A left-wing political operative stepped in it last week when she accused the wife of Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney of “never working a day in her life.”
In justice, I think political strategist Hilary Rosen was not aiming at Ann Romney’s status as an at-home mom. She intended only to suggest the Romneys were too rich to be in touch with the needs of middle America.
But talk about out of touch! Who doesn’t know that moms of all stripes are hair-trigger sensitive to...
I can’t help but notice the grim mysteries of Holy Week are upon us this year in the middle of a national debate in which one side sees religious believers and institutions as a thorn in the side of progress and wishes to marginalize their ability to influence society. For Christians, the week we enter into the mysteries of sin, suffering, death and judgment are our holiest (and strangely, happiest) days of the year. But what has Good Friday to say to the world? Is it one more proof of...
Do you want to pay for someone’s abortion? Take money out of your wallet and directly fund the taking of a human life?
The thought may horrify you, but that’s exactly what you may be compelled to do under a little-scrutinized provision of our new health care law.
While the political debate over the Affordable Health Care Act (“Obamacare” for short) has thus far centered on the injustice of compelling even religious insurers to cover abortion-inducing drugs and sterilization, most...
During the dusty, hot June of 1858, Abraham Lincoln addressed the Illinois Republican convention as their candidate for the U.S. Senate.
In a speech widely viewed by his colleagues as true but so politically incorrect as to be embarrassing, Lincoln observed that America could not remain forever half slave and half free.
Lincoln feared that the newly adopted Kansas-Nebraska act permitting slavery in the territories meant Americans were abandoning the proposition that all men and women...
“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens.”
The Father of our Country, whose birthday we just celebrated, penned those words because he saw a clear connection between the nation’s freedom and the virtue of its individual...
Legislatures in Washington, New Jersey and Maryland are now considering whether to redefine what marriage is.
The Washington Senate has already done so and the bill is expected to pass easily through the state House. Same-sex marriage may pass in New Jersey this Spring, though it’s not clear there would be sufficient votes to override Gov. Christie’s promised veto.
In my home state of Maryland, where such a measure was blocked by public outcry last year, an undaunted Maryland...
Bishops from the dioceses of Baltimore, Washington and Military Services were in Rome last week, making their requisite ad limina visit to Rome to pray at the tomb of St. Peter and renew their allegiance to his successor.
It was a religious duty they were observing, but the Pope chose to speak to them not of prayer or sacraments, but about threats to religious liberty, the proper relations between Church and State and the role of the Catholic citizen in a secular nation.
His appeal to all...
It took all Advent and Christmas, but I’m finally accustomed to responding, “And with your spirit” each of the five times it’s required of us at Mass.
On the whole I’ve settled in to the new English translation of the liturgy. One line still startles me each time I hear it, though. In the second Eucharistic prayer, when we intercede for the dead, the priest prays, “Welcome them into the light of your face.”
I’ve a fond memory from a night in college when I introduced two...
I slammed the door on Joseph and Mary the other night. That was after I threatened to slap them.
It wasn’t a renunciation of faith, but an expression of it, however. I was participating in my first Las Posadas celebration, and playing the part of an innkeeper.
Do you know this lovely custom?
It originated in Spain, though now is practiced primarily in Mexico and Central America.
Neighborhoods or church communities mark the novena leading up to Christmas with a nightly candle-lit...
It was Advent fifteen years ago when I went to heaven.
Not literally: I’m too carnal to be making mystic claims for myself. Rather, I experienced one of those moments of grace and transport the Lord sends for no discernible reason other than as pure gift to delight us.
I was commuting to work and tuned into the local classical station when the “Hallelujah Chorus” from Handel’s Messiah began.
The beloved composition is actually for Easter, as the libretto indicates. We have...
