With their sky high prices, Broadway-level shows are largely unknown to me. But thanks to an actor friend at my parish, I received a complimentary ticket to a matinee performance of “Hank Williams: Lost Highway,” which until late June will be playing on West 42 Street. It arrived there a

One of my earliest religious memories is of learning the Act of Contrition from a Sister of St. Joseph during a C.C.D. class in our parish church in suburban Philadelphia. It was probably a Sunday morning after Mass; I must have been around seven or eight, and was most likely preparing for first hol

Indonesia is a country most of us know only through the media, but a recent visit to America House by a member of the Religious of the Sacred Heart brought it into closer focus for me. Back for a home visit, Sister Nance O’Neil has been teaching in Jakarta for 14 years, at AtmaJaya University,

Until I entered the Jesuit novitiate at age 28, I had never attended an Easter Vigil.When I was a boy, it seemed to me that every year, at the morning Mass on Easter Sunday, we read the wrong Gospel passage. Usually the story took place a long time after the resurrection. I couldn’t figure out

My memory of the one role I ever had in a high school play has largely faded, but I do recall the director, a young English teacher who brought to his task great energy and commitment. Living in my Jesuit community is another energetic and committed young English teacher, Chris Derby, S.J., a Jesuit

The television coverage of the war in Iraq has been like none other. As soon as President Bush’s deadline of March 19 had passed, TV viewers were offered the opportunity to see, in real time, images from the besieged city of Baghdad. And thanks to embedded reporters, viewers could peer into th