If you’ve got a fresh Christmas tree, the needles are beginning to drop on the carpet. If your tree is artificial, you’re still getting restless, thinking about how you like the armchair in its regular place in that corner by the window. But wait! Don’t take your Christmas tree down yet! The news of Christ’s birth, of God’s taking human flesh and becoming one of us, is so important, so mind-boggling, that the blessed Season of Christmas continues until January... Read more
There’s a right way and a wrong way to get attention for your cause. Crashing the Pope’s New Year’s Day Mass in Peter’s Square, climbing onto the scaffolding and unfurling a banner that reads “Pope Stop Terrorism” is definitely the wrong way. That’s what Romanian-born activist Julian Jungarean did, though. And this isn’t the first time he’s made his point by trespassing on the higher levels of Vatican property. He once scaled the Bernini colonnade, the great arms reaching out... Read more
DAY TWO: How are those New Year’s Resolutions coming? You remember Jonathan Swift from your high school English class: He penned Gulliver’s Travels and that classic satirical essay “A Modest Proposal,” in which he suggested that the poor should sell their children as food for the rich—thereby at once eliminating two social problems: hunger, and children living in economic hardship. The Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, poet and cleric who served as Dean of Dublin’s St. Patrick’s Cathedral, wrote prolifically. In A... Read more
Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.” –Matthew 2:1-2 Q: What do you know about the Magi? If you answered that they were three wise men from the East named Balthazar, Gaspar, and Melchior, think again: All that... Read more
Hurry, start praying! Maybe you know this, because a few websites have been talking about it today: On December 31, the last day of the year, the Church grants a plenary indulgence to persons who publicly recite or sing the Te Deum. This opportunity for an indulgence—which was unknown to me until this week—is published in the Enchiridion of Indulgences. The Enchiridion (or Handbook) of Indulgences, published in 1968 by Cardinal Joseph Ferretto of the Sacred Apostolic Penitentiary, is a... Read more
“God is Love,” John tells us (1 John 4:8); and by gnawing on Love, by rapacious grasping at Love, I hope to encounter Him more fully. Read more
Do Michigan’s feminists REALLY care about women? In the ‘70s, when abortion proponents were making the case for legalized abortion across the land, they argued that passage of Roe v. Wade would ensure needed safeguards for women seeking to terminate a pregnancy. “No more back alley abortions!” was their mantra. Once abortion was legalized, they reasoned, women would no longer be forced to abort their unwanted children in unsafe, unlicensed facilities staffed by untrained, uncaring practitioners. Bringing abortion into the... Read more
“Our problem isn’t in Washington; it’s in our parishes. Only if we first build the Church can we, will we, bless the nation.” –Al Kresta Al Kresta, host of the popular “Kresta in the Afternoon” broadcast on Catholic radio and President and CEO of Ave Maria Communications, is talking about the Catholic vote in the 2012 election. In November, according to the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, forty percent of Mass-attending Catholics voted for President Obama, a self-identified... Read more
In December 2002, just a few days before Christmas, a fire gutted the sanctuary of Assumption Greek Orthodox Church in St. Clair Shores, Michigan, one of the state’s largest Orthodox churches. The front vestibule was destroyed by fire; and smoke and water damage compounded the problem. Estimates of the damage reach as high as $3.5 million. With no suitable worship space, the community was forced to hold its 2002 Christmas liturgy on folding chairs in the gymnasium. From the start,... Read more
In The Wizard of Oz, a homesick young Dorothy clicks her heels together and exclaims, “There’s no place like home! There’s no place like home!” Mary and Joseph must have felt the same way, when they finally settled into their routine in Nazareth. First there was that arduous trip to Bethlehem for the census and the frantic search for lodging. Joseph had been forced to make their bed in a lowly stable—and there, as darkness fell in that faraway land,... Read more
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