Most Americans have heard it reported from time to time that the city of Detroit is like a war zone. Shootings and burglaries are rampant. Fires burn out of control. According to Reuters, “With the city now teetering on the verge of bankruptcy, the futile struggle to contain arson is an insistent reminder of the depths of […]
An urgent appeal for prayer has come from one of Ukraine’s most senior Catholic bishops as momentous political change sweeps the country. Archbishop Mieczys?aw Mokrzycki, President of Ukraine’s Latin-rite Catholic Bishops’ Conference, highlighted the “great solidarity” of people worldwide, shown in prayer and practical aid. The archbishop’s comments, given in an interview with Catholic charity […]
A local Catholic has expressed a resounding “No” to hatred and revenge in the Central African Republic in that face of hatred and conflict. Archbishop Dieudonnè Nzapalainga of Bangui made his commented while speaking recently with international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN). In the interview, the archbishop lamented that the Central […]
While the controversial “Lunacek-Report”, which it has adopted this week, calls on EU Member States to“register and investigate hate crimes against LGBTI people, and adopt criminal legislation prohibiting incitement to hatred on grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity”, the European Parliament seems very much less concerned about the hate crimes that actually do take place […]
Religious representatives from Egypt speaking to the international Catholic pastoral charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) expressed the hope for a positive development in the crisis-ridden country following the fall from power of the Muslim Brother Mohamed Mursi. The Coptic-Catholic Bishop of Asyut in Upper Egypt, Kyrillos William, told ACN on Tuesday, July […]
The word that comes to mind to describe my childhood and my abortions is obliterated. There are troubling similarities between the way I was treated as a child and the way I treated my unborn children. I believe that women who were maltreated are predisposed to have abortions. As I was looking for studies to corroborate […]
The first written catechism of the Catholic Church, known as the Didache, and dated somewhere in the first century A.D., begins with a sentence of great clarity. It should be memorized: “There are two ways, one of life and one of death, but a great difference between the two ways.” Discussions of the recent mass murders, […]
Sunday, August 5 was the date of our first annual parish picnic; little did we know that it would be a date marked on calendars for another reason. As we gathered to begin the 11:00 a.m. Liturgy, an ambulance raced down the street past the park. I’m sure most of the parishioners offered a Hail […]
Clearly, what our nation needs is more “separation of church and state.” If those obnoxious, right-wing Bible thumpers would simply quit bellowing about the need for revival – a return to the deeply held Judeo-Christian principles embraced by our Founding Fathers – America would be a much better place. Secular-humanism – that’s the ticket! We […]
While necessity is the mother of invention, sloth and envy beget mediocrity and upheaval – the twin siblings of secular-socialism. It is in this vein that a rebellious and increasingly violent spirit of incoherent anarchy continues to fester in urban centers across the nation. This is most evident in the form of the envy-driven “Occupy […]
An interview with Gavin O’Connor director of WARRIOR WARRIOR is a motion picture story about two bitterly estranged brothers who end up fighting in a cage for the mixed martial arts world championship. It is also about their relationship with their father, whom neither can forgive. The violence we see in the cage is visceral. […]
Commentary on the riots inLondon and other British cities has frequently made the point that what happened there could be a forerunner of something that might happen inAmerica. And why not? After all, it already has — think of Watts, think of the eruptions inWashingtonand other American cities after Dr. Martin Luther King was killed. […]
Should a 13-year-old be able to purchase a school-shooting simulator without parents’ knowledge or consent? The Supreme Court says that freedom of speech requires that 13-year-olds have that opportunity. In a 7-2 decision, the court struck down a California law barring the sale of graphically violent video games to people under 18. I have not […]
Pardon my exasperation, but there are times when the elitist views of the mandarins who set rules for the rest of us from the federal bench and other similarly exalted vantage points are indeed upsetting. As an example, consider the Supreme Court and its decision last month on selling and renting violent video games to […]
Peoria, Mobile, Boston, Chicago, Baltimore, Atlantic City, and now Milwaukee, my home town, has been plagued by violent flash mobs. And that’s just in the past week. Flash mobbing initially began as an experiment in social networking. On June 17, 2003, a crowd of about 100 people, drawn by text messages, emails, and blogs, gathered in […]
