Tolling for Thee: Ireland adapts the Angelus for the 21st century
Every evening at 6 p.m., programming on Ireland’s national radio and television broadcaster stops. News and weather are put on hold while a bell tolls, ringing in the pattern 3-3-3-9. This daily observance of the Angelus, the Catholic prayer honoring the Annunciation, is among the longest-runn
Open to All: The emerging ecclesiology of Pope Francis
Almost everyone has an opinion about Pope Francis. For some time I have been inquiring of my students, co-workers and others in widely varying circumstances what they think of him and why he has so captured the imagination of believers and nonbelievers alike.The responses are telling: Francis emphas
‘Heal the Wounds’: Best practices for the church as field hospital
‘I see the church as a field hospital after battle. It is useless to ask a seriously injured person if he has high cholesterol and about the level of his blood sugars! You have to heal his wounds. Then we can talk about everything else. Heal the wounds, heal the wounds.” What a stunning
Encountering Jesus: Where do we meet him each day?
‘The most important thing that can happen to a person,” Pope Francis explained during a homily on the First Sunday of Advent before confirming a group of parish children, “is to encounter Jesus, who loves us, who has saved us, who gave his life for us.” In our increasingly di
Of Many Things
Of Many Things
The factions so feared by the founding fathers have paralyzed the political process.
Letters
Reply All
Football Is Immoral“Fairness in Football” (Current Comment, 2/10) evoked a huge reaction in me. I have often questioned why Americans not only love football, but idolize it. It is our country’s favorite sport and religion.I have asked myself if viewing a football game is an accepta
Editorials
Disorder in the Court
There are few experiences more devastating than being falsely accused of a crime.
Faith in Focus
The Anointing: Sacred and secular meet on the battlefield
The sacred and secular meet in a future priest’s experience on the battlefield.
Books
Higher authorities
Religious freedom We were against it before we were for it The papacy at one time unreservedly condemned religious freedom as ldquo madness rdquo but now U S bishops condemn any restrictions on it Earning interest on a loan The Vatican condemned this practice then it allowed the idea and s
God Goes West
Jun pero Serra rsquo s instrumental role in establishing the California missions is well known but the contours of his own life have at times been overshadowed by debates over Spanish colonialism and the mission system As an emblem of the religious and colonial system he established along the Cal
Notes From Underground
Bishop Aloysius Jin Luxian has been one of the most important and controversial figures in modern Chinese Catholicism Born into a Catholic family in Shanghai in 1916 he was educated by the French Jesuits in that city and became a Jesuit himself living through a tumultuous time in China rsquo s hi
Poetry
While Waiting
for the night, we decidewe must go nowwhile we can. New York is sinking,we go to Pompei,itself a reminderthat nothing is permanent. Vesuvius erupted yesterday,volcanic ash blanchingthe air above Naples. At the airport, we rent a car,and suddenly we can smellthe sea, feel distended lig
The Word
Away With Despair
When my oldest son was a little boy he was shopping with my mother and father and saw something on a display shelf that he wanted He said so ldquo I want that I want that rdquo My mother explained that you cannot have everything you want but that we buy what we need He…
Columns
Thirsting for Lent
This Lent try focusing on something often take for granted: water.
Culture
Digging Deep: Remembering Seamus Heaney, weaver of words
Remembering Seamus Heaney, weaver of words
Current Comment
Current Comment
Drone strike against wedding party in Yemen violated policy endorsed by Obama, says HRW.
Of Other Things
Good Corp, Bad Corp
Citizen United protects free speech but ignores disparities of power among different speakers.
Signs Of the Times
Pope Francis Describes Bishops at Their Best
In a speech to the Congregation for Bishops, Pope Francis said bishops should act not like ambitious corporate executives but as humble evangelists and men of prayer, willing to sacrifice everything for their flocks. “We don’t need a manager, the C.E.O. of a business, nor someone who sha
Cease-Fire Collapses as Conflict Turns Key City Into ‘Ghost Town’
A cease-fire that seemed to offer a chance for a peaceful resolution to months-long conflict in the world’s newest nation, South Sudan, has unraveled. Intermittent fighting has continued since the cease-fire agreement was signed on Jan. 23. But now in Malakal, a key city in an oil-producing re
A Pastoral Path To Communion?
Cardinal Kasper says church could in very specific cases tolerate a second union.
News Briefs
Father Wissam Akiki became the first married man to be ordained a priest for the U.S. Maronite Catholic Church on Feb. 27 at St. Raymond’s Maronite Cathedral in St. Louis, Mo. • Thousands lined up at the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp near Damascus on Feb. 24 in hope of receiving one of
Challenging High Rate Of U.S. Incarceration
“The church in the United States has a moral and ethical imperative to protect human dignity and must address the problem of mass incarceration in our nation,” the leaders of Christian Churches Together in the U.S.A. said in a statement issued on Feb. 7 in Newark, N.J. The coalition incl
Boko Haram Rampage In Nigerian School
Nigeria is in a state of shock after the killing of 59 students at a government-run college by Boko Haram Islamic militants in the northeastern state of Yobe during the night of Feb. 25. Two days later another attack on a village claimed 12 more lives. During the school attack, the militants spared
Politics
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Culture
Vatican
Scripture
Podcasts