As Pope Benedict prepares to step down from the papacy on February 28, we look ahead to the Conclave which will determine who will lead the Church into the future. Vatican Insider, an on-line publication of the Italian daily newspaper La Stampa, has produced an excellent multimedia tutorial, showing us just how it’s done. This may clear up some of the confusion which is likely in the interregnum, the period after February 28 when the Chair of Peter is vacant,... Read more
Here is my chair. It is where I sit, watching the soup pot and watching the birds, and pondering the mysteries of the universe. Today I’ve been thinking about the Chair of Peter, the feast of which we celebrate on February 22. “A feast for a chair?” you ask. Yep. You see, Peter wasn’t just any old apostle. Oh, sure, he made a lot of mistakes. (Pretending not to know Jesus, when approached by that woman at the fire after... Read more
They get to keep the building—but at what price? In exchange for the property rights, the parishioners of St. Stanislaus Kostka Church in St. Louis, Missouri, are no longer Catholic. After a decade-long dispute, parishioners have won the right to keep their church property and assets. St. Louis Circuit Court Judge Bryan Hettenbach ruled against the Archdiocese of St. Louis—siding with parishioners in 10 of 12 questions, finding that the archdiocese had no legitimate ownership claim on the parish. “The... Read more
Do you remember Ember Days? If you’re a baby boomer or older, you may remember those days of fast and abstinence which occurred in four seasons of the year. Father John Hardon, S.J., in his Modern Catholic Dictionary, explained the Ember Days like this: They were the Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after St. Lucy (December 13), the First Sunday of Lent, Pentecost, and the feast of the Holy Cross (September 14). So this week we would observe the Ember Days, were... Read more
And so Simon Peter also came, following him, and entered the tomb; and he saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the face-cloth which had been on His head, not lying with the linen wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself. John 20:6-7 What exactly are we talking about here? The “linen wrappings”—well, that’s the shroud, what has become known as the Shroud of Turin. But what about this “face cloth” that was rolled up in a separate... Read more
Belief in God increases with age. That is the finding of a longitudinal study by researchers at the University of Chicago’s National Opinion Research Center. The Center conducted three surveys on religious faith, questioning people of different age groups in 30 different countries. The surveys—conducted in 1991, 1998, and again in 2008—explored the range of faith experiences in these countries: Australia, Austria, Chile, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and... Read more
NFL superstar Tim Tebow may just possibly be a religious bigot. That was the concern I expressed last year in an article titled The Tebow Phenomenon: Two Kinds of Prejudice. I looked at the blatant anti-Catholicism expressed by Tim’s father, evangelical missionary Bob Tebow. Today, Yahoo! Sports raised the issue once again, announcing that Tim Tebow has agreed to speak at the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas, on April 28. You see, the pastor of First Baptist is the... Read more
If you travel about 75 miles west from Detroit along old Highway 12, the road which owes its existence to the lobbying efforts of Father Gabriel Richard, you’ll come upon the Irish Hills. Recreational paradise for Michiganders for the past hundred or so years, the Irish Hills offer idyllic lakes full of fish, topped with motorboats pulling waterskiers. Friendly campgrounds, antique shops, a kitschy “Mystery Hill”…. What else could a vacationer want? Well, for one thing, you’ll want to stop... Read more
“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. –Matthew 25:31 After watching this, I can see why the Son of Man may have wanted to get those goats out... Read more
And so life goes on. Shocked and saddened as we are by the news of Pope Benedict XVI’s impending retirement, we look forward to the next pope who will guide our Church through turbulent waters. Dr. Mark Miravalle, professor of Theology and Mariology at Franciscan University of Steubenville, has published this very helpful prayer for our cardinals, who will soon come together in a conclave to elect the next pope. Novena Prayer for a Conclave Heavenly Father, We,... Read more
Seasons of Grace
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