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Of Many Things
Of Many Things
John W. Donohue
Theodore Roosevelt High School stretches for nearly a block along Fordham Road in New York City’s borough of the Bronx. It was built in the late 1920’s for a student population of 2,500 to 3,000. Most of these were the children of Italian-American, Irish-American and Jewish families. &nb
Columns
Romance and Vocation
Thomas J. McCarthy
Afriend recently passed on to me an article in which the author, a priest, argues that we need to reromanticize priesthood and religious life and give people something beautiful to fall in love with. I find it to be an inspired idea, given recent revelations and events, and a troubling idea. Rarely
Called, Gifted and Now Certified
Jeffrey Kaster
Katie graduated from college last year with a degree in elementary education. Her degree did not include any college theology courses, but she had volunteered in parish ministry for a year or two while she was in college. After graduation Katie was hired as a lay ecclesial minister (youth ministry c
FaithThe Word
Enough Food to Eat
Dianne Bergant
We may not be able to explain the miracles, but we cannot overlook one very important element in each story—God works marvels through ordinary people.
Poetry
Sacrament for my wife
Timothy Geiger
Almost three years gone down the back roads of Ohio
Books
A Church Aloof or Engaged?
Thomas R. Murphy
This study seeks to synchronize intellectual developments in American Catholicism with parallel events abroad and to examine how an international conversation among Catholic thinkers sought to influence the church rsquo s dialogue with the modern Western world Most importantly John McGreevy stress
Editorials
Religious Worship in Public Schools
The Editors
Most public schools make their facilities available after school hours to a wide variety of private nonprofit organizations, including religious organizations. Some states, however, including New York, absolutely forbid public schools to allow religious worship—even after regular school hours
Faith
The Chosen Path
William C. Spohn
Ignatian spirituality offers a different wisdom on vocation. It counsels us to discover our personal calling by aligning our gifts and aspirations with what we see as the deepest needs of our world.
Catholic Identity, New Age and Women Religious
Patricia McCann
The lives of religious women were dramatically changed in the second half of the 20th century by several new factors: the call to renewal within religious communities from the Second Vatican Council, heightened awareness of the ecclesiological divides in the post-Vatican II church, increased feminis
FaithThe Word
Bread From Heaven
Dianne Bergant
We are no longer content to live with full bellies but empty minds.
Letters
Letters
Our readers

Inspired to ShareThank you to Kevin O’Brien, S.J., for the affirming and encouraging message in The Classroom as Holy Ground (5/26). Like so many teachers, I was ending the academic season with the year-in-review, still struggling with last minute makeup tests and lost textbooks. By fortunate coincidence, I happened upon Mr. O’Brien’s article and was indeed delighted to read the reflections of a fellow teacher. While Mr. O’Brien may be at the beginning of his career, I am a veteran of 45 years, who decided this past year, for whatever reason, to return to the vineyard.

I have not taught high school students since the late 1970’s, when I was a public school English teacher. The last 25 years as an administrator may have kept me in touch with the students, but there is nothing like being on the front lines. What an epiphany I have had!

As a member of the religion department of our local Catholic preparatory school, I have had a joyful challenge almost every day. The students unquestionably have changed, and yet so many times they remind me of their parentssome of whom I taught.

Mr. O’Brien is righttoday’s students need, more than anything else, understanding and patience and listening. My journey this year has been not only to travel with my students through church history but also to strive to know their life history...and understand their struggles and hopes and to learn about their culture. Most of all, to allow grace to operate in the classroom. It is good to be reminded that teaching is a great act of hope.

I begin this summer inspired to share Mr. O’Brien’s thoughts with my department and to return in the fall with the striking image of my classroom as holy ground and my students’ desks as altars. Now that’s an image that has the potential to provoke a real educational reform!

Marie Rinaudo

Books
Spirito Mexicano
Allan Figueroa Deck
Several years ago when I visited the shrine and retreat house of the Valley Missionary Program in Coachella Valley Calif I knew that something exceedingly unusual had happened Out in the Mojave Desert economically disadvantaged Mexican immigrants had built a stunningly beautiful spirituality c
Correction, Si; Defection, No
Anthony M. Stevens-Arroyo
It scarcely needs repeating that the future of Catholicism in the United States will be shaped by Hispanics, who at 34 million are already the most numerous minority in the country and constitute a majority of Catholics in many dioceses. The religious affiliation of these Hispanics will largely dete
Letters
Letters
Our readers

War Theory

This letter is in reference to Unjust War, Good Outcomes (5/19), by John F. Kavanaugh, S.J. The recondite philosophical analysis of just war theory in the case of Iraq ranks close behind the angels dancing on the pin issue. Why not ask how many Iraqis need to be raped and have their tongues cut out before some soreheads can feel better about losing the last election?

Is it really correct to use morality and just war theory to protect evildoers while they kill and torture thousands of innocents? Is it good sense to search so hard for a rationale to condemn those with the better spirit while injustice runs rampant?

Why not look at other alternatives, such as whether war is even the best term to describe the Iraqi action before getting carried away with war theory? Or how about rationalizing on the basis of the lesser of evils theory?

John M. Michels

FaithThe Word
To Whom Should We Turn?
Dianne Bergant
There are so many people searching today, people hungering for instruction, good people who are looking for direction.
Books
Getting Past Orthodox Doctrine
Pheme Perkins
There are Ph D dissertations yet to be written on religion according to Bill Moyers and the liberal intellectuals of Public Television When they are Professor Elaine Pagels of Princeton University will figure prominently as one of their well-known talking heads Her earlier books The Gnostic Gos
Editorials
Noble Lies?
The Editors
Generations of college freshmen have puzzled over the ancient notion of the “noble lie.” “If anyone at all is to have the privilege of lying,” Socrates suggests in Plato’s Republic, “the rulers of the state should be the persons; and they, in their dealings either
The Future of Sexual Abuse Litigation
Patrick J. Schiltz
Since early 2002, the legal world has become much more dangerous for the church than it was previously. The future looks bleak because of three major developments in the sexual abuse crisis. The first major development is that more sexual abuse cases will be filed against the churchthat is, the numb
Just Policing, Not War
Gerald W. Schlabach
Virtually every Christian tradition is trying to have it both ways on war. Twenty years ago the U.S. bishops published The Challenge of Peace, which explicitly paired just war and pacifism as legitimate Christian responses to war. Three years later, Methodist bishops in the United States made a simi
Books
School of the Holy Ghost
Brennan O
In the winter of 1951-52 Caroline Gordon had a vision of the triumph of Catholic writing in the United States Flannery O rsquo Connor rsquo s novel Wise Blood which Gordon had recently read in proof was about to be published A manuscript novel sent to her by a Louisiana convert seemed even more