Self-styled progressive Catholics have, for over a generation, downplayed the role of charity in social action. They might revere Mother Teresa of Calcutta as a saint, but they dismissed her charitable approach as a superficial, Band-Aid response to poverty. Some even considered her approach dangero
Pope Benedict’s first encyclical letter is superb in many ways and well deserves the nearly universal praise it has received. I found Deus Caritas Est informative, inspiring and at times extremely consoling, even sublime. The world certainly stands to benefit from this profound reflection on t
The Sufi poet Rumi tells the tale of a holy man who sees a snake crawl into a sleeping man’s mouth. Shouting, the holy man wakes the sleeper and forces him to eat rotten apples. He then makes the astonished man run for hours, whipping him as the man cries out in exhaustion. Finally the former
"Actualizing” Scripture, or bringing it to life, is based on the conviction that “the word of God is living and active” (Heb 4:12) and speaks anew to believers in different times and places. This process is carried out by theologians, preachers, teachers, artists, those who pr