Birth and death bookend our temporal experience, but we are called to fill everything between them with love and mercy and decency, not cling to fantasies of a fraudulent eternity.

I have heard it said that if the public could see the physical images of violence after a shooting, perhaps we would all be more fervent in our demand for radical change. I have seen it. Must I make you look, too?

The guys caught up in gang violence were yearning for respect, as all people deserve, and gaining a grasp on their perspective was God’s lesson for me.

’The air was still. The silence felt like a cloak enfolding the room.‘

My sister, who has Down syndrome, never had dolls that looked like her growing up. Today, my kids can play with a Barbie who has Down syndrome, which allows all children to welcome people with disabilities.

My relationship with Mary is complicated. I couldn't see the appeal of Marian devotion until I had a baby and understood how she embodies the life-giving sacrifice of motherhood.