Catholic. Pastoral. Trusted.
I have a theory about nurturing faith in the family. It goes like this: If a child’s faith is an integral part of his or her everyday life—not just the overtly religious parts—it will become so central to that person’s identity that he or she could never leave the Church because...
Waiting is a pain in the neck. Throughout history, humanity has steadily progressed toward ways to make our lives faster and easier. We now can access information instantaneously in virtual worlds of this and that and have virtually forgotten that patience is still a virtue. Also falling by the wayside are the...
I was young when my great-grandparents passed away. I remember being afraid of them. I was intimidated by their vast age and had difficulty communicating with them. So it has been a beautiful thing for me to see my children developing relationships with their great grandmothers—relationships that cross the boundaries...
It’s no secret that the idea of dedicating one’s life totally to God is deeply countercultural. It can be disheartening to see the nearly universal depiction of priests and religious on prime-time TV as people who have failed to live up to their vocations. When we see the aging face...
We live in a world where science reveals wonders as distant as the far reaches of the universe and as intimate as the center of our own DNA. We prize knowledge and revere those who help us reach greater understanding of the world and ourselves. It is a good thing...
A director of religious education once told me that as grade-school children begin to process the world, they come to their parents and teachers with questions. We need to answer those questions, she said, because the window isn’t open all that long. If you don’t answer their questions honestly, somewhere around...
And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart (Luke 2:19). The most familiar translation of that verse invokes the word treasured: Mary treasured these things and pondered on them in her heart. It’s a particularly poignant phrase because it resonates in the human experience. No doubt...
In my freshman year of high school, I attended a talk hosted by an evangelical youth group. The topic was about “almost-ers”—people who weren’t quite good enough to get into heaven and who would therefore burn in hell forever. I was fourteen! It terrified me! Who is ever good enough?...