While Hispanic immigrants to America may be helping to keep the number of Catholics in the U.S. afloat, one sociologist says that the number of Catholics in Mexico is actually dwindling: More than 1,000 Mexicans left the Catholic Church every day over the last decade, adding up to some 4 million fallen-away Catholics between 2000 … Read more
In the fall of 2007, I spent a week in Spain, giving lectures, meeting with Spanish Catholic leaders, and making a hair-raising climb up several hundred scaffolding stairs to the top of Antoni Gaudi’s Basilica of the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona — preceded by Stanislaw Cardinal Dziwisz, Pope John Paul II’s longtime secretary, who was … Read more
My father and mother, ages 88 and 86, recently entered the Catholic Church. Like most things in life, their entrance could never have been imagined or expected, even ten years ago. Yet, like all things in life, their conversion was providential, and, when it happened, it seemed utterly natural. How natural it is, that with … Read more
The Guardian‘s George Monbiot is distressed at the lack of scientific evidence provided by the anti-nuclear movement — spearheaded by Dr. Helen Caldicott, the world’s leading anti-nuclear campaigner — to back their positions: The anti-nuclear movement to which I once belonged has misled the world about the impacts of radiation on human health. The claims … Read more
News out of the Vatican over the weekend: Pope Benedict XVI will call people of goodwill to join him in working for peace during a “day of reflection, dialogue and prayer for peace and justice in the world” to be held in Assisi on Oct. 27. At the start of the year, the Pope announced … Read more
Quick! Tell me about the three top stories in the most recent copy of the Journal of Biblical Archaeology. Actually, from what I can tell, there is no Journal of Biblical Archaeology, though there is an Australian Journal of Biblical Archaeology. That tells you something about how much most of us pay attention to developments … Read more
While everyone is keeping an eye on developments in Libya, the situation in Ivory Coast is deteriorating more and more: One thousand people were suspected to be dead or missing in the town of Duekoue, Ivory Coast, after clashes throughout the country intensified, Caritas Internationalis reported. Aid organizations have been recovering hundreds of bodies in … Read more
America’s founding documents — the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Federalist Papers — are, when read, potentially lethal. Debates about American exceptionalism abound. Writing in the Wall Street Journal before the bombings in Libya, Daniel Henninger brought these currents together in the context of present Arab world turmoil as they relate to Chinese … Read more
If we want to understand why so many states teeter on bankruptcy, Stephen Moore, senior economics writer for the Wall Street Journal, says we should look no further than statistics about U.S. workers. There are now almost twice as many people working for the government (22.5 million) than in all of manufacturing (8.7 million), a reversal from … Read more
Religious belief, and Christianity in particular, has found an unlikely ally in the debate over the proper public place of Europe’s Christian heritage: the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights. In a closely watched decision, the Grand Chamber overruled a 2009 lower court decision, Lautsi v. Italy, and determined that public schools … Read more
Because it was both professional and efficient, the Spanish Inquisition kept very good records. These documents are a goldmine for modern historians who have plunged greedily into them. Thus far, the fruits of that research have made one thing abundantly clear — the myth of the Spanish Inquisition has nothing at all to do with … Read more
The statement was pompously worded, expressing regret about what was to follow. Alas, it said, weeping crocodile tears, it gave no pleasure to present this statement to the public, but it had to be done. Pope John Paul II, it declared, was a terrible pope and should not be called blessed. With such an opening, … Read more
USA Today reports some new trends on college campuses: While more young men and women are staying virgins, casual sexual encounters are also on the rise. The relationship game among college-age adults today is a muddle of seemingly contradictory trends. Recent studies indicate that traditional dating on campuses has taken a back seat to no-strings … Read more
Time for a few Friday morning links: Could the 70 small metal books recently discovered in Jordan turn out to be the biggest find for Christian history since the Dead Sea Scrolls? An elderly Belgian couple opts for euthanasia together rather than face death separately. In the wake of Chernobyl, “there were many media reports … Read more
It is about this time in Lent, around halfway through, that one begins to wonder what the point is. Of anything, really. One purpose of the season is just that: to bring us up against impossibilities. Today, I’m thinking particularly of impossibilities in the realm I am compelled to stare into in my daily life … Read more
O guiding night! O night more lovely than the dawn! O night that has united, The Lover with his beloved, Transforming the beloved in her Lover. Upon my flowering breast Which I kept for him alone, There he lay sleeping, And I caressing him There in a breeze from the fanning cedars. When the breeze … Read more
On the hit show 24, Kiefer Sutherland spent a lot of time looking for stuff (bombs, chips, daughters, etc.); now he’s back in a new web-only series on Hulu, looking for something slightly different. Over at Patheos, Tony Rossi explains: When a cold-blooded hitman bursts into a hotel room to execute someone, the intended victim … Read more
The Catholic News Agency reports that the bishop of Delmas, France, has confirmed the extraordinary healing of a man who made a pilgrimage to Lourdes in 2002. Serge Francois, 56, had lost almost all mobility in his left leg after complications from two operations left him with a herniated disc. Bishop [Emmanuel] Delmas noted that … Read more
Most conversations in Washington these days end up running down the list of likely GOP candidates who will run for the presidential nomination in 2012. The strengths and weaknesses of Newt Gingrich, Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee, Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, and Haley Barbour are quickly calculated; but when it comes to … Read more
David Gibson of Commonweal alerts readers to a two-hour special airing on the History Channel tonight, giving a behind-the-scenes look at life in the Vatican and some rare footage of Pope Benedict at home and at work: The show provides an overview of the history of the Vatican, and focuses on everyday life in the … Read more