Among the great spirituals created by the African-American churches in the South is one that compares death to a train. The same train, it says, that called for my father and my mother and my brother is whistling at the station for me. This train makes only one-way trips, for it is traveling to the

As we approach the November midterm Congressional elections, most of official Washington has gone into recess. In the final weeks of campaigning, both the White House and the Congress have turned their attention from policy to politics. Those who take an idealistic view of the democratic process mig

Witness of MercyNickel Mines, a small farming town in Lancaster County, Pa., has been a place of both human grief and divine grace this month. The horrific killings of five young Amish girls, who were captured, bound and then shot by a deranged man who burst into the town’s one-room schoolhous

November’s midterm elections are approaching, but over five million Americans, in nearly all 50 states, will be denied the right to cast ballots. Why? Because they are current or prior felony offenders who cannot exercise a right guaranteed them in the Constitution. Two million of them have co

Nigerias Potent CocktailNigeria is the 10th largest oil producer in the world, and its delta region provides much of America’s oil needs. But because the nation is plagued by violence, corruption and environmental degradation, the resulting wealth benefits few of its poorest inhabitants. The I

As Others See UsInequities in the U.S. criminal justice system were among the subjects of concern that drew criticism from the United Nations Human Rights Committee last July in Geneva. Maximum security prisons came under fire for virtually 24-hour confinement of prisoners to their cells. Also of co

Those who take an apocalyptic view of the campaign against international terrorism like to cite the historian Samuel Huntington’s prediction of a "clash of civilizations." Commentators sympathetic to this view applauded Pope Benedict XVI’s address at the University of Regensbur

Census Data and the PoorThe poor became poorer last year, according to a recent analysis of the new U.S. Census Bureau data by the nonprofit Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Put another way, the report points out that the proportion of poor people who experienced severe povertythat is, whose

Armies inevitably refight the last war, and generals are often unprepared for the new war their enemy brings them. The law and ethics of war follow the same pattern. Years go by before lawmakers and ethicists recognize the worrisome changes that have overtaken warfare. It took decades for the human

In the minds of many Muslims, because the Catholic Church is the oldest and was for centuries the leading institution in the West, the church and the pope as its head are identified as representatives of the West. Though Pope Benedict XVI’s address in Regensburg, Germany, on Sept. 12 was devot