Competing to Win Years ago, as a basketball camp counselor, I was assigned to room with another counselor. He was a few years younger than I; he was also black, taller, stronger, and far more athletic than I. At the time, I might have dismissed his superior physique and athleticism as genetics and talent. His…
Something about a road trip helps focus the mind. Perhaps because it’s one of the few activities that demands we be truly free of distractions. The Internet and all its pomps and works, while always available on my phone, are unable to snare me when I’m barreling down the highway. Instead, as I stare out at the vast expanse of…
While you lay sleeping, I sat in the hallway and folded the laundry. I pulled warm clothing from the pile and as I folded it, I delighted in small t-shirts emblazoned with cartoon characters. I marvelled over toddler sundresses, I grinned at tiny pairs of socks. I folded your dad’s white t-shirts and noticed the…
“And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon was under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars.” – Apocalypse 12:1 “How do we know Mary ascended into heaven?” I asked. I was standing in the clergy dining room of my high school, where I had…
Can Amoris Laetitia (AL) be read in light of Catholic tradition? This is the question which confronts any serious Catholic who wants to “think with the Church” but who has serious concerns about Pope Francis’ Apostolic Exhortation, particularly Chapter 8. In a recent interview with Vatican Insider, Rocco Buttiglione, renowned authority on the philosophy of St.…
Holy Saturday is perhaps the most mysterious day in the liturgical calendar. On this day, God is silent; He is in the tomb. The Church is silent as well; no liturgies are celebrated for the day. From the end of the Good Friday liturgy to the beginning of the Easter Vigil, the Church contemplates the…
In a recent interview published by the German weekly newspaper Die Zeit (32/2016), Italian Archbishop Guido Pozzo (64), Secretary of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei (PCED), made some important statements concerning his qualitatively progressing negotiations with the Society of Saint Pius X — negotiations which fall under the purview of the PCED. His comments make it clear…
“Water is going to be the death of me,” I said to my husband. “What do you mean? Like a water sport accident?” “No, not like that. I mean pouring glasses of water and I am certain that if I clean up one more spilled glass of water then I will surely die.” The minute,…
The world has become an angry place. In some cases, a dangerous place. In many situations a place of harm and damage and injury, more than many of us can remember. I speak not only of what we hear in the news. Everyone experiences anger and harm and injury and loss sometimes. The Bible says…
I looked down at her sleeping. She had just finished nursing and was still holding onto me with her little hands and her mouth. Her silky, dark blonde curls were resplendent in the mid-afternoon, early August light. The warm pink of her cheeks was soft against the crisp, white sheets of our bed. This was…
Two weeks ago, I went into our closet to pull out the pieces of my husband’s police uniform in order to make sure that everything was ironed and ready and that all of the components were there so that he could work his paid duty that evening. If you aren’t familiar with what paid duties…
