The phrase new evangelization has entered the Catholic lexicon within the past dozen years or so. Despite a good intention, it has no traction and will soon be discarded. Well, it might catch on overseas, but in the United States it is a non-starter. The first difficulty is the word evangelization. All Christians are expected to evangelize and a renewed emphasis on that privilege is timely. But in the U.S. the word itself is associated with a particular expression of... Read more

Michael Hsu, writing in The Wall St. Journal (1/3/16), rates meditation technologies. He examines those specialty headsets and apps that purport to measure mindfulness or peace. They are like the fitness trackers that have recently come on the market. There is disagreement, Hsu reports, among those neuroscientists and engineers interested in these electronic meditation devices. Does one or another app really correlate brain activity (or inactivity) with focused attention or relaxation? Is a meditation app and headband just the latest... Read more

There has always been a strain of anti-Catholicism in our country. For example, Catholics were attacked (verbally, quasi-legally and even violently) through the mid-1800s by public leaders and small groups. The U.S., it was said, is for natives, not for papist immigrants. During the 1850s an entire political party, The Know Nothings, ran on this anti-Catholic platform; supported by vile religious slurs in newspapers, scandalous cartoons and discrimination signs in places of employment and housing. In the 1920s another nationwide... Read more

It is impossible this month to worship in a Christian church and avoid cliché-ridden sermons against the commercial side of Christmas. But are not people in church already aware of the tension between the divinely orchestrated Bethlehem Christmas and the Wal-Mart holiday? Are not people in church already capable of negotiating the multiple messages of December? There are, if you will, three overlapping worlds. The world of delusion. This is the world in which people, sometimes harmlessly, believe that so-called... Read more

In the summer of 2014 Oracle, Arizona reflected back to us two defining cultural images. Oracle with a population of about 4,000 is 40 miles north of Tucson and it is slightly more than 100 miles north of Mexico. It was founded in the late 1870s as a mining town. It seems that Albert Weldon from New Brunswick, Canada took a ship, named Oracle, around Cape Horn and made his way to the Santa Catalina mountain area in Arizona. Two... Read more

Political scientist Sheldon Wolin (1922-2015), who died in October, fought against a dominant approach in social science that constructs abstract models to then be used in devising and evaluating public policy. Instead, Wolin turned to the history of specific societies. From them he derived lessons that apply to modern situations. In a well-known essay, Wolin looks at the saga of twins Esau and Jacob, as revealed in Genesis (See 25:19-34; 27:1-49). He then explores the difference between an individual who... Read more

She is the first U.S. citizen to be an official saint. But it almost didn’t happen. Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini, MSC (1850-1917) and half a dozen others from the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart arrived in New York Harbor in March 1889, following a difficult Atlantic Ocean crossing. Italian priests serving in New York, the story goes, sent disturbing reports back to Bishop Giovanni Battista Scalabrini (1839-1905) of northern Italy. The U.S. church, largely populated by Irish-Americans, treats Italian... Read more

This is the season for gratitude. First up is our national day of Thanksgiving on which we express gratitude to God for our beautiful country and for our relatives, even those who are a tad rowdy at the day’s get together. Thereafter begins three and a half weeks of giving gifts at Christmas parties and at a family reunion or two. Unfortunately, some essential features of gratitude have been lost over the years. First, a true gift must be given... Read more

Our Bears lost because of a disputed play. Actually, our Bears lose for several reasons. Confusion about rules abounds in professional football, particularly regarding a completed pass or an interception. The rules in these matters are deliberately vague because they were written to accommodate our society’s addiction to video technology. The ability to project a prior play on an in-stadium screen and even on fans’ mobile devices has led to an essential loss of meaning about a sports event. Like... Read more