Scott P. Richert My family never watched It’s a Wonderful Life when I was growing up. I saw it for the first time when I was around 30 years old, at a special Christmas. I found myself in tears at the end, and not because I had been emotionally manipulated. The film is a near-perfect…
The season of Advent has been a time of preparation for the great Feast of Christmas. The feeling of anticipation built as we got ever closer, week by week. The candles on the Advent wreath got lit, one by one. Their glow became ever brighter. What was it that we anticipated? The celebration of the…
Mi 5:1-4a Ps 80:2-3, 15-16, 18-19 Heb 10:5-10 Lk 1:39-45 Ironically, as our Advent journey is drawing to a close, another journey is beginning. It’s right there in the first three words of this Sunday’s Gospel: “Mary set out…” This time of year, I think, a lot of us can appreciate the idea of taking…
O Blessed Virgin, Immaculate, Inspirer and Cause of so much love for God, and so much good. You know Jesus best of all. You love Him more than any other. I see so much happens through you, so many miracles and healings, God doing them at your request. I see in my life you make…
Emily Nelson The debate on assisted suicide has risen to prominence again, particularly with the recent vote in Westminster and calls for changes in legislation elsewhere. What can we do about this? Through my work for FaithVersed, I was asked to organise a talk on this topic, aiming to both inform and equip people to…
St Peter Canisius, born on May 8, 1521, in Nijmegen (now part of the Netherlands), shared his birthday with a significant event in Christian history. Martin Luther was placed under ban by the ‘Edict of Worms’, marking the formal start of the Protestant Reformation. Biographers often highlight this coincidence, noting how St Peter would become…
Q: Could Jesus sin? If not, was he truly human and free? A: This is a rather complex question that gets into some deep Trinitarian theology. But I think we can still break this down into some accessible takeaway points. For some background, we believe that Jesus is truly and fully God, the second Person…
Whoever says, “I believe” says “I pledge myself to what we believe.” The syntheses of faith are called “professions of faith” since they summarise the faith that Christians profess, and it was gathered from all the Scriptures. They are called creeds, which comes from the word in Latin: credo (I believe). The first profession of…
Garry O’Sullivan sat down with columnist and retreat giver Fr Ron Rolheiser and asked him about Catholics and the reading of scripture. G: Often people see some of the things you say somehow against Church teaching, is there a problem for many Catholics in their reading and understanding of the bible? Fr Rolheiser: I…
Jason Conroy For years, Ronan Collins kept up a great tradition on RTÉ radio: starting from December 8, he would play a different rendition of O Holy Night every day until Christmas. Indeed, they never start playing Christmas tunes on Radio 1 or Lyric FM before that date. What’s so special about December 8? It’s…
Renata Milán Morales