In a private conversation I found myself writing, “This is why I despise, and I do mean despise, age-bracketed sacramental prep.” I’m referring to the practice, nearly universal, of giving all the Catholic seven-year-olds First Reconciliation and First Holy Communion, and then setting another age — could be seven, or nine, or fourteen, or seventeen — when we round them up again and give out Confirmation. RCIA is more of the same, if we count “age” in terms of “months spent... Read more
Here’s Simcha Fisher writing about her food stamp experience, and her experience should disturb you, but not the way combox losers huff and puff: And we followed this plan for many months. I salted away savings, and I strolled past the meat freezer in the supermarket, lusting after the trays of meat, scorning the shameless slobs who stopped and filled up their carts on the taxpayer’s dime. Freeloaders. Scum. Oh lord, look at that steak. Stop looking. Now go get some spaghetti.... Read more
Readers at this blog, inspired by the knowledge that Pope Francis is just as likely to read Patheos as he is to read The Chronicle, have been inquiring whether they can place advertisements addressed to the Holy Father concerning their bishops, too. I’m not strictly sure whether my contract allows me to accept payment for such things, so I’m running a few for free. As you can see, there are many, many bishops guilty of offenses along the same lines as... Read more
The trouble with being Catholic is that there’s not a quiz at the door. One can thus rise to “prominent Catholic” status without knowing anything much at all about the Catholic faith, as readers of The Chronicle will have observed in the advertisement taken out by San Francisco citizens deeply concerned that Archbishop Cordileone is acting like a Catholic. It’s not a particular surprise that the signatories are confused about their faith, since they also seem to think Pope Francis reads their... Read more
Follow-up to my previous post, here’s Christian LeBlanc teaching the Catholic faith in a grainy video recorded without an audience in a first-take, just-spit-it-out presentation: Lovely example of how he integrates Theology of the Body into Bible history. While you wait for someone to break down and give this man a proper camera crew, here’s the book you want: Read more
In a follow-up on the topic of getting the parent-Church relationship right, here are three best practices to add to your arsenal: 1. Peanut Butter and Grace Susan Windley-Daoust writes: Jen, thanks for the Patheos article on what’s wrong with parishes doing religious ed as first responders. A number of people have forwarded it to me, saying, PB and Grace is addressing this! Well, we hope so. If you want to take a look, its a new small Catholic press... Read more
The feasts of the liturgical year intertwine. At Christmas we adore the baby Jesus, cuddly, but it’s on Good Friday that the liturgy invites us to come forward and give that grown-up baby a kiss. God become man, a man we can hold, and touch, and thank. And then on Easter, Mary Magdalene, apostle to the Apostles, mistress of tenderness, embraces that Man and is told to let go: There is more still coming. There is still more coming. From... Read more
Dear Pope Francis, Other people have shared their ideas with you on how to bring more people back to the faith or into the fold. Their ideas vary from the predictable (evangelization) to the ludicrous (changing Church teaching). Today my son and I would like to urge you to implement two reforms that are nearly guaranteed to work, and which hardly cost anything at all. 1. Add More Sacraments I understand that we’re or more less stuck with the seven... Read more
So I’ve got four high school students sitting at my kitchen table, and we’re going over the passé composé today, that stalwart French tense that is the bane of first-year students. I grab a random verb from the list in the textbook, renverser, to spill. Because they have an evil instructor who gives difficult quizzes at the start of every class session (the better to learn from, my dear) I remind them that a phrase such as j’ai renversé . . . [insert... Read more
The spouse sneaks back to the bedroom this afternoon and says in a low voice, “There are bunny things in my Amazon shopping cart. Am I supposed to buy them?” “I didn’t put them there, if that’s what you mean,” I tell him. A likely suspect comes to mind. “What kind of bunny things?” “Lego, Playmobil. Things like that.” Ah yes. I remember somebunny mentioning these things. “You know that one-click feature? We need to be careful about that or... Read more
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