Studies have shown that a shocking number of children diagnosed with Down Syndrome are being aborted. If anyone out there wants to preach a pro-life message from the pulpit, here’s one that is often overlooked. Attention must be paid. Despite what some may think, these lives have value and meaning—and these children are loved. From Tony Rossi of The Christophers: “Love doesn’t die.” That’s a quote from a letter we received at Christopher headquarters recently from a woman named Jean, and... Read more

This is just wonderful. From The Georgia Bulletin:  Beth Anne Ross and William Dempsey III were united in the sacrament of marriage Friday, April 1, at the morning Mass of St. Jude the Apostle School. Dempsey and Ross, longtime friends and running and hiking partners, became husband and wife at the first wedding in the school community’s history. A second-grade teacher at St. Jude, the bride provided white carnations for her students to pin to their school uniforms. Her class,... Read more

From AFP: French baker Michel Flamant, who owes his life to the homeless man who begged for handouts outside his bakery, knows more than anyone that man does not live by bread alone. To show his gratitude, Flamant is selling the business in the eastern town of Dole to Jerome Aucant for a symbolic one euro. The corpulent Flamant, who wears a tank top and shorts to help him cope with the heat of his bread ovens, says he has... Read more

Well, who knew? Details: A new Pew Research Center study of the ways religion influences the daily lives of Americans finds that people who are highly religious are more engaged with their extended families, more likely to volunteer, more involved in their communities and generally happier with the way things are going in their lives. Nearly half of highly religious Americans—defined as those who say they pray every day  and attend religious services each week – gather with extended family... Read more

Leave it to the great Joanne McPortland  to discover a pearl of great price buried in the pope’s new exhortation: Amid the controversy surrounding Pope Francis’s recent apostolic exhortation, Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love), one extraordinary section has been all but overlooked. In chapter 4, “Love in Marriage,” the Holy Father offers a moving exegesis of that popular wedding reading, St. Paul’s ode to love from 2 Corinthians. It’s about more than marriage, though; it’s mercy in action. The... Read more

From The National Review: The Shroud, the most studied, analyzed, and tested religious relic in the world, has spawned a vast, global field of scientific study, called “sindonology,” but still baffles scientists. Its mysteries are many and complex. For brevity’s sake, I will only scratch the surface (so to speak). First among the major mysteries is how the image was made. Second, what is the substance constituting the image, which can be scraped away with a razor blade? The substance... Read more

From NBC News:  In what Francis himself called Saturday a “last minute decision,” the Essas joined two other Syrian families on the pope’s flight home to start new lives in Rome. The families were chosen not because they were Muslim, but simply because their papers were in order, the pope told reporters on his plane Saturday. “This initiative is purely humanitarian,” he said. “[When] I heard the pope chose us to come to Rome, I thought it was incredible,” said... Read more

What a great idea. Details:  Mike Scioscia, veteran manager of the Los Angeles Angels, visited the press conference room at Target Field on Sunday morning, but it wasn’t to announce a trade. Instead, Scioscia was among perhaps 30 worshipers attending a Roman Catholic Mass the Twins will be offering for all Sunday home games this season. Catholic Athletes for Christ, an organization based in Alexandria, Va., approached the Twins about the idea this offseason. Twins President Dave St. Peter, who... Read more

From The Miami Herald, the posthumous story of Joshua Daniel Bishop, executed last month for murder: An obituary is an all-but-unheard-of rarity for any prisoner, much less one who’d faced lethal injection. But Bishop’s, an eight-paragraph recap of his life, was printed in the local section of last Sunday’s Telegraph – next to obits for an Army veteran who died at 81 and a Baptist church secretary who lived to 94. It was written by one of his lawyers, who... Read more

Stunning and heartbreaking — and deeply moving. You can read more about this incredible visit here. But watch the video below. Photo: Vatican Radio/EPA Read more