Suddenly everyone is an expert on celibacy. Suddenly everyone is an expert on the priesthood. Suddenly everyone is an expert on gay priests. Or more accurately, suddenly everyone is happy to talk about the Catholic Church, no matter how little they know about Catholicism.Maureen Dowd, in a hateful c

Out of town and alone, you want to call home but the only phone available requires collect calls and your family can’t afford the chargesa temporary problem for many, but one that could last for years if you are behind bars. Telephones represent a lifeline between prisoners and their families,

A few months ago I received a phone call from a parishioner at St. Leo’s Church, in Stamford, Conn. It was something of a surprise: the last time I had set foot in that church was almost 14 years ago. During our conversation, I mentioned how important the parish had been in my life, and that I

For two decades, I have taken part in a public Way of the Cross procession on Good Friday. At St. Aloysius in Washington, D.C., the procession began after dark. Moving from the church, we would walk through the surrounding low-income neighborhood, flashlights in hand, following a crossbearer and sin

Nearly 100,000 new books were published in the United States last year, and most of them were ignored by The New York Review of Books and the Sunday book sections of The New York Times and The Washington Post. Although these three are heavyweights in the book review business, they have space to exam

You may have noticed in a recent issue of America (2/25) a listing of retreat houses around the country, sponsored by both Jesuits and others. (The list will be kept up to date on America’s Web site.) Jesuits generally make an annual retreat of six to eight days, and while the specific purpose