Following another rsquo s spiritual journey can be a voyeuristic undertaking Like sampling diverse liturgies one can as an aloof observer watch others worship making insightful observations about their correctness or oddity But like engaging liturgy one can also accompany the other to find w

America rsquo s Bishop the first full biography of Fulton Sheen holds a candle to its subject The prose does not burn the page Trying to outshine a shooting star is doomed to failure For all his solid scholarship however Thomas C Reeves gives us fast and focused narrative Although loaded wi

More than one perplexed priest has asked me: "What should I do when people come to confession and say they have nothing to confess?" It used to be that when people had not been to confession in years, they would offer a lengthy list of sins. Or longtime sinners would say, "You name it

Chinese Documents Detail Crackdown on ReligionSeven top-secret Chinese documents detailing government plans to crack down on religion were smuggled out of China and published on Feb. 11. The government documents, issued between April 1999 and October 2001, detail the goals and actions of China&rsquo

At a friend’s home a few years ago, I sat across the dining table from a Muslim woman who had been born in Egypt and had lived in many cities around the world. Ramadan had recently ended; Lent would shortly begin, and fasting became a topic of conversation. She spoke knowledgeably about Islam&

Jim Cullen has rowed shorter pieces across the pages of Rolling Stone and Newsday as well as skippered three books through the riptides of cultural studies The Civil War in Popular Culture A Reusable Past Born in the U S A Bruce Springsteen and the American Tradition The Art of Democracy A Co

Perhaps the least helpful statement in Susan Sontag rsquo s otherwise indispensable introduction to Summer in Baden-Baden is her peremptory opening declaration that she would include it among the most beautiful exalting and original achievements of a century rsquo s worth of fiction and para-fic

Young Adult Catholics Know Little About ReligiousYoung adult Catholics generally have a positive opinion of men and women religious, but many do not know a great deal about them, according to a new national study. Only one-third of those surveyed, for example, said they knew the difference between d