The seven Machabees were brothers martyred with their mother under Antiochus Epiphanes in about the year 150 before Christ. There is an account of their wonderful death in the Old Testament (2 Mach. 7). The seven brothers suffered, one after another, the most exquisite torments with invincible courage and constancy while their heroic mother stood…

Before his religious life, St. Alphonsus practiced for some time at the bar and was fast growing in reputation when an incident occurred which was the catalyst for his apostolic labors and learned writings. Alphonsus, in his defense of a case of great importance pleaded so ingeniously that the president felt disposed to give judgment…

He was of the sect of the Pharisees and a doctor of the law in the highest reputation at Jerusalem. St. Paul recommended himself to the Jews by saying that he had been his scholar. When the Jews were deliberating to put the apostle to death, St. Gamaliel prevented such a resolution and indirectly showed…

At the end of the twelfth century the Church in France was ravaged by the Albigensian heresy, a doctrine that was entirely unchristian and constituted a social evil. Effective measures were required to combat it. Where others had failed, a Spanish canon, Dominic Guzman, succeeded. He was notable for his learning and love of poverty…

The church of Our Lady of the Snow was the basilica that Pope Liberius built in Rome, in the fourth century on the Esquiline Hill on the site of the present church of St. Mary Major. Our Lady showed the site of her sanctuary to a nobleman, indicating its boundaries by a miraculous fall of…