In response to Nancy Pelosi today, a flashback to Cardinal Edward Egan’s response to a Meet the Press interview she did with Tom Brokaw before the Democratic convention in 2008 seems like an appropriate flashback. The then-cardinal archbishop of New York said: Like many other citizens of this nation, I was shocked to learn that the Speaker of the House of Representatives of the United States of America would make the kind of statements that were made to Mr. Tom... Read more
Unfortunately, she’s not making much sense. And she’s fumbling with war on women talking points used to dismiss pressing religious-liberty concerns when the issue at hand in Wendy Davis and Planned Parenthood vs. Texas’s new law is the human rights of babies at 20 weeks and older. The common response I get in my inbox is: When will she be excommunicated? I actually think the better response is: Lay Catholics inundate the media with the truth about our obligations to... Read more
Sacrament. Prayer. The knowledge that in the Hollywood Hills, cloistered Dominican nuns pray for the rest of us. They “live a life of prayer, penance and sacrifice to obtain the salvation of all people,” a brother notes. Read more
A beautiful reflection from a young man who has been answering a call to try to help on the most neuralgic of issues; Ryan Anderson speaking at an Alliance Defending Freedom event: America is the only country that is founded on a proposition, on a proposition about rights and liberties, not only of Americans but of all people. About rights that all people are endowed with by their Creator; about rights that governments are instituted to protect. If America—the last,... Read more
In the new encyclical, Lumen Fidei, or “The Light of Faith,” Pope Francis, with considerable core contributions from Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, explains how through “the celebration of the sacraments, the Church hands down her memory especially through the profession of faith.” The creed, Lumen Fidei explains, “does not only involve giving one’s assent to a body of abstract truths; rather, when it is recited the whole of life is drawn into a journey towards full communion with the living... Read more
Via Magnificat today, Servant of God Elisabeth Leseur explains: “I know well what this word ‘apostle’ means and all the obligations it creates. First, the necessity of an interior life that becomes stronger all the time, of drawing more than ever charity and gentle serenity from the Eucharist and from prayer, as well as making wholly spiritual intentions. Then, to cultivate my own mind systematically, to increase my knowledge of all those subjects that I am ready to learn; to... Read more
The conversation I imagine may have happened (roughly translated): “Brother, you should really co-sign Lumen Fidei. It’s yours, you wrote it. I’m an editor. My hand was light on this letter.” “The Holy Spirit …. It is God’s alone. And you are their Holy Father now. The faithful need you to help bring them into the Trinity. They need a father to bring them to the Father. ” “Well, then come to the dedication of a monument to St. Michael.... Read more
“I want to live in a society where strong relationships are plentiful and filled with real, authentic love; a love that isn’t afraid of hardship or ugliness, that doesn’t give up when it’s convenient to,” Jose Mena tells me as we discuss twenty-somethings today and the Catholic Church — occasioned by so many things in the news and the reflective moment provided by the ongoing Fortnight for Freedom. “I want to live in a society where inter-generational relationships are strengthened... Read more
Elise Italiano is a schoolteacher in Washington, D.C., who contributed a chapter to the book called Breaking Through: Women Speak for Themselves. The book flowed from a movement in response to an abortion-industry-led “Where are the Women?” campaign in response to protests against the White House’s abortion-drug, contraception, sterilization mandate. Since so much of the rhetoric about the religious-freedom controversy surrounding the mandate has been about single women, that’s what her chapter is about: Single women, modern life, and the... Read more
Earlier this week, I jumped into a cab to make Mass on the Solemnity of the birth of John the Baptist, and the cab driver started asking me all kinds of questions and making observations about the Church. We talked about John F. Kennedy and the witness of Catholics in the public square. “President Kennedy didn’t always follow Church teaching, did he?” he asked, rhetorically. The same, of course, can be said of most of us, can’t it? The reminder... Read more
Kathryn Lopez
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