Charitable appeals reach their full force across the nation about now, as the asking season roars in like a winter gale. Yuletide and year-end tax considerations collide to make a climate perfect not only for marketing U.S. charities but also for the cottage industry of donor guidance that seems to

Many Catholics, perhaps especially among the clergy, continue to be dismayed by the 1994 New York Times survey, according to which over half the Catholics who attend Mass weekly said that they believed that the bread and wine of the Eucharist are strictly the symbolic presence of Christ. (For a rece

It is a truism that Americans spend more than we need to and consume more than we have to. But doesn’t it seem that our desire to consume superfluous goods has lately grown to alarming proportions? The other day, for example, I caught a TV commercial for Fit. In case you’ve not yet been

Christians, Muslims in Bethlehem Hold March for PeaceFor the first time in almost two months Manger Square and the streets of Bethlehem were filled with people after dark as several hundred people participated in a candlelight march to protest Israeli-Palestinian clashes. In the last few months Beth

Everyone knows Christmas is about giving, and who could have any problem with an annual holiday centered on gifts? In a booming economy when consumers are spending, there are no losers; everyone gives, receives and feels good. The atmosphere saturated with preternaturally familiar sights and sounds,

In his way out the door my husband, Shawn, looks at me with honest concern in his eyes. Are you going to be okay? Yes, I bravely try to assure him, choking back a few tears while holding our beautiful new baby girl on my lap. He is off to work and will drop our two older girls at their respective da

The American activist and pacifist A J Muste once said There is no way to peace peace is the way His maxim is pithy but enigmatic What is the peaceful way and how do you follow it when conflicts become armed and dangerous Most of us simply don rsquo t know It is one of the tragedies of our

Privacy has no enemies Its friends date back at least to St Thomas Aquinas who wrote nemo tenetur seipsum accusare mdash ldquo no one is obliged to accuse himself rdquo Is privacy destined to erode because of the electronic footprints of e-mail the Internet cell phones and the vast amounts of

Ex Corde Ecclesiae the Vatican document issued by John Paul II on Aug 15 1990 describes the relationship that should exist between the Catholic Church and Catholic colleges and universities throughout the world Even before that document was issued there had been considerable discussion and deb