Every Christmas, a concept at the heart of the season is the birth of Christ as Saviour. ‘Christ the Saviour is born’ we sing in the carol Silent Night; ‘Saviour’s Day’ warbled Cliff Richard and on Christmas night.
Our need of saving
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Spend this Advent season with the saints
No one knows better how to prepare for welcoming Christ than the saints,writes Bert Ghezzi Advent prepares us for Jesus’ coming at Christmas and for his coming into our lives afresh. And no one knows how to get ready to welcome Christ better than the saints. They express their love for him by putting him…
Insta-culture and a powerful Advent lesson on delayed gratification
Scott Richert When my sisters and I were young, my mother would spend all of Advent baking cookies and making candy. That may hardly seem remarkable; after all, countless millions of Christmas cookies are baked and consumed every year between Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. But my mother didn’t eat any of the cookies she…
Pray the news, pray the media, and imbue the culture with Christ
Sr Nancy Usselmann Though they’re gifts from God, living and working behind our media screens can sap our energy and leave us feeling listless and spiritually dry. Growing our spiritual lives while immersed in a digital world requires a media spirituality that centres us in Christ, the perfect communicator. Blessed James Alberione developed Pauline spirituality…
Why do Catholics have to wait for Confirmation and the Eucharist?
Jenna Marie Cooper Q: Why do Orthodox Christians confirm their infants at Baptism and also permit babies to receive the Eucharist, and why do Catholics wait? A: Thank you for your interesting question! First, it’s not only Orthodox Christians who confer all three sacraments of initiation at the time of Baptism – Eastern Catholics do…
Russia cracks down on Catholic Church in occupied Ukraine
Gina Christian Russian occupation authorities have banned the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church and other Catholic ministries in occupied areas of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, according to the Church’s main communications office in Kyiv. The UGCC announced on its website December 7 that it had obtained a copy of an order signed by Yevgeny Balitsky, the Kremlin-installed…
Macron to invite Pope to Notre Dame’s December 2024 reopening
A year from the reopening of the Notre Dame Cathedral in the heart of the French capital, the cross is again overlooking Paris from the top of the newly installed wooden spire. On December 8, 2024, the most famous cathedral in the world will welcome the Faithful again. The French president said he will extend…
Latin American bishops support Guatemalan cardinal amid threats
The Latin American and Caribbean bishops’ conference has expressed solidarity with Cardinal Álvaro Ramazzini of Huehuetenango, Guatemala, after the prelate said he had been told that judicial officials are seeking his arrest and the country’s outgoing government sent a strongly worded letter to the apostolic nuncio. The conference – commonly known as CELAM – said…
Witnessing to Jesus with humility and boldness
Jem Sullivan Is 61:1-2a, 10-11 Lk 1:46-48, 49-50, 53-54 1 Thes 5:16-24 Jn 1:6-8, 19-28 “Rejoice in the Lord!” is the invitation we hear this Third Sunday of Advent, when God’s word calls us, once again, to enter into the mystery of the Incarnation, soon to be celebrated in the great feast of Christmas.…
Harmful practice of broadly labelling all individuals
Dear Editor, I write with a heavy heart in response to the regrettable events that transpired in Dublin on November 23, culminating in riots that have left our community shaken. I implore the Church to take a more resounding and active role in advocating for peace and dialogue during these tumultuous times. In the face of…