by Agostino Bono In a gargantuan effort, John L. Allen Jr. chronicles the Catholic Church’s history, doctrine, discipline, institutional structures, population shifts, divisions, tensions, diversity, problems and prospects in The Catholic Church: What Everyone Needs to Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013). The one-volume work combines fact-filled pages with succinct writing. In good journalistic […]
by Father William J. Byron, S.J. AS THE FALL 2013 semester opened on college campuses all across the country, the Obama administration showed renewed interest in the finances of higher education. More specifically, the president raised the question of how federal funds can be used more effectively in getting willing students into college classrooms. He […]
by Effie Caldarola THEY SAY JOYFULLNESS is a mark of sanctity. There are no grumpy saints. My husband can verify that by that standard, I have a ways to go toward sainthood. On the other hand, Sister Helen Prejean, C.S.J., passes that criterion with flying colors. I had the honor of being with Sister Helen […]
by George Weigel THIS PAST AUGUST, while contemplating the beauties of the Ottawa River from the deck of my family’s cottage on Allumette Island, Father Raymond de Souza, the Canadian commentator and a former-student-become-friend-and-colleague, offered an interesting take on World Youth Day 2016, which will be held in Kraków. When you think about it, he […]
by Stephen Kent “WE HAVE TO DO something.” That instinctual desire to take action has been ingrained in the American psyche since the colonial days. Yes, we have to do something about the chemical weapon killings in Syria, but that something cannot be more violence. Once again, we have the urge to resort to violence […]
by George Weigel IN A REVIEW quoted on the back cover of Ian Ker’s G.K. Chesterton: A Biography (Oxford), Susan Elkin suggests that Father Ker’s book “has the potential to establish Chesterton in what Ker regards as his rightful place as a major English author.” That’s certainly true; but one does wonder about that “Ker regards…” business. […]
by Father Tadeusz Pacholczyk People sometimes use the phrase “moral compass” to describe the innate sense of right and wrong that human beings have. President Obama, for example, recently mentioned in one of his speeches how we need to, “keep our own moral compass pointed in a true direction.” Although he didn’t spell out what […]
by George Weigel KRAKOW – The chapel in the archbishop’s residence in Krakow – which everyone calls by its street name, “Franciszkanska 3” – has witnessed a lot of modern Church history. Here, clandestine seminarians watched the city’s heroic archbishop, Adam Stefan Sapieha, put the terrible problems of the long, dark night of Occupation before […]
by George Weigel KRAKOW, Poland – The village of Pasierbiec is in the south of Poland, about 30 miles from the old royal capital of Krakow. Its church, the Basilica of Our Lady of Consolation, is full of votum gifts testifying to favors received through the intercession of the basilica’s namesake. (The church itself reminds […]
by Father John P. Cush “Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth” by Reza Aslan. Random House (New York, 2013). 333 pp., $27. Some speak of a contemporary third quest for the historical Jesus. For a definition of the historical Jesus, a contemporary scholar, John P. Meier, states: “the Jesus whom we can […]
