Symposiums
A Conversion of Individuals
Christ spent 3 years forming 12 men. Those men went on to change the world.
ISIS, Just War, and the Words of Pope Francis
Christians have a complicated relationship with violence. Our founder (Christ) died by violence in absolute meekness—living out to the extreme his teaching that when confronted with violence we must “turn the other cheek” (Matthew 5:39). Jesus taught us “Blessed are the Peace Makers” (Matthew 5:9) and we hail him as the Prince of Peace (cf. […]
Pope Francis’ Missionary Impulse: a Transformation I Didn’t Want
By Sarah Summers Granger “I dream of a missionary impulse capable of transforming everything.” – Pope Francis Ten years ago, I didn’t want a transformative impulse. I wanted stability, peace, a small dose of the Holy Spirit – just enough to keep me on the straight and narrow. After all kinds of turmoil in my […]
Seven More Books for Catholic College Students
The college semester is upon us again, and at most universities the new academic year is either now beginning or has recently begun []. For the returning students, this means a return to familiar stomping grounds and reunions with friends before the courses really buckle down into the semester grind. For the new students, it […]
Wake Up, The Glory of the Martyrs Shines Upon You!
In his moving novel, Silence, Japanese-Catholic author Shusako Endo once described the continent of Asia as a “swamp” that choked the sapling of the Gospel and made it uninhabitable for Christianity. That image has always haunted me because a part of my own journey — as a convert to Christianity from Buddhism — has been to […]
Martyrdom in Mosul
When I heard of the atrocities happening in Mosul this past week, I couldn’t believe it. I still can’t. This is happening in our world today? I know there are bad things happening all of the time. I know there is evil. But I couldn’t wrap my mind around such brutality, such fierce evil. After […]
Redemptive Suffering
The fear of suffering, pain, and death may seem like unconquerable mysteries. My time here at CPE [Clinical Pastoral Education] has helped me to understand, via experience, that they are not necessarily things that need to be conquered. No amount of faith excludes us from experience pain, loneliness, and death. Money, power, and other earthly […]
Pope Francis’ Dream for the Church: What Would Happen!
So apparently I am not the only one who loves Pope Francis! Of course it is one thing to like someone and another thing to follow them and what they ask of you! I was very blessed that his monthly evangelization intention for the month of July was for the laity, serving around the world […]
We Don’t Call Her “The Virgin Mary” For Nothing.
Whenever we talk about Mary, we address her with many different titles: Mother of Jesus, Mother of God, Holy Mary, Blessed Mother. However, out of all these, the one most often heard across Catholic (and Protestant) aisles is The Virgin Mary. Virtually every person that claims the Christian faith accepts that Mary miraculously conceived Christ […]
Know Mary, Know Jesus. No Mary, No Jesus.
During my days as a Southern Baptist, my opinion of Mary, the Blessed Virgin, was the same as every other Protestant. I saw her as just another character in the Bible, one who was given a particular task, and when God was finished with her, she faded into the background with the rest of the […]
Dear Robert Tracinski: sola pecunia
I read your article confessing the sin of idolatry by way of mammon. I might recommend confessing your sin in the box where absolution can be administered. It is a great and wonderful hospital for us who are spiritually sick. Mammonism is serious business, just ask the business cronies that lobby government to write laws […]
Theology of Suffering
When I was a teenager and with the Boy Scouts (i.e., Venture Scouts), I went to Manatoba, Canada to do a Northern Tier trek canoeing expedition. We arrived at a small town with a population of about 90, and got on a little puddle-jumper plane that flew us over the beautiful landscape and dropped us […]
Healing the Body of Christ
You may have heard about the controversial Cincinnati Catholic school contracts, which require teachers not to publicly support things contrary to Church teaching. If you haven’t heard about it, here”s CNN”s story highlighting all the teachers that are terrified of being fired; for whatever reason, the reporter didn”t bother to find anyone who thought it […]
Oil and Water: Catholic Mixed Marriages
I’ve been hearing a lot lately about mixed marriages–from friends, from Catholic bloggers, etc etc. I’ve toyed with the idea of writing a little about them before but always hesitated because I didn’t want to write something like a diatribe, or something painfully tangential. And I will say at the beginning of this article that […]
Searching for Truth in the Modern Academy
“Universities have failed in modern society because of their rebellion against the sacred tradition. They have become monumental pyramids, hospices for the remains of what once was learning, now sustained by growing numbers of administrators and shrinking numbers of teachers, surviving on grants and measuring their viability by their endowments, static as the latter-day Egyptians […]
