JANUARY – A CATHOLIC MONTH FOR ALL SEASONS 🙏
As we close this first month of the year, rich in Catholic observances and moral witness, may it be a guide for us to live our faith in public life in the year ahead.
January – the month of the
#WorldDayOfPeace, the
#Epiphany,
#MartinLutherKingDay, the
#MarchForLife, the
#WeekOfPrayerForChristianUnity, and designated by the
@USCCB (US bishops) as
#PovertyAwarenessMonth – can be seen as a
#Catholic MonthForAllSeasons, echoing the morally uncompromising life of
#StThomasMore who has been remembered as
#AManForAllSeasons.
In 1520, the English humanist Robert Whittington described
#ThomasMore as “a man for all seasons,” not because More adapted to the times, but because his moral compass remained rightly calibrated even in the face of the corrupting forces of power and convenience. The phrase endured because it named something real – a conscience steady in prosperity and in peril alike. 🙏
More himself famously reminded King Henry VIII that he was “the King’s good servant, but God’s first.” It was an ultimate witness of integrity that cost him his life – and secured his place as a moral north star to this day. He remains a model of moral clarity for Catholics seeking to live their faith in public life today. 🙏
Whittington’s simple phrase has proven almost as enduring as the virtue it named, especially in our own time, when U.S. Catholics are divided over the social and moral issues that together form the Church’s
#SeamlessGarment – a
#ConsistentEthicOfLife rooted in
#CatholicMoralTradition.
January offers a platform for the full breadth of
#CatholicSocialTeaching. It includes the Church’s call to defend life, uphold human dignity, and stand with the poor. It calls us to form our consciences in accordance with the moral teachings of the Church, rather than along the more convenient – but morally perilous – fault lines of political division. As the Catechism teaches (CCC 1783), conscience must be formed and enlightened, not just followed. 🙏
And it teaches us that we are called to oppose the moral relativism of our time, which infects the entire ideological spectrum. We are called to take, hold, and advance the entire set of values of our faith, even at the cost of social disfavor or worse.
#StThomasMore, defender of truth, pray for us. 🙏
#Holiness #UnityInPrayer #UnityInFaith #UnityInTruth #CommonGood
ALT A square image featuring a red-and-blue patchwork quilt pattern with white overlaid text reading “January – A Catholic Month for All Seasons” at the top.
On the lower half, in white overlaid text, is the following Scripture quotation: “You have been told, O mortal, what is good, and what the Lord requires of you: only to do justice, and to love goodness, and to walk humbly with your God. – Micah 6:8”