The Church of the Holy Sepulcher is brown. Outside and inside the bricks are varying shades of brown, the color of impurity and ruin. The whole atmosphere is messy, anarchic brown. The church reeks of decay and neglect. The walls have been blackened by centuries of candles, the floor stones are unev
From Our Archives
Posted inFrom Our Archives
Meeting Jesus Again
"I must have heard my grandmother tell my grandfather a thousand times, Get behind me, Satan,’ but I thought she made up that phrase. I didn’t know it was in the Bible! I thought it said somewhere that Jesus died when he was 33 years old. Where is that? Where’s the part where
Posted inFrom Our Archives
Repentance
Ash Wednesday is the most countercultural day of the year. Repent! Turn away from sin! Now what could be more un-American than repentance and the admission of sin? Denial of guilt may be a human problem haunting each conscience and every culture, but we seem to have made a science of it. It is suppo
Posted inFrom Our Archives
How a Pope’s Illness Affects the Church
The recent hospitalization of Pope John Paul II has revived interest in numerous questions about what happens to the church when a pope is sick and what would happen if he became disabled.What happens to the church when a pope becomes ill? If the pope becomes sick, he can delegate some of his a
Posted inFrom Our Archives
The Troubled Conscience Of an Israeli Soldier
Adam Keller, jailed for refusing to serve in the Israeli Army in Lebanon, has a son, Uri, who was jailed for refusing to serve in the Israeli Army. The senior Keller, a leader of Gush Shalom (Peace Bloc) and a serial-defier of Israeli governments since he was a teenager (he is now 50), works in Tel
Posted inFrom Our Archives
Is Genetic Engineering the Answer to Hunger?
Both the developed and developing worlds are facing a critical moral choice in the controversial issue of genetically modified food, also known as genetically modified organisms and genetically engineered crops. Critics of these modifications speak dismissively of biotech foods and genetic pollution
Posted inFrom Our Archives
Plain Talk About Health Care
As one of the world’s last industrialized nations to be without a national health care system, the United States is beleagured by a host of public health problems and contrasting proposals to solve them. Yet all the discourse appears to have generated no great public outcry for universal cover
Posted inFrom Our Archives
The Plight of Iraqi Christians: An Interview With an Iraqi Friar
Yousif Thomas Mirkis, O.P., is an Iraqi Roman Catholic priest. He recently welcomed me to his community home in Baghdad, the convent of the Dominican friars. In the courtyard, he pointed to the ground. Look, he said. A cross lay molded into the tiles. This is to remind us that the cross is down here
Posted inFrom Our Archives
The Same Old Story
I always cringe when our convent doorbell rings after 10 o’clock, as it did the other night. It’s not in fear that a terrorist or some shady character might be outside. Rather, it’s the scenario that I feel certain will unfold as soon as I open the door. I have played a part in the
Posted inFrom Our Archives
A Victory for People Like Us
In the aftermath of the U.S. presidential election, the Washington Post reporter David Finkel interviewed white evangelical voters in the small town of Sheffield, Ohio. The Leslie family had seen its annual income drop from $55,000 in 2001 to $35,000 in 2004. It did not affect their vote: Jobs will