Just saw this one for the first time, courtesy of Mr. Hannan. I'm going to have to chew on this analysis for a while and see what I think. But it struck me that it may make for a good "discuss with students" article for some further, future incarnation of my Grace course, particularly once the students are advanced enough to start thinking ( Read more... )

GOODBYE A MARTINI
"Church back 200 years"
The last interview: "Why do not you shake because we are afraid?"

Fr. Georg Sporschill, a fellow Jesuit who interviewed him in Conversations night in Jerusalem and met Federica Root Martini on 8 August: "A sort of spiritual testament. Cardinal Martini has read and approved the text. "

How do you see the ( Read more... )

I was honestly a bit surprised to find such a blunt appraisal in the New York Times this week. I've long been concerned by the destruction of diversity in the American religious sphere represented by the destruction of liberal Christianity, but it seemed to be impossible to convince such people that they had left the liberalism of the Niebuhrs, or ( Read more... )

This Supreme Court decision may have been one of the most important First Amendment decisions in years, moving back toward the American Revolution's "Freedom of Religion" intention and away from the last half-century of more French Revolution-inspired idea of a government backing a cultural "Freedom from Religion" as a matter of political ( Read more... )

Here are two columns from The National Catholic Reporter that were worth reading and saving. The first is striking, especially as I go through this nasty surgery process. From the title, I expected "Manger/Baby Jesus" sentimentality. But in St. Paul's terms, this was meat, not milk. And good stuff. The second is a sensible article from John ( Read more... )

I was probably just coming into sight of Saint Joseph's High School, riding up the bike path, when the first plane hit the towers. It was a gorgeous late summer morning, and the day began as just another pleasant and fun one with my students. It was somewhere in my first period of teaching Church History that Judy Simon knocked on my door, told ( Read more... )

In talking about strange specifics of American Christianity with my students, I have to say that few things boggle me as much as the sorts of predictions like today's confident end-of-the-world announcement by Harold Camping, a California preacher whose prediction has been taken up with great hilarity by media outlets and people around the world. ( Read more... )

Old times not forgotten: Civil War at 150Apr 2, 11:19 AM (ET ( Read more... )

It's been a crazy time to watch the world. The stunning developments in public action in the Middle East, and perhaps the hope there for more just forms of government, and then the horrors of the multiple disasters to beset Japan. In Japan, I'm proud to see America use its might for more constructive ends, and I'm hopeful at the more modest and ( Read more... )

I still was pretty weak this afternoon, and hesitated on whether going in to the university was pushing things, but I just so didn't want my "The Experience of Grace" course or my once-a-week Master's course "Church, Sacraments, and Ministry" to be a week behind that I decided I had to do it. I had had to take a rest while doing the monumental ( Read more... )