When Pope Benedict XVI addresses Catholic college presidents and diocesan superintendents in Washington, D.C., on April 17, his topic will be the importance of Catholic education. He is likely to urge universities to remain faithful to Catholic teaching, preserve the unity of faith and reason, and prepare young people for the challenges and the suffering … Read more
Belmont Abbey College is one of the few Catholic colleges in the southeastern United States, located about ten miles west of Charlotte, North Carolina. Unfortunately, its president and chancellor are currently embroiled in a defense of the college’s Catholic identity against eight faculty members who insist on insurance coverage for voluntary sterilization, abortion, and contraception. … Read more
If David lived today, I have a feeling not a few modern-day Perfecti in the blogosphere would respond to Psalm 51 with something like the following . . . If David lived today, I have a feeling not a few modern-day Perfecti in the blogosphere would respond to Psalm 51 with something like the … Read more
Someone else asked me, “Do you believe in anything?” I said to him, “I believe in Allah.” So he said, “But I believe in torture and I will torture you.” — sworn statement of Amin Sa’id al-Sheikh on his experiences in Abu Ghraib Elaine Scarry’s 1987 study The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking … Read more
The Sacrament of Penance is making a comeback as young people flock to confession. But repentance may not always look the way you expect. The confessor is not the master of God’s forgiveness, but its servant. The minister of this sacrament should unite himself to the intention and charity of Christ. He should have a … Read more
Each January I appear as a pinch-catechist for my parish’s RCIA, delivering an afternoon’s worth of talks on Catholic moral teachings to a handful of catechumens and candidates. The timing coincides with the end of the “inquiry” phase — four months of Breakfast Club-style sharing of “What Jesus means to me” — and the beginning … Read more
For a time last fall, the press, and therefore to some extent the public, was briefly yet intensely occupied with the publication of some letters of Mother Teresa. Readers of this column will know of these letters, of course. The small Albanian nun had never supposed that they would be made public, since they had … Read more
When the Christmas season concludes in mid-January with the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, the Church begins the season known as Ordinary Time. Ordinary Time is not so named because it is dull or lacking the flare of more exciting liturgical seasons; rather, it designates time that is ordered or numbered, first through … Read more
As questions abound concerning the role of religious faith in the political process, it seems an apt time to reflect on the proper place of religion in our American culture. Few issues in recent years have been as controversial or have evoked as much heartfelt emotion on all sides of the question. I believe a … Read more
In his autobiography, G. K. Chesterton writes, “A large section of the Intelligentsia seems wholly devoid of Intelligence.” At first, this surprising indictment might be interpreted as merely humorous; after all, are not “intellectuals” those to whom we turn for enlightenment and guidance, those who are the luminaries of universities — castles of knowledge and … Read more
Jesuit spokesmen, both official and unofficial, rallied promptly — and properly — in support of their newly elected superior general, Rev. Adolfo Nicolas, S.J., calling him a holy and highly intelligent man and a natural choice for his new job. What they neglected to say, on the record at least, is that Pope Benedict XVI’s … Read more
Most of us modern Christians congratulate ourselves that we’re tolerant and not judgmental. All that Old Testament brimstone is old hat. We’ve advanced and evolved. We’re more forgiving than our ancestors. But then a story like this catches our eye: Shouting, "This is YouTube material!" a 27-year-old British man urinated on a dying … Read more
The lives of the saints always fascinate me. There are so many different ways for people to express their friendship with Jesus — so many different ways to grow in holiness. The canon of the Church’s saints and blesseds includes people from all walks of life. There are mystics, missionaries, martyrs, and heroic servants of … Read more
In the middle of my junior year (1970-71) at Loyola University of Los Angeles (now Loyola Marymount University), we had two distinguished guest lecturers: Rev. Hans Kung and Professor Dietrich von Hildebrand. The contrasting manner of their reception at Loyola, as well as their personal effect on me, makes for an interesting story. First, … Read more
A friend of mine tells of attending a showing at a Jesuit university of a video produced to mark the centenary of the birth in 1907 of Rev. Pedro Arrupe, S.J., “the Basque Jesuit,” who as a missionary in Japan tended the wounded and dying after the atom-bombing of Hiroshima, and was superior general of … Read more
The “Catholic vote” is the key for the reemergence of the Democratic Party as a competitive force in presidential elections. Party chairman Howard Dean summarized the recent problems when he said, “The Democratic Party was built on four pillars — the Roosevelt intellectuals, the Catholic Church, labor unions and African Americans. But we stopped communicating … Read more
A sumptuous travel magazine — to which, I need scarcely add, we do not subscribe — arrived in our letter box the other day. Things are so beautifully laid-out these days that one cannot always tell whether a given item is actually just a piece of advertising. In any case, the cover shows … Read more
C. S. Lewis once remarked that he was a converted pagan living among apostate Puritans. Our culture is, if anything, even more redolent of curdled apostate Calvinism than it was in Lewis’s day, and that fact can be seen everywhere. On a whimsical note, it is discovered in an NPR broadcast I heard a few … Read more
“The Church is alive!” Pope Benedict XVI spoke these stirring words five times over in his homily at the Mass inaugurating his ministry as Bishop of Rome on April 24, 2005. During a recent visit to the Pacific islands of Oceania, as chaplain on a cruise ship, I experienced firsthand what the pope was … Read more
“The Word was made flesh, and dwelt amongst us” (Jn 1: 14). We begin with the Beginning. The Word was with God. The Word was God. Flesh did not make the Word. What “dwelt amongst us” was the Word, the Logos, nothing less. This is a fact. The whole world is different because of it. … Read more