We need to pray even when that seems the most lifeless thing to do. That’s a counsel from Michael J. Buckley with which we need to challenge ourselves daily. In the face of real life, prayer can often seem like the most lifeless thing to do. What difference does prayer make? I will pray for…
Notebook Synodal pathway… I am not sure whether that should be followed with an exclamation mark, a question mark or a full stop! Synodal pathway! (Exclamation mark) That could work. I am prone to overusing exclamation marks and am not quite sure why. I like them. They suggest life, a bit of fun and wonder…
The point about the new Texas abortion law which few commentators seem to grasp is that Roe v. Wade divided America disastrously, and should never have formed a nationwide ruling on the subject of abortion. It was passed by the Texas state legislature, in both upper and lower houses, by a democratic vote, and with…
The View Next week, a compelling new documentary Ireland’s Fall: The Abortion Deception will tell the inside story behind the repeal of the Eighth Amendment. That account will differ, of course, from the narrative that has been so widely spun by abortion campaigners and their media allies who would have you believe that Ireland’s abortion law…
Mary McAleese’s remedy for greater lay involvement is undermined by the legalism with which she wants to save the synod process writes Prof. Massimo Faggioli It is always wise to pay attention to the statements that former president Mary McAleese makes on the Catholic Church. They always reveal something on this moment in the life…
The world is a messy place and often the only realistic choices are between bad and even worse writes David Quinn Everyone remembers where they were on September 11, 2001. I was still the editor of this newspaper and had gone into a pub for lunch with some other staff and on the television set…
Letter from Poland Sunday saw the beatification of two blesseds with very different, but equally holy, missions in the Church in Poland. Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, declared the ‘Iron primate’, Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski and Mother Elzbieta Róza Czacka blessed at Mass and a service September 12, at…
Having spent most of my adult life and career living in western Europe and covering Catholicism, I’ve developed three broad observations about the cultural landscape here vis-à-vis the Church. – First, the Church is undergoing a long-term transition from a culture-shaping majority to an optional subculture, sometimes in harmony with the broader majority and sometimes…
Twenty years ago this week, struggling to digest the events of September 11th, I wrote this column. Two decades later, my reaction is the same. Here’s the column. Iris Murdoch once said that the whole world can change in 15 seconds. She was talking about falling-in-love. Hatred can do the same thing: On September 11…
Notebook Mark Pattison The 20th anniversary remembrances of the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States is renewing a canonisation push for the first identified casualty: Franciscan Fr Mychal Judge. Fr Judge, a New York Fire Department chaplain, was at the World Trade Centre site praying with and ministering to attack victims when debris falling…
Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Mary Kenny
David Quinn
John L. Allen Jr.