I am neither a lawyer nor a sociologist but as a priest and bishop I can see how fast law and culture are changing. The words of Pope Francis ring true, when he said: “We are living not in an era of change but in the change of an era.” In this new era, the influence...Read More
In the Gospel Jesus compares the Church to a vineyard. Its owner and grower is no mere human being but God himself. And just as an ordinary owner would plant the best vineyard he could, so God gave to the Church everything we need to become the good, virtuous, and holy people God intends us to...Read More
Ten days from now, the Church will celebrate the Feast of St. Luke – St. Luke the great evangelist and also the patron of physicians – for, as Tradition attests, St. Luke was himself a physician, first of the body and then of the spirit.Read More
Dear friends, inspired by the religious for whom we pray tonight and confident in the intercession of Mary, the Mother of the Church, may we in our time make the Church fruitful by reflecting in our lives the holiness of Christ to the glory of God the Father.Read More
Let us not underestimate the power of this prayer that, through Mary’s intercession, brings us to the heart of salvation history, and helps open our hearts to the power of the Spirit, just as Mary’s was.Read More
On this feast of St. Francis of Assisi, I note that Bl. Stanley’s middle name was Francis and that he lived his priesthood in the spirit of St. Francis of Assisi. Like Francis, Father Rother lived simply, was close to nature, and devoted his life utterly to bringing the Gospel to the poor.Read More
Aboard this ship, there is only one Captain, namely, the Christ. Just as the Captain occupies a unique role on the ship, even so Christ is utterly unique and irreplaceable in the Church and in human history. For he is the only Son of God, sent by the Father into the world to take upon...Read More
As you know better than me, the phrase “wall of separation” appears nowhere in the Constitution and still less in the Bill of Rights. Rather, it originates in an 1802 letter that Thomas Jefferson wrote to the Danbury (CT) Baptist Association whose members had written to him complaining that their religious freedom and rights of...Read More
It turns out that the evangelization might not be as complicated as we think and the steps we need to take to evangelize effectively are not out of reach; nor are the people we are trying to evangelize as tough to reach as we might think. The good news is that many of the reasons...Read More
We are living in an era when no matter what party is in power, and no matter what the precise composition of the Supreme Court may be, the First Amendment is interpreted more or less consistently more as a restraint on religion rather than as a protection of religious freedom.Read More
Filled with the Holy Spirit, Bl. Theresa of Jesus understood what many others in her day did not understand, namely, Things did not have to remain the way they were. Things could change and they could change for the better.Read More
Jesus’ final words to us this night seem to imply a divine law of economics: “To anyone who has, more will be given and from the one who has not, even what he seems to have will be taken away.” Yet, these words of Jesus do not refer either to our charts of accounts or...Read More