Today’s readings put together an Old and New Testament text that, at first glance, may seem unrelated. The OT text is the beginning of the story of Jonah and the gospel reading is the Parable of the Good Samaritan. It took a minute for my slow brain to figure out why the Church combines those readings. But then it hit me: both are direct challenges to tribalism. Lots of people miss that the story of Jonah is a challenge to... Read more
It could have gone to help the people of Puerto Rico Trump has spat on and ridiculed. But no, instead he blew it on sending Mike Pence to a ball game and ordering him to stage a walkout in order to gin up his white jingo base. You know, the ones who really care about “small government” and not wasting our tax dollars. Best part: the back to back phony tweets where Pence tries to make it look like this... Read more
vs. the American Social Darwinist Approach: If the totality of your grasp of Catholic Social Teaching is “Subsidiarity means I earned it and I get to keep it” you have embraced a radically deformed gospel and need to learn about the Dignity of the Human Person, the Common Good, and Solidarity. The gospel treats our earth goods in just way it treats our spiritual gifts: you have been chosen to receive those goods for the sake of the unchosen. The... Read more
….through October, Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity feature artists to inspire discerning reflections on peace and all good. Listen, enjoy and reflect on the deeply felt music of Franciscan Friar of the Renewal Fr. Tansi Obisi, CFR, Arwen Lewis, Austin songwriter Rick Busby and Folk Music Legend Jean Ritchie. Read more
…has a new book out! It’s coming out today in a beautiful hardcover edition from Ave Maria Press. To celebrate the book, Brandon also created a FREE 5-part video series titled “5 Reasons to Be Catholic.” Here’s the first one: You can see the rest here. Read more
On October 6, 3018 of the Third Age of Middle Earth this happened: Read more
…continue to throw a faithful spanner in the works of the Francis-haters and their “filial correction” of the Holy Father. It seems that the case for the Amoris laetitia critics’ self-proclaimed “Filial Correction” (1) of Pope Francis is weakening. Dr. Joseph Shaw, one of the signers of the Correctio filialis, recently wrote: “It is not that we’re saying that the text of Amoris cannot be bent into some kind of orthodoxy. What we are saying is that it has become clear that orthodoxy... Read more
Introduction to a Study. My latest over at The Catholic Weekly, in which we will take an in-depth look at a difficult text, some problematic interpretations of it, and what I think is the most reasonable reading of it. Here’s a taste, but click on the link above for the whole smack: This is, to be sure, a difficult text. Perhaps you have heard some variation on this style of interpretation: Gospel: Jesus is challenged by the Canaanite woman to... Read more
We have a friend of the family with Lou Gehrig’s Disease. She is a simple soul, a head injury victim who is easily pushed around. A couple of months ago, she finally got assisted living care. She did not want euthanasia and is a Catholic, but a palliative care group has managed to talk her into killing herself. She is not competent to make this decision and is doing it because of pressure. My wife is trying to find help... Read more
…on gun control. She writes: Before I started researching gun deaths, gun-control policy used to frustrate me. I wished the National Rifle Association would stop blocking common-sense gun-control reforms such as banning assault weapons, restricting silencers, shrinking magazine sizes and all the other measures that could make guns less deadly. Then, my colleagues and I at FiveThirtyEight spent three months analyzing all 33,000 lives ended by guns each year in the United States, and I wound up frustrated in a whole new... Read more
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