The crucial moment in this calculated aggression came 70 years ago, on March 8-10, 1946, in Lviv, Ukraine. There, after more than a year of secret police coercion, a non-canonical “council” (or “Sobor”) of Ukrainian Greek Catholic clergy “voted” (without discussion and by a “spontaneous” show of hands) to abrogate the 1596 Union of Brest that had brought their Church into full communion with Rome. Not a single Ukrainian Greek Catholic bishop was present.
YOU’VE GOT TO have a good memory for mid-Sixties pop music to remember the Seekers, an Aussie quartet that once vied for the top of the British charts with the Beatles and the Rolling Stones (and did quite well here in the U.S., too). But this isn’t a pop culture quiz; it’s a reflection on our increasingly disturbing 2016 presidential election, with a little help from, yes, the Seekers.
I WAS SITTING in a reconciliation room once, confessing my usual garden variety list of sins when I was suddenly aware that the priest was gazing out the window. Being reflective, perhaps? No, I was fairly sure he was daydreaming. I left my confession with the feeling that I was forgiven by God but ignored by my confessor.
“Choice” rings hollow when pressures come from family members who increasingly see their financial resources being drained and their loved ones as burdens; when health insurance companies will pay for a lethal dose of drugs, but deny a claim for expensive chemotherapy treatments; when health providers subtly make judgment calls about whose lives are worth living and whose are not; and when the mechanisms of our very government sanction and assist in death-making.
Some people are not distracted, and Nancy Reagan was one of those who was not distracted. May she rest in eternal peace.
Ever since the Maidan revolution of dignity, Russian propaganda has been pumped into the world in a steady stream. Most unfortunately, it has too often misrepresented what the Kremlin is up to in Ukraine while slandering Ukraine’s Greek Catholic leaders.
Early in the 1980s, the historic Church of the Holy Apostles, serving the Chelsea neighborhood of New York since 1848, was dying. Membership was down and money was scarce. Undaunted, the pastor and congregation started a soup kitchen.
I didn’t know that this farmer from Okarche, Okla., just might become the first U.S.-born male saint.
Justice Scalia was regarded, by admirers and detractors alike, as the most consequential jurist of his time.
There are many opinions circulating about Pope Francis. Some say he’s too liberal, others say the Holy Father stresses mercy too much over justice. Permit me to present a few facts about how the pope has performed his duties since assuming the chair of St. Peter. I hope it will help you get to know him better.
