A powerful editorial by NCR on the sexual abuse crisis sweeping the church nbsp The Holy Father needs to directly answer questions in a credible forum about his role — as archbishop of Munich 1977-82 as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith 1982-2005 and as pope 2005-
In All Things
Those Sprint Commercials You Can’t Get Out of Your Head
So the other day I m watching TV and up comes one of those Sprint commercials — you know the ones where everything is either white black or yellow and there s that quirky uptempo music in the background and we re meeting different adults who are pretty much acting like they re 15 again Usu
Reidy on ‘The Pacific’
In his magnificent book Wartime Understanding and Behavior in the Second World War Paul Fussell writes movingly of a then little-known wartime memoir by E B Sledge called With the Old Breed nbsp As I recall from Fussell s book which I must have read four or five times nbsp the author averr
Tracing the Causes of the Abuse
How could it happen nbsp The terrible revelations of sexual abuse in Ireland and Germany have confirmed the reality that the abuse of children by clergy is not a phenomenon confined to the United States Nor as Kieran Conroy the bishop of Arundel and Brighton in the U K nbsp stated recently n
The Expiration Date of This Catholicism: Being a Theologian in an Abusive Church [UPDATED]
As the news is again reminding us Catholics are part of a secretive and abusive church built on ldquo homosocial rdquo power men governing men and excluding women men in a culture of homoerotic images too often and too loudly denying genuine life beyond heterosexuality and willing to go to al
To Our Readers and Correspondents
At the request of some of our readers and bloggers we have added our correspondents email addresses to the comments boxes So when you move your mouse over a commenter s name his or her email will appear Click on it and your preferred email client will open up and you can write your fellow corr
Shame on the NYTimes
Usually we can all turn to the New York Times and the Washington Post with a reasonable degree of assurance that their writers and editors are top-notch journalists who ferret out facts put those facts in a proper context and truly enlighten a reader rsquo s understanding of whatever event is be
A Tale of Two Women
Graymoor Spiritual Life Center in New York has this year sponsored Saturday morning Lenten retreats based on the life and ministry of contemporary spiritual leaders I was asked to introduce the Franciscan Sister Thea Bowman to one of the Saturday morning retreats I did so gratefully I first enco
In All Things Charity
In the wake of what some observers called the worst vitriol in this country since the Civil Rights era Sister Mary nbsp Ann Walsh media relations director of the USCCB offers a call for charity nbsp nbsp Politics has become a kind of blood sport News junkies over the weekend heard reports of
Why Politics Turns Ugly
One of the consequences of the blogosphere and cable news is that it is very easy to only engage those who share similar concerns or those with a similar point of view So lately I have been paying attention to conservative Catholic sites that opposed health care reform because they thought it di
