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Five years ago last October, the superior general of the Jesuits, Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, delivered a historic address at Santa Clara University in California, urging that the promotion of justice should have a central place in Jesuit higher education. Father Kolvenbach was not simply innovating. Ten
Film
My presence at a midday meeting a few weeks ago was not essential. Surely, other demands on my time were more pressing, but for some strange reason as the campus carillon struck noon, even though I’d be a few minutes late, for some inexplicable reason, I decided to put in an appearance. I open
News
Pope Calls for Deeper Understanding of LoveIn his first encyclical, Pope Benedict XVI called for a deeper understanding of love as a gift from God to be shared in a self-sacrificial way, at both a personal and a social level.The pope said "love between couples, often reduced today to selfish se
The Word
It is no secret that today there are deep divisions in our society and in our churches This Sunday rsquo s Scripture readings remind us that there were deep social and religious divisions in the Judaism of Jesus rsquo day as well and in the Christian communities founded by Paul They also remind u
Recently I taught theology in South Africa, at St. Joseph’s Theological Institute in Pietermaritzburg. Hot and humid in late summer, 50 miles from the Indian Ocean, Pietermaritzburg in the state of KwaZulu-Natal is the city where in 1893 Gandhi was thrown off a train because he was not white,
Culture
Visiting Rome in early 1959, while still an Anglican priest, I asked a learned Benedictine from Belgium who was prior of the monastery where I was staying, whether he had attended the funeral of Pope Pius XII six months earlier. His reply, an apt comment on the style of papal liturgies of that era:
News
Florida Court Overturns Voucher ProgramThe Florida Supreme Court struck down the state’s school voucher program on Jan. 5 in a 5-to-2 ruling that disappointed Florida Catholic Conference officials. The ruling said the Opportunity Scholarship program violates the state’s constitution, whi
In the summer of 2004, when more than 60 victims of human trafficking were found in Long Island, local residents were shocked. Human trafficking had been going on in their backyards for two years, and they had not known it. Churches opened their doors; the local bishop provided temporary shelter in
Some artists whom you think you know well, like some old friends, can surprise you entirely. Perhaps experience has prepared you to share their vision. Or the times have taken a turn that gives the art new urgency. New scholarship uncovers influences and contexts. Radiography and restoration can tel
The Word
It is hard to imagine a human being who does not want to be happy free and fulfilled It is a paradox of human existence however that genuine happiness freedom and fulfillment seem to come mostly to those in the service of a noble cause or project Caught up in his own losses and sufferings the
Of Many Things
We have a policy at America of not running many obituaries. The practice saves the editors from agonizing over who gets one and who does not. Of course there are some obvious people who deserve obituaries or appreciations. Pope John Paul II and Mother Teresa, for example. Over the last year the theo
Since the terrorist mass-murder attacks of 9/11, we have seen a growing debate over the use of torture. The famous civil liberties and defense attorney Alan Dershowitz, in Why Terrorism Works, wrote a full chapter to justify the use of an authorized torture warrant under highly controlled conditions
FaithFeatures
There are so many mistaken notions about St. John of the Cross (1542-91) that we might do well to clarify some of them.
Film
Syriana provides a valuable insight, one of those “Aha!” moments. Before sitting through this new film, brilliantly written and directed by Stephen Gaghan, I held the rather conventional belief that the news from the Middle East was relentlessly depressing because of the horrible events
Letters
Now There’s a Fourth
Peter Heinegg’s perceptive review of Edmund Wilson: A Life in Literature (1/2) reminded me of an incident almost a half-century ago. I grew up a few miles from Talcottville, the upstate New York village where Wilson spent part of each year. As a Princeton undergraduate, I had learned about Wilson and wrote a review of his memoir, A Piece of My Mind: Reflections at Sixty for the local daily in Watertown. In the course of the review I referred to his prolific and catholic mind (lowercase c’), but the editor at the paper changed this to Catholic mind (capital C’)a major distortion, to say the least.
When the review appeared, I was off in Army basic training at Fort Dix, N.J. My mother wrote to say that Edmund Wilson called and wants to have dinner with you. I followed up on the invitation instantly on my first furlough home. The two of us Princetonians had a long, convivialvery convivialevening solving the world’s problems: the c problems, not the C ones.
It was for me an extraordinary encounter that ended with Wilson’s jocular pontification: You know, Duffy, there are only three people from upstate New York who’ve ever amounted to anythingyou, me and John Foster Dulles, and I have grave doubts about him. It was nice of Peter Heinegg to bring back this memory.
James H. Duffy
Arts & CultureBooks
Everything about this book is elegant Embossed printing on the book jacket fits exquisitely the beautiful rendering of a medieval painting of a youthful bejeweled Mary Magdalene Equally appealing is the typeset and book design Instead of footnote numbers cluttering the text scholarly notes appe
Editorials
There has been a notably wide variety of interpretations from Catholic leaders of the Vatican instruction, published on Nov. 29, concerning the admission of gay men to orders. It is difficult, therefore, to determine exactly what effect it will have on future applicants to seminaries and religious o
While there are many reasons to worry about what the future may bringwith global warming, oil depletion and international terrorism high on the listit is imaginable, at least for optimists, that these challenges can be dealt with in some fashion or other. One problem, however, should invite no easy,
It was good to learn of the National Leadership Roundtable on Church Administration (America, 9/26), and its members’ efforts to improve the stewardship of the church. As a city pastor, I see five difficulties in putting the excellent recommendations of the roundtable’s final report into