I am back. Unwillingly, but back. I’ve just spent four days in prayer, and to be honest, I don’t much want to leave that oasis. I could stay there forever. The wonderful thing is that one day I will get to stay there forever, and do it for real. Have you ever noticed how good we are at imagining hell? Our movies, poetry, sermons seem to find it easy to foresee hell. We can go lurid in our imaginings, complete... Read more
I am taking a few days for prayer. I’ll be back Monday. Read more
Over fifty years after a little boy saw his father off for Viet Nam, he flew the Soutwest airlines flight the brought his body home. For over two centuries, Americans have paid the price to defend our democracy. We owe them more than words can say. Read more
Justice in the Gospel is a justice of repentance, change and mercy. It is the justice of walking in another person’s shoes. This video will seem harsh to people who have never felt what it’s like to be on the bottom of the wheel of life. The bottom line to it is that “There is no them. Them is us.” That is the social and cultural message of Jesus in two short sentences. There are so many ways we walk... Read more
Pope Francis gave an interview to Commonweal recently. Among other things, he identified what he called “Neo-Malthusianism” as a problem that we are dealing with today. I hadn’t heard of Malthusianism, so I had to Google. According to Google, Malthusianism is the theory that population growth is geometric and that over time, the population will outpace its resources. The pope evidently sees this as wrong. He also said that Pope Paul VI, in his encyclical on birth control, identified this... Read more
Homemade face masks will not protect you the way that a commercial face mask will. But they do help. A CDC discussion of homemade face masks as they pertain to novel viri in general says, Although insufficient for the workplace, this mask offered substantial protection from the challenge aerosol and showed good fit with minimal leakage … We showed that a hand-fashioned mask can provide a good fit and a measurable level of protection from a challenge aerosol. I want to... Read more
Nobody, including them, is trying to deny that the Democratic Party is militantly pro choice. As a lonely pro life Democrat, I can attest to this with feeling and regret. It is one of the most painful facts of my political life, a source of grief and sadness. However, there are evidently rumors floating around the internet that the Dems were using the Coronavirus relief bills to fund abortions, or, as a blackmail over abortion, or some such. Those rumors... Read more
WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF, AT THE END OF THE 15 DAY PERIOD, WE WILL MAKE A DECISION AS TO WHICH WAY WE WANT TO GO. Donald Trump, caps his. President Trump is right when he says that the measures we are taking to combat the Coronavirus are not sustainable in the long term. I’ve held off writing about the economy because I don’t know any way to do it without scaring people. Even... Read more
The Holy Father has granted a Plenary Indulgence because of the pandemic sweeping the world. I am grateful to him for doing this. Lent is a time when we get a spiritual wash job. It is a time of deeper conversion and getting clean from our sins. The normal ways we do this have been truncated by the exigencies of fighting this pandemic. Life saving is the order of the day. It’s easy to overlook the necessity of soul-saving repentance... Read more
Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. St Paul Pope Francis has granted a Plenary Indulgence to all of us who suffer from the Coronavirus. Those who are subject to quarantine, health care workers, family members and all those who care for those who are sick with Coronavirus are all granted this Plenary Indulgence if their hearts are “detached from any sin,” and they do one of the following: Unite spiritually through the media with the... Read more
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