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Emmaus: from Despair to Joy

What a disappointment!  They thought they’d found the Messiah.  But he’d been trapped like an animal and executed as a criminal.  Up until his very last breath, they had hoped he’d descend from the cross in stately power and call down fire upon the hypocrites. But all they heard from him were seven last “words” […]

Adopting a Mom

About 23 years ago I packed all my belongings into my Dad’s Suburban and drove 1500 miles from my Rocky Mountain home to live in a place I had never seen and could barely pronounce.  I had never planned to attend college – since there was no such thing as a faithful Catholic college, to […]

How to Gain True Self-confidence

“So, during supper, fully aware that the Father had put everything into his power and that he had come from God and was returning to God, he rose from supper and took off his outer garments” (John 13:2b-3b). This came from the reading on Holy Thursday this year. Each year, in the attempt to emphasize the true […]

May Blossoms, Part Two

The guy sitting next to me in the optometrist’s office bugged me. I mean, he really bugged me. He bugged me like I wanted to actually step outside and stand on the sidewalk by the front door until it was time for my appointment; that’s how much he bugged me. Rather than commit an act […]

What Would Jesus Cut?

That is the question asked by the left-leaning Christian organization, Sojourners, in its campaign of the same name. It is a most appropriate question given the battle over the budget and given this time of year, not long after the most holy holiday of the year for Christians. Sojourners claims that, despite record budget deficits […]

Swiss Cardinal at the Helm of Catholic Ecumenism

Looking ahead to the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017, the United Evangelical Lutheran Church of Germany (VELKD) started a Luther Garden in Wittenberg and invited each of the Lutheran Churches worldwide and also their ecumenical dialogue partners to plant a tree “as a sign of reconciliation and mutual understanding”.  In one of his […]

The Church and the Deficit

For a long time I supposed that social issues — abortion, same-sex marriage, and the rest — were the great dividing line in American politics, with the collapse of natural law thinking at the root of the problem. While I still see the culture war resulting from this as a large part of what ails […]

UN Agency Calls for Population Reduction

A recent press release by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) declares that the world’s population will reach 7 billion people on October 21, 2011. According to PRI President Steven Mosher, while the release pays lip service to human achievements, it also makes a veiled demand for more population control. In the release, UNFPA’s Executive […]

U.S.-Pakistan Relations in Decline

Although the execution of Osama bin Laden was mainly a symbolic and psychological act of counterterrorism, its most immediate consequence, ironically, affects U.S.-Pakistan relations. In response to Pakistani upset about their national sovereignty being trespassed, the Zardari government severely condemned what it called “an unauthorized unilateral action.” Members of U.S. congress, already disappointed in the […]

What is Human Dignity and the Sanctity of Life?

Pope Benedict XVI has aroused some opposition but also worldwide hope for dialogue and discovery of shared truths about our humanness, God, and moral and social crises of our times. He has focused much of his initiative on the core question of “human dignity” and, by implication, “the sanctity of life.” There is good reason […]

Charges Dropped Against Almost All of the ND88

Charges Dropped Against Anti-Abortion Protesters At Notre Dame’s Commencement with President Obama Thomas More Society’s Relentless Legal Defense Wins Justice for Pro-Live Activists  Today, Michael Dvorak, St. Joseph County, Indiana prosecutor, dismissed the criminal trespass charges that he has pressed over the last two years against almost all of the pro-life protesters, known as the […]

A Report from Tuscaloosa’s Ground Zero

The Warrior River borders the University of Alabama campus, separating old Tuscaloosa from up-scale housing developments to the north. Tuscaloosans know a “north of the river” address connotes six-figure incomes. The schools, public and private, are excellent. It’s the country club set. The Warrior River forms a barrier separating Tuscaloosans by class and largely, although […]

Bin Laden and the Hydra of War

As we ponder the significance of Osama bin Laden’s death, it is well to reflect that Islamists are not the cause of hostilities; they are but symptoms of a much greater cause. Individually killing them off—which is nice—is like a doctor temporarily treating a sick patient’s symptoms without eliminating the cause of sickness. Ayman al-Zawahiri, […]

Son Day. Sunday. Some Day.

Sunday is the Son’s Day.  So I thought once-upon-a-time in my little girl reasoning. Jesus is the Son of God. He rose from the dead on a Sunday.  Hence, Sunday is Son-day.  Little did I know back then that my silly little play on words was not far from the truth. This ever-ancient-yet-ever new Catholic […]

The Royal Wedding and How to Take Marriage Seriously

They grace the cover of Time magazine this week, do Kate and William, with not one but two full-page spreads inside: of the coach ride after the wedding and of the Westminster Abbey recession. Days after the grand affair, the world still gawks and talks.  Much of the talk is about what the newlyweds have […]

Vicarious Revolutions for the West

Since January this year, the world has been watching the Middle East with anticipation and hope.  A cascading series of uprisings in the Arab world began in Tunisia with the overthrow of President Ben Ali.  In one country after another, populist insurgents were pitted against autocratic dictators.  Some – like Mubarak of Egypt, Gaddafi of […]

Time for a Fresh Start on ‘Terrorism’

The liquidation of Osama bin Laden is a cause for full-throated national celebration.  It must also be the occasion for a redirection of our efforts to wage and win what has been misnamed “the War on Terrorism.”  At last, we must recognize the struggle we are in for what it is – the War for […]

Comic: Concupiscence?

Exposed

No means No. Duh! you might be thinking. What else could it mean?  Well, for some men “no” translates to mean, “yes”. And for law enforcement officials, “no” could mean a charge of rape.  But I’m getting ahead of myself. This all begins with Shannon Deitz’s book, Exposed: Inexcusable Me, Irreplaceable Him. It is a […]

Getting Off the Misery-Go-Round of Scrupulosity

“Bless me Father, for I have sinned.  It’s been an hour and fifteen minutes since my last confession,” Mike fearfully utters to the priest.  Mike had confessed prior to the Mass he just attended, but during Mass remembered something he did not confess.  This greatly troubled him because he knew it was a mortal sin.  […]

May Christians Preach Outside a Philadelphia Mosque?

Law enforcement scrutiny, detainment by police, and a court date to answer trumped-up charges: these are the consequences of preaching Christianity to Muslims not only throughout much of the Islamic world, but sometimes even in America as well. The most infamous example occurred last June, when four missionaries from Acts 17 Apologetics were arrested and […]

Obama and the Nature of Truth

Some people collect coins, others scan the beach with metal detectors. I enjoy trolling footnotes at the back of a book for little gems of insight or historical anecdote. I was recently rewarded for this eccentricity while reading John D. Mueller’s new book, Redeeming Economics: Rediscovering the Missing Element recently published by ISI Books. Mueller, […]

Poem: “Wild Riding Kingdom”

Wild Riding Kingdom I. Wild animals took flight before a tsunami clouded the land with rushing water pushed by shifting plates below the sea, yet we could not see it coming. Magellan saw clouds of dwarf galaxies three billion years away but did not know what we know: Some stars eat each other. II. Black […]

Open Hunting Season Again on Human Embryos

“This case is not over,” said lead attorney Samuel B. Casey about Friday’s 2-1 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington D.C. that gave the green light for the destruction of human embryonic stem cells for research purposes.  That action overturns an injunction put in place by a District Court judge last summer. […]