Of Many Things
At a time of real division, how can we help clear the air? First, breathe.
“What does the midwife tell us to do? Breathe. And then? Push…. Tonight we will breathe. Tomorrow we will labor in love through love, and your revolutionary love is the magic we will show our children.”
Your Take
The Letters
I didn’t go to confession at all for at least 25 years, and now I go twice a year and that is plenty for me.
Which religion’s liberty is most threatened in the United States?
“Let’s understand: Religious discrimination can also mean using one’s own religion to discriminate against others.”
Editorials
Why are private prisons thriving under Trump?
How many deaths will it take to end for-profit prisons?
Pro-life views are not ‘extremism’ and shouldn’t disqualify Gorsuch
Preserving an absolute right to abortion does not justify pre-emptive opposition to a Supreme Court nominee.
Catholics need to take a stand against anti-Semitism
Any instance of anti-Semitism is “a blasphemy against God’s chosen people.”
Short Take
How can the church help the victims of climate displacement?
Climate change is already affecting vulnerable populations across the world, in places that are the least able to adapt.
Dispatches
Bishop McElroy on his critics, mercy for immigrants and the disruption we need.
At the U.S. Regional World Meeting of Popular Movements in Modesto, California, San Diego Bishop Robert W. McElroy electrified attendees with a challenging analysis of this “pivotal moment as a people and as a nation, in which bitter divisions cleave our country and pollute our national dialogue.” He told his Modesto audience on Feb. 18…
Pope Francis urges international intervention as famine threatens South Sudan
As civil strife threatens greater disorder, a famine looms in South Sudan; Pope Francis urges intervention.
Top Vatican Legal Expert: Pope Francis opens the door to Communion for Catholics in irregular marriages
“Amoris Laetitia” addresses the reality of Catholics in “non-legitimate unions” and opens the possibility for them to receive the Eucharist under certain conditions.
Faith leaders need more training to deal with mental health issues, say professionals
Summit participants learned about mental health awareness, suicide prevention and pastoral wellness.
Features
Treating saints like superheroes is a dangerous game.
We have to take the saints down from their pedestals.
The fight for religious liberty is never going to end. We’d better get used to it.
The Bill of Rights has failed to protect religious groups from legal assault on a number of occasions since our nation’s founding. Can it happen again?
Faith in Focus
Should Catholics be feeling the March Madness?
What should Catholics think about the money-making potential of big-time sports in universities?
I knew I couldn’t defy my wife’s Alzheimer’s. I learned to embrace it instead.
I have been told, “You cannot be both caretaker and husband.” This bothers me: How can I not be both caretaker and husband to Gail?
Ideas
A British Cult of Personality takes on the Cult of Scientology
“His attempts to gain access to the church even led Scientologists to set their own cameramen on Theroux, taunting him that they were making a documentary, too.”
‘Jane the Virgin’ offers a refreshing look into Christian sexuality
Jane is not the angry, repressed Catholic we have come to expect in pop culture.
Please stop watching John Oliver
The false sense of solidarity that comes with sharing an Oliver segment on Facebook is an invitation to apathy not resistance.
John Oliver: Comic Crusader Against the Status Quo
“Last Week Tonight” is the best example of the power that humor can have in bringing about change.
Books
A Theology that Weeps
John A. Coleman, S.J., reviews “A Church of the Poor: Pope Francis and the Transformation of Orthodoxy” by Clemens Sedmak.
A Muslim scholar sets out to investigate Jesus Christ
The Islamic Jesus draws on the presentation of Christ in the Quran to find new common ground for the People of the Book.
The dawning of America’s imperial ambitions
Leading those who believed it was America’s destiny to acquire an empire were Senator Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts and Theodore Roosevelt, a newly minted war hero.
Russia needs a truth commission now.
The story of a corrupt president, Boris Yeltsin, and his successor, Putin, trying to reconstruct their country as a world power
Poetry
Al Kiddush Hashem
Al Kiddush Hashem (to sanctify His name) We will climb this last cold hillside where morning leaves its breath upon the uncomplaining stones, its voice of light come just beneath the sky’s grey arch and arbor. You will carry my wood to your altar. Your back is broad, bronzed; I have come old—have grown tired…
The Word
I Will Raise You Up
We might not embody new life with such Christ-like perfection that we can raise the dead, but we can reveal the new creation in other ways.
The Jesus Who Cannot Be
John wrote this Gospel to show how easy it is for any of us to lose sight of Jesus, even when he works openly.
Last Take
Remember, those who were once called ‘other,’ are now called ‘American.’
On St. Patrick’s Day, we celebrate our Irish heritage and our good fortune to be Americans. The success of America is the result of the work of people from every part of the world–of different backgrounds, religions and languages, coming together, committed not to a race or a religion but to an ideal. This is…
Faith
I Will Raise You Up
We might not embody new life with such Christ-like perfection that we can raise the dead, but we can reveal the new creation in other ways.
The Jesus Who Cannot Be
John wrote this Gospel to show how easy it is for any of us to lose sight of Jesus, even when he works openly.
At a time of real division, how can we help clear the air? First, breathe.
“What does the midwife tell us to do? Breathe. And then? Push…. Tonight we will breathe. Tomorrow we will labor in love through love, and your revolutionary love is the magic we will show our children.”
Which religion’s liberty is most threatened in the United States?
“Let’s understand: Religious discrimination can also mean using one’s own religion to discriminate against others.”
Should Catholics be feeling the March Madness?
What should Catholics think about the money-making potential of big-time sports in universities?
I knew I couldn’t defy my wife’s Alzheimer’s. I learned to embrace it instead.
I have been told, “You cannot be both caretaker and husband.” This bothers me: How can I not be both caretaker and husband to Gail?
Top Vatican Legal Expert: Pope Francis opens the door to Communion for Catholics in irregular marriages
“Amoris Laetitia” addresses the reality of Catholics in “non-legitimate unions” and opens the possibility for them to receive the Eucharist under certain conditions.
Treating saints like superheroes is a dangerous game.
We have to take the saints down from their pedestals.
Faith leaders need more training to deal with mental health issues, say professionals
Summit participants learned about mental health awareness, suicide prevention and pastoral wellness.
Magazine
The Letters
I didn’t go to confession at all for at least 25 years, and now I go twice a year and that is plenty for me.
Politics
Faith
Culture
Vatican
Scripture
Podcasts