"Is that stuff still going on?” the American college professor asked incredulously. He had heard of a Dalit boy whose college acceptance was revoked because he broke a coconut in his temple in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The boy, overjoyed at having graduated with honors

Despite high-profile death sentences like Scott Peterson’s in California, public support for the death penalty is falling. The reasons lie partly in mounting evidence that innocent people have been condemned andin some casesput to death. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor said in

Pro-Life Events Mark Roe v. Wade AnniversaryIn what was the first large-scale Roe v. Wade anniversary demonstration in San Francisco, 7,000 pro-lifers marched down San Francisco’s Embarcadero, along the city’s waterfront, in the Walk for Life West Coast on Jan. 22, the 32nd anniversary o

During the nearly 20 years I served as staff director of the Catholic bishops’ Committee on Science and Human Values, I frequently made the case that the annual dialogues the bishops conducted with scientists were a form of evangelization. The proposition usually provoked blank stares. Accordi

It was the most ambitious censorship drive the world has ever known, and the Rev. Hubert Wolf wants to reveal its secrets. Not only that, he wants to turn the Index of Forbidden Books inside out, posting on the Internet for all to see a guide to the confidential debates that lay behind it. Wolf is a

Vatican May Reopen Old Abuse ComplaintsA previously dormant case against Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., founder of the Legionaries of Christ, could be reopened at the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a Vatican lawyer said in a letter to three former members of the Legionaries who

Now that the turbulence surrounding the 2004 presidential election has abated, it is critical to revisit a question that deeply divided both the Catholic bishops and the Catholic laity during the heated months of summer: Should Catholic public officials who endorse the continued legalization of abor

Catholic Agencies Mobilize for ReliefAs the death toll from the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunamis soared, Pope John Paul II praised the international community for rapidly mobilizing aid efforts and said the church’s charitable agencies were doing the same. In a statement on Dec. 30, Carita

Pope Emphasizes Healing, Holiness to Visiting U.S. BishopsIn a series of ad limina talks during 2004, Pope John Paul II has encouraged U.S. bishops to regroup pastorally after the sexual abuse scandal and recover their prophetic voice on moral and social issues. The pope acknowledged that the abuse

I can’t imagine what led me to focus my childish desires on St. Jude and spend in excess of three weeks’ allowance on a plastic statue instead of, say, another Archie comic book.