by Father Arlen Harris, O.F.M. Cap. The smile. It is warm, and it is gentle. And it continues to inspire this still “green” priest even in the present day. I first met Msgr. Paul Jervis, pastor of St. Martin de Porres parish in Bedford-Stuyvesant, five years ago at Our Lady of Victory Church. I was […]
by George Weigel LET ME BEGIN by paying Father Andrew Greeley, who died this past May 29, a compliment he’d never have paid me, or indeed anyone of my “location” in the Church: Catholicism was duller after Greeley was felled by an accident in 2008, and the Church feels emptier since his death. In the […]
A good understanding of the principle of human dignity can be found in examples from new technology. Or from the straight talk of Pope Francis. Both can be equally effective. “We have begun this culture of disposal where human beings themselves are nowadays considered as consumer goods, which can be used and thrown away,” the […]
by George Weigel The “Edict of Milan,” whose milleseptuacentennial (so to speak) is being marked this year, wasn’t an edict and wasn’t issued at Milan. Still, its enormous impact on the history of the Church and the West is well worth pondering on this 1,700th anniversary. In his magisterial study, The First Thousand Years, Robert […]
by Father Tadeusz Pacholczyk Many of us have probably heard single women talking among themselves about men, where one of them ends up saying, “That guy, he’s just a pervert – he’s only interested in sex.” When women detect that a man’s focus has become the pursuit of pleasure, and that unbridled sex has become […]
by George Weigel When he was elected as Paul VI just 50 years ago, Giovanni Battista Montini seemed the perfectly prepared pope. He was the son of a middle-class family of Italian professionals with good Vatican ties. A competent linguist who had enjoyed a distinguished career in the Holy See’s diplomatic service, he was also […]
by Bill Dodds I’M NOT SURPRISED that this summer is bringing back many memories of times when our three children were younger. This is the first one since their mom, my wife Monica, died last winter. What surprises me, but shouldn’t, was how wise she was about making family memories. She was the one who […]
DESPITE HISs HUMBLE origins as a baker’s son from Trastevere, Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, longtime curial head of the Holy Office (“successor to the Inquisition,” in journalese) and scourge of the Nouvelle Theologie of the 1950s, was a formidable figure in pre-conciliar Catholicism. Cardinal Ottaviani’s approach to theology was neatly summarized in the Latin motto of […]
by George Weigel AS THE REVISED Standard Version renders the 14th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, Paul and Barnabas remind the proto-Christians of Antioch that it is only “through many tribulations” that we enter the Kingdom of God. The New American Bible translation drives the point home even more sharply: “It is necessary […]
by George Weigel WITH HIS NEW book, American Church: The Remarkable Rise, Meteoric Fall, and Uncertain Future of Catholicism in America (Ignatius Press), mild-mannered Russell Shaw has become the bull in the china shop of U.S. Catholic history, knocking heroes off pedestals and overturning conventional story lines – all in aid of trying to understand […]
