Halloween Magic
I am cutting circles out of bright orange construction paper and turning them into jack-o’-lanterns. As the pile of scraps grows higher, I find myself thoroughly enjoying the unusual challenge of using magic markers to make scary-looking teeth. A few months ago, I volunteered to take over bull
Can God Be a Bride?
When I got married at the relatively advanced age of 42, I wore my mother’s satin wedding dress from 1946, as my three sisters had done. I also carried her prayer book, wore borrowed pearls and tossed the bouquet. Since my father had died years before, my two brothers accompanied me down the a
No to the Death Penalty
As I begin my seventh year of cell-to-cell ministry on Florida’s death row, it is not surprising that I am frequently asked to speak to Catholic audiences on the realities of the American death penalty. Most invitations are from Catholics who are sincerely interested in the truth, but who know
Watch for Angels
Have you seen any angels lately? A whole crowd of people sighted one recently in Texas. I got the news in an urgent e-mail from my niece just a few days ago. “Uncle Bob,” she wrote, “we need your prayers. My daughter Jacquelyn and five of her friends were in a terrible accident las
Letters
Letters
Society Owes Them
In Adults Left Behind (10/11), William J. Byron, S.J., observes that adults now unable to read were perhaps failed by their schools when they were children, and points out that society owes them something now. Many of those who could not read in school then dropped out of school, went to the streets,…
Editorials
Pledging Allegiance
Gregory Lee Johnson turned up in Dallas, Tex., for the Republican National Convention in 1984. To show his contempt for the policies of the Reagan administration, Mr. Johnson burned an American flag, while other demonstrators shouted approval. A Texas criminal court convicted Mr. Johnson of flag des
Faith and Reason
The Man With a Ladder
In his textbook of moral theology, Henry Davis, an English Jesuit theologian, wrote that of all the principles of moral theology, the principle of material cooperation is the most difficult to apply. The principle is used to analyze the contribution one makes or the assistance one gives to the wrong
Faith in Focus
A Good Priest and a Boy
I can’t remember exactly how old I was, but from what I have learned, that’s not unusual. I must have been 10 or 11, in the fourth or fifth grade at a small parochial school. I was an altar boy, and it was while serving at 6:30 Mass before school one morning that I first…
Books
The Cult of Ares
The trouble with philosophers is that they think ideas are everything The trouble with Jungian psychologists is that they think timeless archetypes shape all human behavior James Hillman is both a philosopher and a Jungian psychologist and he is vulnerable to both charges but in this rambling r
Liturgy Inculturated
In Dynamic Equivalence The Living Language of Christian Worship Father Keith Pecklers offers a fascinating narrative of the mid-20th-century Vernacular Society in the United States interwoven with the larger history of vernacular worship in the church The whole story is framed by an opening chap
The Word
What Happens Next?
There is within every living being an innate tendency to cling to life and flourish It is no different with human beings In fact it is this passion for life that often causes us anxiety in the face of death The value that various peoples ascribe to the human spirit can be seen in the…
Faith
The Man With a Ladder
In his textbook of moral theology, Henry Davis, an English Jesuit theologian, wrote that of all the principles of moral theology, the principle of material cooperation is the most difficult to apply. The principle is used to analyze the contribution one makes or the assistance one gives to the wrong
News
Signs of the Times
U.S. Bishops to Vote on Adult Catechism, New Conference PresidentWhen the U.S. Catholic bishops meet in mid-November, they will be asked to approve a first-ever U.S. national catechism for adults and elect a new president to lead them for the next three years. They will also be asked to vote on join
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