Photo by James Baca In December 2021 and May 2022, I had the pleasure of teaching a mini-course in Rome, exploring the life and thought of St. John Paul II. My students came from a cross-section of world Catholicism and offered a range of insights from different local Churches in our discussions. They were, however, uniformly surprised and disturbed by something I brought to their attention. Vatican II, I explained, had rightly called for a renewal of Catholic moral theology.

(Photo by Cari Devlin | Denver Catholic) It was heartbreaking to observe the behavior and paradoxical statements made for hours on end at...

Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone at the altar during Mass in 2021. (Photo by Dennis Callahan/Archdiocese of San Francisco) What would...

The College of Cardinals celebrated a "Pro eligendo Pontifice" Mass, or the Mass for the election of a new pope, in St. Peter's Basilica on March 12, 2013 before entering the Sistine Chapel for the papal conclave. (Photo by Jeffrey Bruno/CNA) Pope Francis’s recent announcement that he will create 21 new cardinals on August 27, 16 of whom would vote in a conclave held after that date, set off the usual flurry of speculations about the shape of the next papal election. Much of

Photo by Rock Li via Wikicommons If the Church is to continue to be Christ’s presence in the world, then part of that mission includes continuing his sacrifice. I recently wrote about the sacrificial witness of the priest in the face of modern oppression, giving examples such as Cardinal Nguyễn Văn Thuận and Servant of God Walter Ciszek. The reality, however, is that this witness continues right now throughout the world. Priests, religious and members of the lay faithful are

Given the rubbish about Ukraine spewed out by Russian propaganda trolls and regurgitated by foolish or ideologically besotted Americans, this year’s annual Summer Reading List will focus on serious books that explain the background, including the religious dimension, of a conflict that will shape Europe’s future — and ours. Lost Kingdom: The Quest for Empire and the Making of the Russian Nation , by Serhii Plokhy, tracks the imperialist chromosomes in Russia’s national genom

When Jesus began his public ministry, he started by choosing 12 men who became the Church’s first priests. The 12 Apostles are the...

With a gracious assist from former Kansas governor Sam Brownback, I had the privilege of a personal tour of the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Museum in Abilene this past March. And I couldn’t have had a better guide: Mary Jean Eisenhower, the 34th president’s charming granddaughter, with whom I shared lunch in a roadside restaurant evidently much favored by the locals — the parking lot was jam-packed before noon. After a getting-to-know-you hour over heartland victuals, M

(Photo: Jonathan Sanchez / Unsplash) So, you say you are pro-choice. But you also say that you are appalled to hear that several states,...

People make a human chain as they pay tribute to the victims around a makeshift memorial in front of the Uvalde County Courthouse in Uvalde, Texas, May 26, 2022. (Photo by CHANDAN KHANNA / AFP) Deacon Ernie Martinez is a deacon at Notre Dame Parish in Denver and a Denver police officer. My heart is heavy with memories from being one of many police officers who responded to Columbine High School on an April day in 1999. The evil which transpired in Uvalde, Texas, where the liv

Photo by Devon Divine via Unsplash For those in our pews who think it is impossible to accept and live by the Church’s teachings related...

Photo by K Mitch Hodge on Unsplash We are not used to thinking about owing anything to God. In many ways, religion has become focused on “me,” going to Church therapeutically to feel good about oneself. In reality, we owe God everything. Religion, traditionally understood, sought to render to God the worship, homage and thanksgiving that was due to him as God, the one who made us, cares for us and saves us. In Catholic theology, this was understood as an expression of justice

Photo by Bohumil Petrik | Catholic News Agency Tertullian, the first major Christian theologian to write in Latin, is thought to have coined the maxim Semen est sanguis Christianorum , typically (and rather freely) translated as “the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church.” Martyrs, we usually think, are those who shed their blood “in hatred of the faith”: the definition of martyrdom used by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints. But an ancient Christian tra

There are striking parallels between the Russian disinformation campaign that continues to foul the global communications space in the...

Photo from Fr. Walter J. Ciszek Facebook Page The evils of the 20th century hold a strange fascination. We cannot help but read and reread accounts of totalitarian oppression, such as Elie Wiesel’s Night , Anne Frank’s Diary, Viktor Frankl’s profound Man’s Search for Meaning , and Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago . Something about these experiences, primarily relating to the horrors of Naziism and Communism, speaks deeply to the resiliency of the human spirit that c

ROME. As of May 15, Catholic journalists around the world will be able to count one of their number among the saints, as Titus Brandsma,...

ALEXANDRE MEN - PRETRE ORTHODOXE RUSSE - ASSASSINE EN 1990 NE: DECEDE: 1990 I’ve been thinking recently about Robert Frost’s poem, “The Road Not Taken,” and its relationship to a deceased Russian Orthodox priest. As the Soviet Union was crumbling in 1990, two roads metaphorically diverged in a Russian wood. One was the path of national renewal facilitated by an evangelically vibrant, intellectually open and ecumenically engaged Russian Orthodoxy; the other was the more famili

(Photo: Adobe Stock, edited) There are disadvantages to writing a monthly column in a 24 hour news cycle world. By the time my time rolls...

Credit: © L'Osservatore Romano Pope Francis is undoubtedly grieved by the carnage in Ukraine. And when the Catholic Church’s chief ecumenical officer, Cardinal Kurt Koch, tells journalists he shares the papal conviction that religious justifications of aggression are “blasphemy” — a wicked use of the things of God — we may be sure that this, too, is Francis’s view of things. Why, then, should Pope Francis meet with Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus’, as some personalitie

In both the Roman and Byzantine liturgical calendars, Lent 2022 has coincided with a brutal war in Ukraine. That war was launched by Russia’s Vladimir Putin for an ignoble, imperial cause. It has been conducted by the Russian military in a manner that recalls the barbarism of the Romans who crucified 6,000 slaves along the Appian Way after the Spartacus revolt. It’s an old story. Tyrants cannot tolerate the truth about their tyranny; they terrorize in order to break the spiri