The recent papal interregnum and conclave underscored the importance of re-forming, and reforming, the College of Cardinals. As configured on February 28 (when Benedict XVIs abdication took effect), the College was a somewhat strange electorate, albeit one that produced a striking result. … Continue Reading»
Last week, Glee aired a ripped from the headlines episode meant to capitalize on the debate over gun control. According to the Washington Post, the program featured long, unsettling stretches of students sitting in the darkness, hiding under tables and desks and sobbing, while leaving devastating video messages for their loved ones … Continue Reading»
The U.N.s recently released 2013 Human Development Report summarizes strikingly good news about the decline in global poverty over the last two decades (whereas once 43 percent of humans lived in extreme poverty, that figure has now fallen to 21 percent) and predicted the rise of a global middle class… . Continue Reading»
Today, the Gang of 8 offers a comprehensive immigration reform plan intended to address the contemporary realities of immigration. To prepare for that conversation, Id like to offer some points of importance for Christians to consider on this issue. Pope Pius XII said that Americans are stewards of natural resources that could support a large population… . Continue Reading»
For almost forty years, Tom Konchalski has scoured high school gymnasiums across the East Coast”and sometimes beyond”assessing up-and-coming athletes for his newsletter, High School Basketball Illustrated. Appearing sixteen times a year, its read by many of the nations top college basketball coaches… . Continue Reading»
In the final scene of A&E’s Pride and Prejudice the camera pans a double wedding tableau: Elizabeth and Darcy and Jane and Bingley, both couples surrounded by family and community. Misunderstanding, pride, and prejudice complicated these courtships, but honesty, self-evaluation, and chastity accompanied them too. Continue Reading »
Rupert Sheldrake is a heretic, and he has the second-degree burns to prove it. On January 13, Sheldrake, a research biochemist trained at Cambridge, gave a TEDx talk at Whitechapel where he proposed to turn what he calls the ten core beliefs of science from assumed dogmas into questions… . Continue Reading»
That one of the most striking lines of poetry on beautys impermanence was written by a priest-killer and a thief is among literary historys many seeming incongruencies. Where are the snows of yesteryear? (Mais où sont les neiges danten? in the original medieval French) appears in a ballade in the middle of François Villons Testament … Continue Reading»
Last month, a Swiss woman biking through India with her husband was gang raped by five attackers. In December, a female medical student, accompanied by a male friend, was riding a bus in Delhi, India, when she was brutally gang raped by eight passengers who then threw her off the moving bus… . Continue Reading»
Hello, senior seminarians everywhere. You are among the slew of new pastors soon to be unleashed upon unsuspecting congregations and parishes all across America. The Church of Christ trembles with excitement… . Continue Reading»