below. The winner will get a $50 gift card to our store! Voting ends July 5th.

• Greg Willits from the Rosary Army
• Mark Shea
• Mac and Katherine from Catholics in a Small Town
• Kathryn from Catholic Family Kids

1) Jesus of Nazareth
2) St. Francis of Assisi
3) Diary of a Country Priest

We heard grumbling that we stacked the deck by putting the Pope’s book on top and did notice some questionable voting activity from IP addresses designated to some “vatican.va” domain (whatever that is) and that American Papist tried to surreptitiously sabotage the voting by tainting Brideshead Revisited with his posting of the horrible trailer to the new movie version. In the end, we believe that the voting was fair and no voters were turned away from the polls.

So now it’s time to download a study guide, download the resource kit and take it to your parish or local store and get a discussion group started!