As the world sees these things, the emperor’s brief life was a tragedy; his empress’ long wait an exercise in illusion. But the truth is that, devoted to their Faith, their peoples, their children, and each other, they saw far more clearly than those whom fortune or Providence gave more power to – more than Wilson, the kaiser’s generals, Clemenceau, or Lloyd George. The pettiness of the Czernins, the Renners, and the Horthys that line their path merely serve, a century on, to underline their true greatness.

-Charles Coulombe, Blessed Charles of Austria: A Holy Emperor and His Legacy

Praying last night in the Church of Santa Maria dell’Anima, I felt enveloped in a deep serenity. Time, the fleeting world, passed into the obscurity of earthly twilight: the Eucharistic Sun alone remained shining forth His rays to comfort this deeply afflicted world. In this year of crisis, it is easy to fall prey to doubt, to let ” the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choketh up the Word” in our lives. In these moments, the saints show us the path of virtue, guide us to the light of the Sun of Justice. And there in the presence of Our Lady of the Soul, my own soul saw for the first time that the anxiety and turmoil we now face is as nothing to the Eternal Peace which one courageous saint tried to make present in a small way on earth a little over a century ago.

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