In 1992 the then-chief executive of Monsanto, Robert Shapiro, told the Harvard Business Review that genetically modified crops will be necessary to feed a growing world population. He predicted that if population levels were to rise to 10 billion, humanity would face two options: either open up new

Kishore Mahbubani rsquo s bittersweet assessment of the recent shortcomings of U S foreign policy will more than likely fall upon deaf ears The dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore Mahbubani explains how American leaders have alienated governments around the world a fact

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger Elected Pope Benedict XVICardinal Joseph Ratzinger of Germany, 78, who has been prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for the last 24 years, was elected the 265th pope and took the name Benedict XVI. Appearing at the central window of St. Peter’s B

The Archdiocese of Boston recently completed an evaluation of the demographic and fiscal viability of parishes that resulted in a 25 percent reduction in the number of parishes. A principal reason for initiating this reconfiguration process was the fact that one-third of the pastors in Boston are ov

In a dream Perpetua beheld a bronze ladder

Robert A Orsi Harvard Divinity School rsquo s Charles Warren Professor of the History of Religion in America takes a complex approach to his own religion and academic disciplines drawing from his Italian-American family history to illustrate how mid-20th-century Catholics in the United States re

When he looks back on the years when he was a young parish priest in suburban New Jersey and then in wounded, smoldering Newark, Msgr. Thomas A. Kleissler remembers the lessons he learned in the living rooms and kitchens of his parishioners. It was, he said, the richest experience of my life as a pr

The 1985 bestseller and nostalgic spoof Growing Up Catholic included a parody of The Baltimore Catechism and asked the following question: “Who’s really in hell?” The answer: “We cannot say for certainty that anyone is in hell, except for maybe Hitler and Judas.” Even t

For so many people, John Paul II was a moral magnet, even in death. A commentator on PBS called him a pope for all seasons. One could understand why. The whole world could watch massive lines of people, 35 across, snaking through the streets of Rome. Eighteen thousand an hour, two million in all, wa

In Gilead Marilynne Robinson rsquo s first novel since she published Housekeeping 25 years ago the author offers a profound prayerfully paced narrative containing a wealth of literary consolations To the reviewer rsquo s bromide ldquo Run don rsquo t walk to your nearest bookstore and buy th

The next pope will face many challenges, some of them unprecedented in the life of the church. While the papacy is not the church, it is difficult to overestimate the influence that a pope can have on the church. Certainly John Paul II had a tremendous impact on the church and the world at the end o

Over the past months, America asked several prominent Catholics in the United States to look ahead to the challenges that will face the next pope. These American Catholics come from various parts of the country and represent a variety of perspectives. They are theologians, teachers, activists, write

The title of this book is misleading The book is not about the evolution of Christianity but about the evolution of doctrine mdash or theology as Marshall D Johnson calls it in his introduction The 12 crises therefore are crises about what Christians normatively believe The author whose prio

In the spring of 2005, Pope John Paul II and Theresa Schindler Schiavo died within three days of each other. The pope’s death was held up as a Christian model; Ms. Schiavo’s was a flashpoint of moral and ecclesial turmoil. Terri Schiavo was 41 years old, had been in a so-called persisten

Here’s a surefire recipe for a hit television miniseries: Combine the most exciting aspects of The DaVinci Code with the apocalypticism of the wildly popular Left Behind novels, and toss in a bit of The X-Files for good measure. That was probably the logic, or illogic, behind NBC’s new s

Cardinals List Qualities for Next PopeSaying they needed time for serious prayer and reflection, the world’s cardinals stopped talking to the press, but only after giving them an almost endless list of qualities they said they would look for in a future pope.In interviews up to Pope John Paul