Checklists have been with us for many years, especially in critical industries where a mistake could make the difference between life and death. We’ve all seen footage of pilots in the cockpit doing a careful checklist before takeoff. And we know the ground crew does similar check listing before each takeoff. I suspect commercial aircraft […]
A leading Catholic bishop in Iraq has spoken of his people’s shock and courage after a car bomb outside a church left 13 people injured. Archbishop Louis Sako of Kirkuk said he and his faithful “will never stop witnessing to Christ” in spite of the bomb which went off directly outside the Holy Family Syrian […]
The last thing in the world same-sex “marriage” advocates want to talk about is polygamy. If you ever tell them marriage recognition for same-sex relationships requires recognition of polygamy as well, the usual response is, “we’re not talking about polygamy.” Nor will they, even if you want them to. Polygamy exposes the weakness of the […]
The foreign assistance appropriations bill proposed by a House subcommittee “makes morally unacceptable, even deadly cuts to poverty-focused humanitarian and development assistance,” said Bishop Howard J. Hubbard of Albany, chairman of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Committee on International Justice and Peace, and Ken Hackett, President of Catholic Relief Services, in a […]
What you put in the collection basket says a lot about you and where you are at in your journey. Some of us put in our 10% tithing without a second thought. Some of us put in the few “extra” dollars we may have. Some of us struggle with the need to “give” to the […]
It should be clear that the vast majority of current thinking about the problem does little to address the underlying causes of our dilemma [see Part 1]. And this is odd because the mechanics of prices are well known and have been since the time of Aristotle. No competent economist of whatever school disputes these […]
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) sharply criticized a new HHS “preventive services” mandate requiring private health plans to cover sterilization and all FDA-approved contraceptives, including drugs which can abort a child before and after implantation in the womb, with no co-pay. “Although this new rule gives the agency the discretion to authorize a […]
The enthusiastic voices of pro-life youth from around the world dominated the events of [last] week’s High Level Meeting on Youth at the United Nations, drawing the attention of UN bureaucrats and delegates alike. “I keep running into all these pro-lifers, they’re everywhere…in fact most of the people I’ve interviewed are pro-life,” a young woman working […]
New York is now the fifth state in which activist judges have imposed legalized homosexual marriage. Conservatives are once again lamenting this historic “redefinition of marriage.” But they’re wrong. The historic redefinition of marriage took place at the seventh Lambeth conference in 1930 when the Anglican Church made it licit for its members intentionally to […]
Meditation and Questions for Reflection or Group Discussion (1 Kings 19:9,11-13; Psalm 85:9-14; Romans 9:1-5; Matthew 14:22-23) Hearing God’s Still Small Voice There was a tiny whispering sound (1 Kings 19:12). Have you noticed how noisy our world is? We celebrate holidays with ear-shattering fireworks. Young people listen to music so loud that you can’t […]
Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on a news article in [Sunday’s] New York Times on the Catholic Church: A priest, Fr. Roy Bourgeois, decides to break with the Catholic Church’s teachings on ordination and “ordains” a woman in an illicit ceremony. He is given three years to recant, but he refuses, and is now […]
I recently heard the first radio ad of the season for school supplies, so it won’t be long before the bell rings and America’s children file back into the classroom for another year. Perfect timing for a pop quiz. Everyone grab a No. 2 lead pencil and join in. Question 1: At the end of […]
U.S. Army Private First Class Nasser Jason Abdo, 21, first made the news last August when, arguing that his Islamic faith contradicts serving in the American military, he filed for conscientious objector (C.O.) status. Referring to current American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Abdo asserted that a Muslim “is not allowed to participate in an […]
with Jennifer I Kimball, Be.L. Thirty years after the Center for Disease Control (CDC) reported the first US case of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), the disease continues to stretch its shroud of death across the world. This, despite the billions of dollars that have been invested in the development of vaccines, spent on anti-retroviral […]
My brother John has a great photo from the birth of his first child. It’s a picture of his daughter’s unbelievably tiny baby-hand gripping his finger. His daughter’s whole hand, so perfectly formed and so amazingly small, can only just wrap around John’s bony knuckle. You just can’t conceive how they were ever that little. […]
What does a man do after reading powerful, potentially life-changing words from a saint? Hopefully he actually changes his life. Additionally, he could slice and dice the words up, put them in a book, and try to get as many other people as possible to read them. That’s what I did after reading the works […]
The College of St. Mary Magdalen in Warner, New Hampshire, has had a make-over. On October 16 of 2010, this small liberal arts college rededicated itself to rigorous intellectual and spiritual formation while unveiling a new name: the College of Saint Mary Magdalen. The name was modified to serve notice that the Catholic identity remained […]
Only one miracle of Jesus is recorded in all four gospels — the multiplication of the loaves and fishes. I once heard a homilist give what he said was the real meaning of the story: the people in the crowd took out food they were hiding under their cloaks and shared it. Jesus’ preaching inspired […]
Amidst the rhetorical pyrotechnics surrounding July’s debt-ceiling debates, another controversy streaked across the sky like a comet, flared for an instant, then receded into the maelstrom of ongoing partisan attacks. The shooting star in question involved an exchange between two of Congress’ most controversial members, Allen West (R-Fla.) and Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), whose regard […]
One can hardly turn on the radio or the TV without hearing the melodrama being played out in Washington DC around the Federal Budget. Well, I guess it is not so mellow. There are no simple answers, there are no immediate cures. As is true in any question in life, there are two sides to […]
Author’s Note: I read with interest Mary Kochan’s article on the Catholic Lane website, “Catholics, Please Say Something about Jesus!” I was somewhat surprised by the passionate responses, both pro and con, to her article. As I said in my own response to Mary’s article: “I think the argument should not be over what you […]
The question of whether Catholics talk enough about Jesus was recently raised on this site. It came up as part of difference of opinion over whether believers of any stripe should be scandalized by expressions of devotion to Mary that don’t mention her divine son in the same breath. Catholic apologist Dave Armstrong was among […]
Saint Paul on God and love is simple for to the saint these are one and the same. That is his statement to the Christians at Rome and he declares this squarely in the middle of his Epistle to the Romans, his 5,000-word tour de force on love, God, sin, death, resurrection, and the salvation […]
“The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with them for the usual daily wage, he sent them into his vineyard. Going out about nine o’clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and he said to them, ‘You too go […]
