It doesn’t get any better than this. From the Facebook post of Michael and Megan Foster, sharing details with friends and family: Our guide, Simon, who has seen over 500 adoptions in over 20 years of work in China is moved to tears as he says he’s never seen a child so happy to meet her parents. We were prepared for much worse in this moment and we know of course there will be challenges to come still. But we... Read more

The great saint died 75 years ago today—and I’m reminded of this great story from last year, one that more people need to know: For one moment at Auschwitz, he became the turnstile through which the priest passed to the death that would earn him sainthood. Franciszek Gajowniczek (pronounced guy-of-KNEE-check) stood near the altar after Communion on Saturday evening and spoke to the congregation through an interpreter, Maria McGinn, a parishioner born in Poland. On July 29, 1941, at the... Read more

One of the great untold stories of the Rio Olympics, from Catholic News Agency:  Katie Ledecky, Lia Neal, and Anabelle Smith are some names you might hear on television if you are watching the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro this year. These Olympians have all won medals in the 2016 games, but they are also united by another common factor: their Catholic education. Sacred Heart Schools, founded by the Society of the Sacred Heart, boasts of a network of over... Read more

The esteemed Sara Butler in First Things looks at what we know about women and the diaconate so far and reaches this conclusion: Since the diaconate is a grade or degree of Holy Orders (The Catechism of the Catholic Church [CCC], §1554), the unity of the sacrament seems to require that its subject, who is the sacramental sign, be a baptized male. In the end, the ITC referred the question to the discernment and authoritative decision of the Magisterium. Encouraged... Read more

The archbishop of Philadelphia, Charles Chaput, offers some thoughts in his column this week: My column this week is a collection of personal comments.  Read it as thoughts from a brother in the faith, not as teachings from an archbishop. Presidential campaigns typically hit full stride after Labor Day in an election year.  But 2016 is a year in which two prominent Catholics – a sitting vice president, and the next vice presidential nominee of his party — both seem... Read more

An interesting comparison of the two men running for vice president, from retired sociology professor William F. Powers:  Notwithstanding numerous similarities, Tim Kaine and Mike Pence are political and religious polar opposites. How can these two “nice Catholic boys” have turned out so differently? It stems from the differing understanding that these men – and millions of others – have of three overlapping questions: l) How should we relate to Jesus Christ? 2) What determines moral behavior? 3) What should a... Read more

A small but significant part of the culture is disappearing, and the landscape is changing:  Where are the lawn Madonnas of yesteryear? One of the charms of wandering the outer-circle neighborhoods of New York, far from the towering commercialism of Manhattan, has been the statues of the Blessed Mother staring out serenely from the postage-stamp lawns of rowhouses. “A lot of new nationalities came in, it isn’t what it was,” said Lou Campanella III, a statue and masonry dealer whose... Read more

From The Telegraph:  Women ripped off their black burqas and defiantly smoked cigarettes, while the men cut their beards as they gave the peace sign. After two years living under the Islamic State, the last-remaining residents of the northern Syrian city of Manbij could not quite believe it when the US-backed forces arrived to rescue them. “Why did you take so long?” sobbed one woman, who had been trapped in her basement for a week along with her two daughters and... Read more

It should be noted: the Church is already ordaining married men, both as priests and deacons. But the question needs to be asked: should the Church ordain more of them, and make this practice more widespread? The need is great and will only grow in the next few decades, as more priests retire or enter eternal life. Austin Iverleigh has some thoughts in Crux:  In much the way that access to the sacraments of the civilly divorced and remarried was the... Read more

Details, translated by Google from the original French: The archbishop of Rouen is prepared to initiate a canonization procedure within the prescribed period of five years. It states that it “carefully preserved evidence about the Father Jacques.” Making a miracle, a condition generally imposed by the Church for canonization, will not be necessary: “To the martyrs, their loyalty before death takes the place of miracles.” For Bishop Lebrun, the abbot, killed in his church of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, at the foot of the altar,... Read more