During my first half-decade as a priest, I buried a total of three people. In the last two years here in Belize, that number is well over a hundred—and it has reminded me of love’s eternalness.
Death and Dying
Posted inFaith, Faith in Focus
A church in Rome has over 3,000 skeletons on display. They give a chilling—but hopeful—reminder about death
All Souls is not just a remembrance of those we have lost, whether to death or to time. All Souls is a remembrance that beyond this world, there is more to come.
Posted inFaith, The Good Word
Why do Catholics pray for the souls of the dead?
The notion that our prayers can aid the dead as well as the living has always been a part of the Christian faith.
Posted inExplainer, Faith
Explainer: Where did Halloween come from—and should Catholics celebrate it?
Halloween’s roots lie deep in pre-Christian rituals—but also in the long heritage of All Saints Day.
Posted inFaith, Faith in Focus
Día de los Muertos is a celebration—even during a pandemic.
For those who have lost loved ones to Covid-19, celebrations will not be the same this year. But they will still remember the souls who have passed on to new life.
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
The death-haunted music of Phoebe Bridgers
Phoebe Bridgers’s new album ‘Punisher’ begs the listener to embrace the inevitability of death, not run away from it.
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
Pope Francis: It is impossible to bear the tragic loss of a child without God’s help
“Every tragic death brings with it great pain. But when it snatches (the lives of) five adolescents and a young mother, it is immense, unbearable without God’s help,” he told members of the victims’ families Sept. 12.
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
Syro-Malabar synod urges dioceses to set up cremation facilities in India
The COVID-19 situation in India has been worsening; India, with more than 4.3 million cases, is now second after the United States.
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
‘Traumatic way to say goodbye’: roadside funerals in Colombia
In Columbia, as elsewhere, how to conduct funerals for loved ones have been changed as a result of the pandemic.
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
What Lil Wayne’s latest album tells us about Black death in 2020
Lil Wayne pulls from this rich tradition of Black death celebration while dismissing the social conditions that forged it.