Category: Advancing the Kingdom

Years ago in some philosophy course at college I recall reading one author’s prophecy that mankind (so we were called then) will someday have to choose between totalitarianism and charity. Put metaphorically, will the wheels that make the world go around be greased by resources…

Recently I read that fewer than half of Italy’s Catholics believe life is eternal, that is that there is ‘life after death’. How many of us in our country who identify ourselves as Christians are of like mind?  What, if any, are our thoughts on…

One sometimes hears the phrase ‘the consolation of hope’. It is soothing in its implication, particularly so in such troubled times as ours. Less frequently encountered is the phrase ‘the consolation of truth’. Equally salubrious, this latter expression is perhaps more forceful. The consolation of…

Much has been written of late about the risks we incur by our increasing dependence on technology. As the song puts it: “Is it a boon or a bane?”. From the perspective of Christian social doctrine one might ask if technology enhances or jeopardizes the…

He is recognized as a poet, an author, a dramatist, a philosopher, a humanist, a world leader, a pope, and now a saint. How fortunate for us that we are his contemporaries. It is an understatement that Pope John Paul II was a prolific and…

“Against the tsunami of our toxic culture”. This quote from a recent article by Fr. Paul Scalia could be an invitation to observe Independence Day from a new perspective. As residents of the freest nation in history perhaps it is fitting for us to ask…

While its significance is ancient the phrase ‘Eucharistic coherence’ has appeared only recently in the life of the Church. Unless I am mistaken it was first used in the concluding document of the conference of the bishops of Latin American and the Caribbean held in…

Lamentable, isn’t it – the diminished presence in our vocabulary of the word whither? Is its desuetude another consequence of the culling homogenization of our culture, a process which with biting irony is labeled multiculturalism? Or, is it simply a response to time’s ravaging touch?…

Happy Birthday, Christians. Today, the Feast of the Pentecost, is the birthday of the Church. So, Happy Birthday to all you baptized members. May the coming year bring us closer to the Lord and to each other, and in doing so enable us to offer…

Citizenship is a liberal art.  If liberty is understood to be the freedom to avoid natural law rather than the freedom to embrace natural law the term ‘free society’ becomes a self-contradiction. Ruminate on these two provocative concepts which are found in Fr. John Courtney…