He’s got quite an unusual background—and was influenced by the writings of Thomas Merton : Msgr. David Talley, a former Southern Baptist who became a Catholic at the age of 24 and has served at various archdiocesan parishes, has been named by Pope Benedict XVI as an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Atlanta. At a press conference in Atlanta, Archbishop Wilton Gregory called the bishop-designate “one of our finest priests.” Talley, 62, said he will “hope to give my... Read more
From Philadelphia comes this remembrance of a deacon who died just after Christmas: Paul Michael Parchinski was a chemical engineer who over a 34-year career worked his way up the echelons of the petroleum industry, retiring from Citgo in 2001 as senior environmental adviser. It was then that he decided to take a job with an employer even mightier than the oil giants. Mr. Parchinski became Deacon Parchinski, serving his home parish, Holy Angels Roman Catholic Church in Woodbury. Instead of... Read more
From my former colleague Steve Hartman at CBS News, a lovely slice of American life: Every evening, for two years now, Don Brittain walks out onto his porch with his trusty trumpet and plays the famous 24 notes for Taps. Now, it has become a nightly ritual for his entire neighborhood in Tacoma, Washington to stop, listen, and meditate, if only for a few moments, whenever they hear him play. Read more
The conservative American Family Association offers its prediction: A conservative religious group is warning that 2060 will be a grim time, when Christians are treated “like African Americans were prior to civil rights,” the family unit is dissolved and America has a Muslim president. Christian organization the American Family Association issued the warning to members on Tuesday in an email entitled “What will religion look like in the year 2060?,” according to Think Progress. The message was written by Donald Wildmon,... Read more
Ha! Read more
Though some were shocked, simply shocked to see fleeting moments of sexual congress (one involving a guy in a Santa suit), other Christians have embraced the movie’s message. From CNN: “Les Miserables” is booming at the box office, and that financial success can in part be traced to a group of its biggest boosters: Christians, particularly evangelicals whom NBC Universal went after with a microtargeted marketing strategy. The story in “Les Miserables” is heavy with Christian themes of grace,... Read more
Actually, I’ll let Brandon Vogt do it. He lays out 10 common arguments in favor of same-sex marriage, and then deftly deflates them in Our Sunday Visitor. As Brandon points out: “This is not an attack on people with same-sex attractions. All people, regardless of sexual orientation, deserve to be treated with dignity and respect. Instead, this article is a rational look at whether civil marriage, an institution that touches all people and cultures, should be redefined.” Here’s his first three:... Read more
And they’re beauties, as the sample above shows. Details: The Catholic Diocese of Raleigh has purchased 42 stained glass windows for the new Holy Name of Jesus Cathedral. The Diocese has received more than $52 million in pledges so far, it said Wednesday. The majority of the windows were created by Paula Balano, who became the first woman to open her own stained glass studio in the United States in 1925. They came to Raleigh from a Philadelphia church. The... Read more
There’s something delightful and sweet about this: Kansas dad Emio Tomeoni shows how he spent the afternoon at home with his kid. I’m glad he cleaned up after. (And I bet Mom is glad, too…) Read more
An intriguing little item from today’s New York Times: Years before Superman could be easily spotted in the sky among the birds and planes — or in motion pictures, or on billboards or lunchboxes or the many other pop-cultural artifacts he now occupies — his co-creator Joe Shuster met him in person on the street. In 1945, some seven years after he had been regularly illustrating Superman adventures written by his partner, Jerry Siegel, Shuster encountered a young man who looked exactly... Read more
The Deacon's Bench
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