The next big thing: long-distance marriage prep online?

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

Yes. I hadn’t heard about this before, but it’s catching on. Details: A collaborative project between a Port Huron company and the Archdiocese of Chicago has allowed thousands of couples to receive Catholic marriage preparation online. In the past two years, more than 2,000 couples have used Marriage Ministries, an online Catholic marriage preparation series, to prepare for the sacrament. Located above Weekends on Military Street, Marriage Ministries was developed in collaboration with the Archdioceses of Detroit and Chicago and... Read more

Worth a thousand words: Buffalo’s new married priest

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

Father John Cornelius, the first married priest in the Diocese of Buffalo, gives communion to his wife at yesterday’s ordination. The New York Daily News has a complete write-up. Read more

“It was pretty common for a woman to be lying on the abortion table while holding a rosary…”

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

Tim Drake has a very good interview with Abby Johnson posted at the National Catholic Register. Johnson, you’ll recall, was a director at Planned Parenthood who finally quit in 2009. Last year, she and her husband joined the Catholic Church and started an apostolate for abortion workers called And Then There Were None. At one point in the interview, she talks about the need for the Church to speak more about healing from abortion. The following exchange leaped out at... Read more

On a married priest abstaining from sex: “A praiseworthy thing”

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

That’s the assessment of canon lawyer Ed Peters, writing about the item that’s raising eyebrows (and igniting comboxes on the interwebs). Ed writes: I saw the news item about a married deacon who announced that, upon his ordination to priesthood, he and his wife will cease conjugal relations. Because such a decision by them is, as everyone who follows this topic knows, consistent with what I think Canon 277 and the unbroken Western tradition behind the canon call for, I had not planned... Read more

A growing trend: home funerals

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

Here’s an interesting glimpse into this phenomenon from Jaweed Kaleem at Huffington Post. I suspect a significant number of these funerals take place for reasons that are primarily economic. But it can’t be denied: the experience of death and mourning, when carried out in the home, is very different—immediate, intimate, familiar. Details: A little over five years ago, Alison and Doug Kirk held their 9-year-old daughter’s hand as she lay on a futon in their Nashville living room, told her... Read more

Pope: lack of faith may harm validity of marriage

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

A little something for all you canon lawyers out there, via Vatican Radio: Lack of faith may hurt the intrinsic goods of marriage: procreation, marital fidelity and its indissolubility. This was the message at the heart of Pope Benedict XVI’s address Saturday morning to members of the Tribunal of the Roman Rota received in audience for the opening of the judicial year. The Pope reiterated that the current crisis of faith brings with it a crisis of conjugal society. He... Read more

Homily for January 27, 2013: 3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Last updated on: March 13, 2015 at 4:50 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

[Click here for readings.] So, how are those New Year’s Resolutions going? Back on January 1, Forbes posted an article on their website saying that about 40% of Americans make resolutions for the new year —but only 8% of those people end up keeping them. And usually after about a month – meaning any day now—most of us have fallen back into our old habits. I know my waistline hasn’t gotten any smaller, my desk hasn’t gotten any more organized... Read more

“The petition on the White House web site labeling the church a ‘hate group’ is beyond the pale…”

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

The cardinal archbishop of Washington, Donald Wuerl, pops up in today’s Washington Post and offers a timely defense of the Catholic Church: The Catholic Church is no stranger to criticism from those who disagree with its teachings, but the petition posted recently on the White House Web site to label the church a “hate group” is beyond the pale, even in an age when an aggressive secularism seeks to marginalize the influence of religious belief. The church has long been criticized as “too dogmatic.”... Read more

Homily for January 27, 2013: 3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Last updated on: January 26, 2013 at 6:07 am By Deacon Greg Kandra

Buffalo’s married priest says he will stop having sex—UPDATED WITH VIDEO

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 5:00 pm By Deacon Greg Kandra

I posted on him a few days ago. Now, some more details, from the New York Daily News: John Cornelius will be ordained a Roman Catholic priest this weekend — and with the blessing of his wife they’re giving up their sex life. Cornelius, a father of three, will become the first married Roman Catholic priest in New York — and Sharyl, his wife of 33-years, has agreed to the whole celibacy thing. “We have decided to do that voluntarily,”... Read more