The Healing Power of Christ
When You heal, everything comes back to life, even in the past, and You give fruits to the one who has not known how to flower.
– Maurice Blondel
I recently came across the above quote from the French philosopher, Maurice Blondel. It appears to be a statement addressed to God. It expresses the sovereignty of the Lord God over all things – space, time, life. God is not limited by time, for time is His creature, and He transcends it. As the Source of all life, the Lord can touch the wounds that we carry in the present and heal them all the way back to the moments in which we received them. The sins we’ve committed, He can forgive. The effects of our sins, as well as sins committed against us, He can heal. He alone can bring forth life where there was no life, where there was only the stinking rot of death, where there was nothing at all. He doesn’t do it just for us as individuals. Our Lord binds up and heals the wounds that exists in families and even nations. It is something at which to marvel, the recapitulation and healing of the whole of salvation history through Our Lord’s 33 years on earth – doing what Adam failed to do, putting right what Abraham, Moses, David, and all of us have gotten wrong.
Bursting with life, Jesus shares His life with the barren-hearted – those who do not know how to love, how to flower. Without Him to fill us with His life, we are left alone and closed in on ourselves. He comes to us from Heaven and opens His heart to us that we might open our hearts to Him and let Him bring us to the very Heart of God, the eternal embrace of Father, Son, Holy Spirit.
posted 9/22/20
Nicaea and Unity
After the homily at every Sunday Mass, the congregation rises to recite the Niceno-Contantinopolitan Creed, better known as the Nicene Creed. The Nicene Creed is a concise distillation of the foundational beliefs of orthodox Christianity. It has its origins in the Council of Nicaea which took place in modern day Turkey in the year 325…
The Grace of Angry Prayers
While his day job for the past 20 years has been chaplain to the students at the University of Minnesota Duluth, Fr. Mike Schmitz is best known for his work with Ascension Presents and his popular podcast “The Bible in a Year.” Full of enthusiasm, Fr. Mike is one of the great contemporary teachers of…
The Gift of Dependence
Leah Libresco Sargeant is a writer who has been making the rounds promoting her new book, The Dignity of Dependence. In a recent interview with Church Life Journal, she said that her book is an attempt to debunk what she sees as a false idea of what we are as human beings, namely the idea that we are “autonomous individuals…
Dilexi Te
A little over a week ago, Pope Leo XIV issued his first teaching document in the form of an apostolic exhortation called Dilexi Te. To be honest, I have not yet read it myself, only commentaries about it (always a dangerous thing to do). But among those who have shared their thoughts on the document,…
Loving Our Little Plot
Last weekend at the cathedral, Bishop Frank Caggiano conferred the St. Augustine Medal on over 170 people in recognition of their exceptional service to parishes, schools, and Catholic Charities throughout the Diocese. Among the recipients of this year’s award was Eden Huang, who I’m sure is very upset with me as she reads this. If…
The First Tablet
A few months ago, I was at a (non-parishioner’s) wedding reception and found myself in a conversation with a group of people I knew, but not very well. The conversation took place at that point in the evening when guests suddenly feel relaxed enough to freely share their opinions on politics and religion. In due…
Summer Rest
This Tuesday (7/29) we celebrate the feast day of Sts. Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, a family of siblings who were close friends of Jesus. Our Lord would often stay at their home in Bethany when He was visiting Jerusalem. In St. Luke’s gospel (Lk 10:38-42), we hear about one such visit. Martha is “burdened with…
Building Happy Marriages
What is the secret to a happy marriage? According to experts, going on dates (with one’s spouse) is very helpful. Unfortunately, most couples rarely enjoy a date night together. Based on a nationwide survey of over 2000 married couples, 52% of married couples report either never or seldom go on dates together, with 48% reporting…
Apologetics
The term apologetics refers to a reasoned and systematic defense of a particular set of beliefs, and it has always had a place in the history of the Church. Many of the Church’s great saints engaged both fellow believers and non-believers in fierce debates over important questions of doctrine. St. Peter himself encouraged Christians to…
The Catholic Founder
This weekend, people across this proud land will gather together to enjoy hots dogs, watermelon, and fireworks as a way of celebrating Independance Day, the commemoration of the signing of the Declaration of Independence 249 years ago. There are many household names among its signatories, such as Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and John…
The Promise & Peril of A.I.
Artificial Intelligence is a hot topic these days. While techno-utopians from Silicon Valley speak of it with great optimism, many others, including Pope Leo XIV, are much more circumspect about what its impact will be on civilization. A few years ago, Fr. Stephen Grunow of Word on Fire gave an interesting lecture on the issue…
A Few Announcements
This weekend our parish is happy to welcome Mr. Colin Firda who is a seminarian studying to be a priest of our diocese. Colin will be with us for a couple of months, during which time he will be helping out by serving Mass, writing a short weekly reflection for the bulletin, and moving heavy…
What’s in a Name?
As the Church gets to know its new pope, one of the things that is helpful to consider is the name that Cardinal Robert Prevost took upon his election to the See of Peter. It has been the tradition since the sixth century for popes to adopt what are called “regnal names,” and the name…
Tales of Conclaves Past
This week, members of the College of Cardinals of the Catholic Church will perform their most important function, which is to elect a new pope. The election takes place during what is called a “conclave,” which comes from the Latin words, con and clavis, which literally means “with key,” referring to a room with a…
Pope Francis, R.I.P.
The first time I heard the name Jorge Bergoglio was the evening of March 13, 2013, when he stepped out on the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica as Pope Francis. I was a deacon, in my second-to-last year of studies in Rome, only months away from priestly ordination. Just weeks earlier I had been sitting…
Putting in the Work
Shannon Sharpe is considered to have been one of the best tight ends to ever play professional football. He won two Super Bowls with the Denver Broncos and one with the Baltimore Ravens and retired from the NFL in 2003 as league leader in receptions, touchdowns, and receiving yards at his position. These days, he…
Not Doing What We Can
At last weekend’s Masses, the Church had us reflect on a scripture passage about King Saul falling into the hands of David (1 Sam 26:2-23). Saul had been making David’s life miserable for years, trying to kill him out of envy. Suddenly, David has a golden opportunity to put an end to his ordeal by…
Drifting Apart, Marching Back
Last weekend our parish hosted a marriage workshop called “Adventures in Marriage.” Over the course of three days, 22 couples spent time learning how to constructively work through challenges together, and by all accounts the program was very well-received. I was able to watch parts of the presentation and witness some of the exercises that…
Candles
This weekend, Masses will begin a little bit differently than usual, with the blessing of candles for Candlemas. Candlemas is the feast on which we commemorate the presentation of the infant Jesus in the Jerusalem Temple 40 days after His birth. Historically-speaking, the Temple at the time of Jesus was known as the second Temple.…
Coach Freeman
It’s been a good year for head coaches who are serious about their Catholic faith. Last June, Joe Mazzulla coached the Boston Celtics to their franchise’s 18th NBA title and is still known to stroll around the parquet floor praying the rosary before home games. This winter, in only his third season at Notre Dame,…
Fires
Over the past few weeks, terrible wildfires have devastated the city of Los Angeles. As I write this, experts are forecasting more of the same Santa Ana winds that have fed and spread the destructive blazes. The fires so far have burned an area more than twice the size of the island of Manhattan, consuming…
The Gift of the Magi
There is a bar on East 19th St. in Manhattan called Pete’s Tavern which is always nice to visit this time of year for its Christmas decorations, which create a festive atmosphere conducive to the sharing of libations. In one of the booths, not far from the door, the author O. Henry composed one of…
Gratitude
Gratitude brought Dorothy Day to God. In 1925, Day was living in a bungalow on the beach in Staten Island. She had spent the past ten years working in Manhattan as a journalist documenting the radical political movements she supported, and living a bohemian lifestyle with artists, playwrights, and activists in Greenwich Village. An abusive…
Benefits of Belief
Do parents want what’s best for their children? Almost always. That’s why they work hard, sacrifice time and resources, and try to instill in them values and habits that will help them succeed and flourish. But what if, more than any other activity, regular religious practice is the most likely to help your kid succeed…
Altar of Repose
Our parish is blessed with two beautiful churches. St. Gabriel’s was built in 1964, originally as a multi-purpose space, serving as both church and school gym. When plans to build a free-standing church were abandoned, the space was designated permanently as a church, and a gym was included in the later expansion of the school…
Filial Piety
“Lee Corso is a mixture of Don Corleone and Yoda.” For those unfamiliar, Lee Corso is a sports broadcaster who co-hosts the show “College Game Day” on ESPN along with Kirk Herbstreit, who likes to describe his colleague this way. Back in college, my roommates and I would gather around the television every Saturday morning…
Reasonable Faith
Is it reasonable to believe in God? The Church at the First Vatican Council (1869-70), in its document Dei Filius, declared infallibly that “God, the principle and end of all things, can be known with certainty by the natural light of human reason from created things.” This means that human beings on our own can…
The Joy of Creating
Every Thursday afternoon in high school I would spend an hour with Mr. Guzzi, my piano teacher. Mr. Guzzi was a well-respected local jazz pianist, and I was interested in learning that style of music. During those lessons, he taught me things like music theory and chord progressions. He gave me drills to develop basic…
Surviving the Political Season
November 5 is election day, and the weeks leading up to it can be a very stressful time for people. Political rhetoric will surely intensify as Americans prepare to choose to whom we want to entrust the enormous power that comes with political office in our country. Aware of how this can affect us, Fr.…
All About Angels
This is the time of year when the Church wants us to think about angels. September 29 is the Feast of the Archangels and October 2 is the Feast of the Guardian Angels. Angels are our fellow creatures, whom God created before the dawn of time. But they are a very different kind of creature…
John 1:5
On March 30, 1981, a 25-year-old named John Hinckley attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan. Hinckley was a troubled young man who hoped that his crime would gain him notoriety and the attention of actress Jodi Foster, with whom he had become obsessed. Using a revolver, Hinckley shot the president in the chest from close…
(Mal)Formed by Technology
“Technology makes us different people – people who are less inclined to be Catholic,” writes Colin Miller in Church Life Journal. Miller insists he is no luddite. He is merely reminding us that, for better or worse, we human beings are shaped by our actions. Consider how repetition and practice allow us to become proficient…
An Exceptionally Normal Man
I have never been to Los Angeles. I have no desire to visit. I think that has something to do with having grown up rooting for the Boston Celtics. I was 10 years old in 1986, when Boston had its greatest team, whose best player was, of course, Larry Bird. Bird was always my favorite…
Curbside Sanctuary
Everybody knows that summer in Stamford officially begins with the Greek Fair at Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church on Newfield Ave. For many years, our next-door neighbors have provided rides, games, and lots of food the first weekend of June, and the crowds are reliably large. Visitors to the fair typically use the grounds of St.…
Time to Pray
When I was in college, I heard a priest preach about the importance of daily prayer. He said that the Catholic whose interaction with God was limited to attendance at Sunday Mass and nothing more the rest of the week was living on “spiritual life support.” His point was that, while Sunday Mass is foundational,…
Get Married
These days, marriage is often dismissed or overlooked as an important institution for human flourishing. But in his new book Get Married, Brad Wilcox, a professor of sociology at the University of Virginia, argues that “so many of the biggest problems across America are rooted in the collapse of marriage and family life.” In fact,…
Restorative Images
Interesting things are happening in France. Adult baptisms are up 30%. There is unprecedented interest in the annual pilgrimage from Paris to Chartres. The reconstruction of Notre Dame Cathedral will be finished in time for Christmas. All this surprisingly good news was reported by The Pillar in the context of an interview of 27-year-old Frenchman…
Our Special Guests
Before you read any further, please mark this date on your calendar: May 21, 2024. At 8pm that evening, the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage will arrive to the Church of St. Cecilia. The National Eucharistic Pilgrimage is an initiative of the bishops of the United States. Four groups of pilgrims will be journeying from different places…
Compunction & Divine Mercy
A few days before Easter, Pope Francis gave a homily about compunction to the priests of the Diocese of Rome. Though not a word one often hears, he said compunction is “essential” to the spiritual life. It’s related to the word puncture, referring to “a piercing of the heart that is painful and evokes tears…
Avarice
In a January 24 speech, Pope Francis described avarice, or greed, as “a sickness of the heart, not of the wallet,” that affects rich and poor alike. It is the attempt to gain control over the world by exercising mastery over the things of the world. But it is a false mastery, the pope says,…
Attraction to Distraction
Cultural critic Ted Gioia observes in a recent essay that we are rapidly entering into a “post-entertainment culture.” People are losing interest in movies, television, and music. “The fastest growing sector of the culture economy is distraction,” he argues, “Or call it scrolling or swiping or wasting time or whatever you want. But it’s not…
God-Given Rights
Last week, journalist Heidi Przybyla of Politico caused a stir when she expressed grave concern about “Christian Nationalists,” those whom she says “believe that our rights as Americans, as all human beings, don’t come any earthly authority. They [believe our rights] don’t come from Congress, they don’t come from the Supreme Court, [rather] they come…
Wrath
Over the past month, Pope Francis has been giving a series of talks on the Seven Deadly Sins. In a recent reflection on wrath, our Holy Father described it as “a vice that destroys human relationships.” If left unchecked, anger over an incident or action often will end up aimed at the other person himself.…
Confident Abandonment
During this season of Lent, we take up the three disciplines of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. As concepts, fasting and almsgiving seem less appealing than prayer, but are relatively easy to do. Prayer, on the other hand, is something most people would like to do, but find difficult. For Lent, I’ve been re-reading a book…
Interesting Conversations
Someone recently shared with me a video of an interesting conversation between Bishop Robert Barron and Fr. Joseph Fessio, SJ. Many of you are probably familiar with Bishop Barron, who has become well-known as the founder of Word on Fire Ministries and for his evangelization work on YouTube and other social media platforms. Fr. Fessio…
Reshaping Culture
The ancient custom of foot binding originated in China about 1000 years ago. Somehow it had become fashionable among elite women of Chinese society to have small, dainty feet. To achieve this aesthetic, the feet of girls four or five years old were broken and then tightly bound. The binding of the feet intentionally prevented…
No Double-Dipping
George Costanza is not a good role model. There are many reasons why this is true, including his propensity to double-dip. We first learned of the Seinfeld character’s bad habit in Season 4 during the episode when George tries to score points with his new girlfriend by accompanying her to Michigan to attend the funeral…
R.I.P. Shane MacGowan
The unusual Christmas song “Fairytale of New York” will be getting extra airplay this year. That’s because the unusual man who wrote it, Shane MacGowan, died this past November 30 at the age of 65. The song made MacGowan and his band The Pogues famous when it was released in 1988, and was the biggest…
Feels Like Home
When I was 25 I spent a year living in Spain. I was between jobs and unsure what my next move was going to be, so it seemed like a good (and fun) use of time as I contemplated my future. One of the most memorable parts of that year was the month I spent…
Why Laws Matter
I recently watched a video of an exchange that took place in a committee meeting of the Irish Parliament about the legalization of physician-assisted suicide. The exchange was between a young Irish parliamentarian and an expert on medical ethics invited by the committee to testify. The parliamentarian was demanding that the expert explain on what…
Planning for the End
Last Saturday we welcomed several speakers to give presentations on making end-of-life decisions. One spoke of the importance of having an Advanced Medical Directive and designating a Health Care Representative who has authority to make medical decisions on behalf of an incapacitated patient. Another talked about what’s involved in purchasing a cemetery plot and the…
Finding Wisdom in the Desert
Roman persecution of Christianity ended when the Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity in 313 AD. Suddenly, to be Christian was to share the religion of the emperor and his mother, which made it socially respectable, even advantageous. Some saw spiritual danger in this development, worrying that it would lead to a soft Church that made friends…
The God of Bethesda
Central Park is one of the great landmarks of Manhattan. In a recent article published in the journal First Things, John Byron Kuhner gives a virtual tour of the park that culminates with a description of a terrace, at the center of which “is a large circular pool, whence rises an elaborate fountain, of the…
Alma Mater
This weekend I will be away from the parish, attending my college class reunion. Twenty-five years ago, I graduated from the University of Dallas (UD), a small Catholic university located in Irving, TX. It was an unlikely choice for an 18-year-old from Connecticut, but I had a cousin studying there whom I visited as a…
Cardinals
Next Saturday, September 30, Pope Francis will install 21 new members of the College of Cardinals. A Cardinal of the Church is a senior member of the Catholic clergy whose most important responsibility is to elect a new pope when the reigning pontiff dies or resigns. Most Cardinals are bishops, though not all. Popes occasionally…
Keeping Time
While January 1 marks the beginning of the calendar year, and July 1 is the beginning of the fiscal year, and the first Sunday of Advent is the beginning of the liturgical year, Labor Day marks the end of summer and the beginning of another school year. I imagine that for most parents these days…
Fr. Coley Palmer, R.I.P.
On August 14, Fr. Michael “Coley” Palmer passed away at the age of 86. Fr. Palmer was born in Stamford in 1934 and was baptized at St. John’s Church on Atlantic St. When he was still a boy, his family moved to Springdale where they became members of St. Cecilia Parish when the church was…
Living Together
A few months ago, the Institute for Family Studies published “How Moving in Together Makes It Harder to Know if He’s the One,” an article by Scott Stanley and Galena Rhoades, research professors at the University of Denver. The authors note that more than 75% of couples live together before marriage. While a couple’s decision…
Conversion
“A personal encounter with the real mystery of a personal God is at the heart of every conversion,” writes Fr. Donald Haggarty in his book Conversion. Years ago, as a deacon, I was responsible for a Bible study at a local parish, and we usually had about 5-6 people attend each week. About four months…
WYD
Papal biographer George Weigel tells a story about meeting with Pope John Paul II in December 2004. The pope was quite ill with the Parkinson’s Disease that would claim his life just a few months later, but he was still alert and happy to share a meal with his friend, who presented him with a…
Grandparents’ Day
Ever since the 1970s, the first Sunday after Labor Day every year is designated National Grandparents’ Day. But we Catholics have been celebrating Grandparents’ day since at least the 6th century, with our observance of the feast day of Sts. Joachim and Anne (July 26), the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the grandparents…
Conscience
“If there is anything I learned during my time as an interrogator at Guantanamo Bay, it is the importance of a well-formed conscience,” writes Jennifer Bryson, a Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, in an article appearing in a 2022 edition of The Lamp. In the summer of 2001, Bryson was an unemployed…
Cardinal George, Cultural Missionary
I recently finished reading Glorifying Christ, a new biography by Michael Heinlein about Francis Cardinal George (1937-2015), who served as Cardinal Archbishop of Chicago from 1997-2014. Cardinal George was by all accounts a devoted pastor, but also a brilliant man, who was widely seen as the intellectual leader of the American episcopacy. Before becoming a…
Keeping the Proper Perspective
After capping off a 61-1 season with a third straight national championship, members of the University of Oklahoma softball team were asked by a journalist how they were able to handle the unique pressure that comes with high expectations and play with joy when anxiety could easily set in. Infielder Grace Lyons responded first, saying:…
Go to the Sacred Heart
Since it was opened in 1885, people have been visiting the Basilica of the Sacred Heart in the Montmartre neighborhood overlooking Paris to take in more than just the view. Above the main altar in the sanctuary of the church, the Most Blessed Sacrament has been exposed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week…
Incorrupt
On Ascension Thursday (5/18/23) the Benedictine Sisters of Mary, Queen of the Apostles in Gower, Missouri transferred the coffin of Sr. Wilhelmina Lancaster from her grave in the community cemetery to a sarcophagus in their monastery chapel. What would have been a normal act of devotion to their foundress, who died on the same feast…
God is Good
“Forever I will sing the goodness of the Lord!” With this reference to Psalm 89, Bishop Caggiano began his homily for the Mass last Saturday (5/20) at which he ordained six new priests for the Diocese of Bridgeport. The Bishop remarked that such an occasion should evoke songs of praise and thanksgiving from the hearts…
Health Crisis
There is a mental health crisis in our society, especially among the young, and everybody knows it. Fr. Roger Landry, the Catholic chaplain at Columbia University, in a recent article in the National Catholic Register, cites a 2023 Center for Disease Control study which found the following: 57% of girls and 29% of boys reported…
God is Beautiful
There is an old cherry tree that grows on the northwest corner of the Parish Office building on the campus of St. Cecilia. Every year, around this time, I look forward to seeing the beautiful pink flowers that adorn its twisted brown branches. The blossoms make me think of the conversion story of a priest…
Why Read Scripture?
“The Christian story is amazing,” says English historian Tom Holland in a recent conversation with Bishop Robert Barron. Holland’s latest book, Dominion, examines the impact Christianity has had on human civilization, which he argues is so complete that even Christianity’s harshest secular critics often unwittingly base their critiques on ideas that he says are fundamentally…
Bells
In 1940, Walt Disney released the film Fantasia, which consisted of eight sequences of animation set to pieces of classical music. It is generally considered a masterpiece. The most famous scene from the movie, of course, is “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” which features Mickey Mouse as a novice magician who tries to wield magic to help…
Gift of Life
The late comedian Norm MacDonald, who hosted the “Weekend Update” segment on Saturday Night Live in the 1990s, made the following observation during one of his parody news reports: “Dr. Jack Kavorkian was responsible for another death this week. This time it was a 58-year-old woman. She’s the twenty-sixth of Kavorkian’s patients to die since…
Warring with Spirits
Warning: this article contains spoilers about season one of “The Rings of Power” television series. If you have been looking forward to watching it, I suggest skipping to the second paragraph. “The Rings of Power” is a television series on Amazon Prime that serves as a prequel to J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings…
Why the Church Teaches
For those who follow these things, the #6 most popular podcast on iTunes right now is hosted by Fr. Mike Schmitz, a Catholic priest from the Diocese of Duluth, ND. Fr. Mike’s current podcast is a follow-up to his extremely popular “Bible in a Year” program, which he hosted in 2021, and is called “Catechism…
God’s Precious Ones
If you were a member of the Church in its earliest days, one of the people you’d have thought most unlikely to become a follower of Christ was Saul of Tarsus. Saul was a Pharisee, a brilliant young scholar of the Law, and a zealous defender of his tradition. He believed the Christian sect was…
Pope Benedict XVI, R.I.P.
On February 11, 2013 I was sitting in a Roman lecture hall, taking notes and trying not to be distracted by my Australian classmate whose phone kept buzzing. Finally, he turned to me and whispered, “The Holy Father just resigned.” I looked at him skeptically, saying, “That’s not possible. Someone is pulling your leg.” A…
Matthew 26:38
“Last year, nearly one in 30 deaths recorded in Canada was an assisted suicide death.” Catholic ethicist Charlie Camosy cited this troubling statistic during his recent interview in The Pillar of Amanda Achtman, a human rights advocate who works with Canadian Physicians for Life. Since the 2016 introduction of Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID)…
Resisting Colonization
I had never heard of Bo Burnham until I came across a clip of a recent conference at which he spoke about the impact of social media on culture. Burnham is a 32-year-old comedian and musician who received critical acclaim for a comedy special he produced during the COVID-19 lockdowns called Inside. Originally from Massachusetts,…
Communion
This Tuesday, November 1, is the Solemnity of All Saints. It is one of the greatest feasts of the year because it is a celebration of those who have reached the final destination for which we are made and to which we all aspire, with the help of God’s grace. It’s important to remember that…
An Odd Sort of Mercy
Graham Greene was one of the most acclaimed writers of the 20th century, whose best novels feature morally complex characters who experience grace through their very real struggles with fallen human desire. I recently read his 1951 novel, The End of the Affair, which takes place in London in the mid-1940s. A writer named Maurice…
Bending the Knee
When I was a seminarian, I had a summer assignment at a parish where the pastor gave me the task of training the altar servers. I was very pleased when a pretty decent number of kids showed up to the training session. The first thing we practiced was processing down the aisle at the beginning…
Singing and Parking
On Singing: “He who sings prays twice.” This is a phrase attributed to St. Augustine of Hippo, the patron saint of our Diocese. He is saying that when we sing our prayers, we adorn the words we speak to the Lord with a beauty that comes from our hearts’ love for Him. It is like…
Survey Says
A couple of months ago, the Diocese approached me and asked whether our parish might be interested in participating in a program that assists in outreach and ministry to married couples and families. After listening to what they had to say, I saw it as a good opportunity. There seems to be little debate that…
Knowing Ourselves
When the first images from the James Webb Space Telescope were released in July, the public response was astonishment. What the Hubble Telescope had revealed faintly was now seen with unprecedented clarity – thousands of galaxies in a patch of sky the size of a grain of sand, some of whose light took over 13…
Throw Away Culture
In his encyclical “Laudato Si,” Pope Francis writes about “throw away culture.” While much of the encyclical discusses themes about the environment, “throw away culture” refers to much more than littering or the wasteful nature of consumerism. Lucia Silecchia, a law professor at Catholic University of America, has argued that Pope Francis intends the phrase…
Clearing up Confusion after Dobbs
In the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision Dobbs v Jackson, there has been a good deal of confusion over the significance of its overturning of Roe v Wade and Planned Parenthood v Casey. Surveys show that a very large number of Americans, up to 68% in some polls, believe that Dobbs criminalizes abortion,…
Reconstruction
On Friday, June 23, the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Supreme Court of the United States issued its much-anticipated opinion Dobbs v Jackson which struck down its 1973 opinion Roe v Wade and the 1992 decision Casey v Planned Parenthood. Dobbs effectively ended the 49-year federal prohibition of legal restrictions on…
Sacred Heart, Sacred Body
The month of June is dedicated to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. One may be forgiven for not knowing that, since the Sacred Heart of Jesus is not something that attracts corporate sponsorship or media attention. Sadly, there are no parades organized to celebrate the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Which is surprising, in a…
Adrift No More
At this year’s graduation ceremonies at New York University, pop star Taylor Swift addressed the class of 2022. If you’re not familiar with Taylor Swift, she is one of the best-selling musicians of all time, having sold over 200 million records since her debut album which came out in 2006 when she was 17. During…
Rosary & Renovations
Pray the Rosary May is the month of Our Lady, and a good time to resolve to pray a daily rosary. But you don’t have to take my word for it. Just a couple of weeks ago, two world-famous Catholics made strong pitches for the daily rosary. There was Pope Francis, of course, who exhorted…
Vicki Thorn, R.I.P.
“A number of times over the years I’ll be someplace, and someone will have introduced me, and all of a sudden this woman will come up to me, and she’ll say, ‘May I give you a hug?’ And she’ll just wrap her arms around me and hold me very tight, and she whispers in my…
What It’s All About
There’s a story about a young Italian priest who was travelling by train and found himself sharing a compartment with a group of high school students. Since it was 1952 and there were no smart phones to distract them, the priest and the young people engaged in conversation. What the priest discovered through the conversation…
Forgiveness & Healing
Forgiveness is the subject of a new book by moral theologian Fr. Thomas Berg and clinical psychologist Dr. Timothy Lock, who both serve on the faculty of St. Joseph Seminary in Yonkers, NY. The book is called Choosing Forgiveness: Unleash the Power of God’s Grace, and they recently gave an interview to The Pillar about…
Learning from Alvaro & George
When I was 25, I lived for four months in Madrid as a guest of a large Spanish family of 8 children, most of whom were grown and living on their own. I was introduced to the family by a friend who briefed me about them as he drove me to their home. In the…
Comprehending Brianna’s Choice
In this month’s edition of the Fairfield County Catholic (Jan 2022), there is a beautiful article about a young woman named Brianna Farens who grew up in Shelton, and is a graduate of St. Joseph High School (2010) and Providence College (2014). She had always thought about pursuing a career in medicine, like her father,…
The Blessing of Children
Pope Francis got himself into trouble with the commentariat last week for some things he said during his January 5 audience that were critical of married couples who decide against having children. “Many couples do not have children because they do not want to, or they [intentionally] just have one – but they have two dogs, two cats [that] take the place of…
Family Matters
There’s an excellent essay by Helen Alvare in the current edition (Jan 2022) of Magnificat, entitled “Who is my Neighbor?” Alvare is a tenured law professor at Antonin Scalia Law School (George Mason University), an advisor to the Vatican and the US Bishops Conference regarding issues of family policy and religious freedom, and the author of many articles and books. Here it is in its entirety: I have…
Hopes and Resolutions
What do we hope for in this new year of 2022? Certainly, we continue to suffer the effects of the pandemic. COVID-19 has exposed many of the hidden maladies of our society, including a widespread sense of isolation and a desperate yearning for meaning and purpose in life. We have seen how social alienation is easily co-opted by political movements and ideologies that foment resentment and…
Norm
Over the next couple of weeks, the media will begin its annual practice of reflecting on the events of the past year, including the passing of celebrities and politicians. One of the people who surely will be mentioned is comedian Norm MacDonald, who died of cancer in September. MacDonald was best-known as a cast member of Saturday Night Live and for anchoring the…
Friends with Nones
I recently read a very sad article entitled, “’Nones’ at the Peripheries.” It appeared on the website of a Catholic news provider called The Pillar and was the final installment of a series of articles about a survey commissioned by The Pillar which I also wrote about in this space a few weeks ago. This particular article focused in on a segment of our country’s population that is religiously unaffiliated. They are often referred to as the “nones,” since their response to the…
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The Parish of St. Cecilia-St. Gabriel 