In preparation for Pentecost, I went to Sunday Mass in the cathedral church where I had ministered in northeast China. At 6:30 a.m., I participated in the early morning Mass with about 300 people. I was shocked to find the leader of the song was the man that the Religious Affairs Bureau had placed in the bishop’s office as the receptionist. His responsibility had been to “care for” and inform public security on the daily life of the bishop. There on Sunday morning, he was leading the community in song and prayer. 

Several weeks after Servant of God Dorothy Day’s funeral, I was interviewed for a television program in 1981 by a “liberated nun.” She asked me, “What is the legacy of Dorothy Day?” Without hesitation, I said: “Her faith!” The nun was nonplussed, for she thought I would have said: “Her activism, her protests against war,” and so forth. (Today, the nun’s congregation no longer exists.)

“When the always well-written and often wrongheaded New Yorker dislikes something, chances are good that I’ll like it — a principle that holds, with certain reservations, in the case of “Dignitas Infinita,” the April 8 “Declaration of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith on Human Dignity.”

At the age of 75, bishops are mandated to submit their letter of resignation from administration directly to the Holy Father in Rome.

The passage of time is making it less and less likely for a person to stand shoulder to shoulder with a veteran of the Korean War, and even less likely with a veteran of World War II. That both would also happen to be prisoners of war? The chances are quite slight in 2024.

World Day for Consecrated Life is an annual recognition and celebration of the vocation to religious and consecrated life in the universal Church. The term “consecrated life” includes religious sisters, both active and monastic, religious brothers, religious order priests, members of secular institutes and consecrated virgins, all of whom are present in the Diocese of Brooklyn. 

Catholic Schools Week is a time to celebrate the many gifts that Catholic education provides. Our schools are places of learning, faith, and community, where students are encouraged to grow in mind, body, and spirit. 

Perhaps the two most spoken letters in the alphabet today are AI, artificial intelligence, where technology imitates the work of human beings. AI portends the future, is inspiring in the marvels it can accomplish but also instills fear in the changes it will bring.