The Art of Alfonse Borysewicz
America is pleased to introduce its first audio slide show. Catholic artist Alfonse Borysewicz, profiled in the February 11 issue, narrates a tour of his work. Watch the slide show.
Bob Dylan Is Not Dead: Todd Haynes chases an elusive legend in ‘I’m Not There’
‘I’m Not There,’ reviewed
The First Political Casualty of 2008: The near death of conventional wisdom
This article was supposed to have been a post-mortem analysis of the 2008 presidential primary season. At least that’s what I thought I would write when I first proposed it. But that was back in the halcyon days of another era (exactly six weeks ago), when our understanding of American politics was guided by certain…
Running With the Money: Campaign financing and the race for the presidency
Campaign financing and the race for president
‘An Ordinary Mystic’: The faith and art of Alfonse Borysewicz
The relationship between the art world and the Catholic Church in recent years has been, to say the least, strained. To pick two prominent examples, Andres Serrano’s photograph “Piss Christ” was condemned by Catholic leaders when it was first shown in 1989, as was Chris Ofili’
Pilgrimages for Peace: Bob Mann on postwar Cambodia
How did you happen to go to Cambodia? I left the United States in 1979 to work as a physician’s assistant with Jesuit Refugee Services in camps on the Thailand-Cambodia border; it was the time of the Khmer Rouge slaughter of Cambodians, the so-called killing fields. Initially I was to stay onl
The Witness of Courage and Forgiveness
Preparations for the 10th Annual Service for Families and Friends of Murder Victims last October turned out to be both fatiguing and exhilarating. Members of the Cherish Life Circle, which sponsored the service, know what it is like for mourners to come, some year after year and others for the first
Of Many Things
Of Many Things
It is not often that popes cancel scheduled addresses, but after protests by professors and graduate students at Rome’s La Sapienza University, the Vatican canceled a lecture by Pope Benedict XVI scheduled for the opening of the university’s academic year on Jan. 18. In the end, the cont
Letters
Letters
War Profits I have read numerous articles in America on the war in Iraq. These articles have been well written and based on fact and Catholic teachings. None supported the war. In the Dec. 24 issue, an article by John F. Kavanaugh, S.J., continued the fine journalistic tradition of the magazine. Thr
Editorials
Responding to Recession
There is general consensus among economists and business leaders that the United States is entering a recession. The indicators look bad, including a decline in consumer spending and confidence, the collapse of the housing industry, the credit crunch and increases in unemployment. What went wrong?
Faith in Focus
Our Broken Parish: When respect for the laity is lost
Do not fret because of the wicked; do not be envious of wrongdoers…. Trust in the Lord, and do good. —Psalm 37:1, 3 While we Catholics profess universality, the fact is that Catholic parishes can differ radically. I do not just mean culturally, in the way that a parish on the island of G
Books
Dramatic Faith
In late October 2004 James Martin S J an associate editor of America got a surprise phone call from the actor Sam Rockwell Sam was developing his role as Judas for an Off-Broadway production of a new play 8220 The Last Days of Judas Iscariot 8221 by Stephen Adly Guirgis Because Sam was
#5: Help Your Competitors
After traveling through the United States in 1831-32 Alexis de Tocqueville famously marveled at the American phenomenon that gave rise to what we now know as the social or independent nonprofit sector Americans group together to hold f tes found seminaries build inns construct churches distr
Film
What Might Have Been: A flawed adaptation of Ian McEwan’s ‘Atonement’
Novelists are liars. So are filmmakers. In their search for the truth artists find mundane reality quite unsuited to their purposes. The only solution lies in creating an alternative universe, where events and personalities lead to desired conclusions. In “Burnt Norton” T. S. Eliot observed, “
The Word
Looking Backward and Forward
Each year on the Second Sunday of Lent the Gospel reading concerns the transfiguration of Jesus With the presence of Moses and Elijah the transfiguration narrative reminds us that what we commemorate during Lent is part of the history of our salvation The transfiguration also anticipates or prev
Columns
Hope and Change: ‘I imagine a world less hostile, a nation less arrogant and a politics less calcified into ideology.’
Im not making this up, folks. Thats Bill Clinton, the man who somehow could say he was against the Iraq war from the beginning, making up a story about himself as if he really had been against the war from the beginning. I am tired of politicians making things up with stories, usually prefaced by…
Culture
A Slow, Sure Spiritual Journey
What to read this Lent
Current Comment
Current Comment
The Finger of Suspicion “I just don’t believe that people in this country are going to choose their candidate based on which church he or she goes to,” former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney said in a recent Republican primary debate in Florida. The problem for Mr. Romney’
Faith
Looking Backward and Forward
Each year on the Second Sunday of Lent the Gospel reading concerns the transfiguration of Jesus With the presence of Moses and Elijah the transfiguration narrative reminds us that what we commemorate during Lent is part of the history of our salvation The transfiguration also anticipates or prev
News
Signs of the Times
Rector of Seminary in Kenya Murdered A Catholic priest of the Diocese of Nakuru, Kenya, was killed on Jan. 26 as vicious interethnic violence claimed more lives in the Rift Valley. The Rev. Michael Kamau Ithondeka, 41, was killed at an illegal roadblock set up by armed youths on the Nakuru–Eld
Politics
Faith
Culture
Vatican
Scripture
Podcasts