Spirituality on the Western Front
He was standing on the side of a rural road in Southern Arizona, about 50 miles from the Mexican border, where the Sonoran desert is dry, desolate and deadly. As I drove by, I could see he was holding up an empty water jug in his hand, asking for help. I kept driving for the…
Waters of Life
Throughout Scripture we encounter references to flowing water and its power to renew life. John baptized Jesus in the waters of the River Jordan, where Jesus began his own public ministry. In John’s Gospel, Jesus meets the Samaritan woman at a well. He tells her of the life-giving (flowing) wa
Indonesia’s Buddhist Heritage
A fascination with ancient Buddhist temples led me in August 2003 to visit Borobudur, an eighth-century monument located on the Indonesian island of Java. But the visit also taught me a great deal about kejawen (“Javanese”) piety—the syncretistic blend of Hinduism and Buddhism with
Food for Terri Schiavo
The story of Terri Schiavo is probably known to most Americans. A 39-year-old Floridian, she has been sustained by a tube supplying artificial nutrition and hydration since she suffered, 13 years ago, brain damage brought on by a heart attack. The brain damage has reduced her to a condition called P
Of Many Things
Of Many Things
It’s called Washington Heights. What heights, and why Washington? The Washington part refers to our first president, and heights to a section of Manhattan’s Upper West Side that indeed deserves the name because of its high elevation. Boarding the No. 1 Broadway Local subway, I took a rid
Letters
Letters
Season of Remembrance
The sensitive reflection by George M. Anderson, S.J., about renewing on each November day, with deep gratitude to God, the memory of some recently deceased friend (Of Many Things, 11/3) constituted, I am sure, his daily act of faith in life eternal. As a valued fringe benefit, his column nudged me and, no…
Editorials
Staying the Course in Iraq
As U.S. casualties mount and stories of military funerals compete for front-page attention with positive Pentagon assessments, the future of U.S. military action in Iraq threatens to become an issue in the presidential politics of the 2004 election year. Democratic candidates have already suggested
Faith in Focus
La Esperanza
Esperanza is Spanish for hope, and one person whose presence has brought hope to Hispanic immigrants in Delaware’s poultry processing plants is Rosa álvarez. A Carmelite Sister of Charity who is herself an immigrant—from Spain, years ago—she is one of the founders of a commu
Books
Be a Partner’
A Declaration of Interdependence was published originally in England as The World We rsquo re In Its author a reporter for The London Observer described the British edition as a call to arms against a conservative unilateral world view The military metaphor is apt The book is a slashing take-
Alma Mater Inc.
Many academics seem to have the paranoid conviction that like Rodney Dangerfield they get no respect surrounded as they are by yahoo students apparatchik administrators Babbittish trustees and a clueless public that takes them for tenured radicals overpaid slackers summers off sabbaticals
A Hard-Fought Battle
ldquo You will suffer for this rdquo With that ominous quotation Anita Caspary begins a tragic and potent narrative of the 1967 crisis that led her religious congregation to dissolve its canonical ties with the Vatican and form an independent ecumenical community Older Catholics have vivid mem
The Word
Reading the Signs of the Times
If these are the signs of our times, how can we say that our redemption is at hand?
Faith
Reading the Signs of the Times
If these are the signs of our times, how can we say that our redemption is at hand?
News
Signs of the Times
Sexual Abuse and Many Other Topics on Bishops’ AgendaMembers of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops opened their fall general meeting in Washington. D.C., by hearing a challenge from their president to direct the energy of the whole church to the eradication of sexual abuse and the healing
Politics
Faith
Culture
Vatican
Scripture
Podcasts