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by Greg WillitsFounder – Rosary Army To be a witness to Jesus Christ in the modern world can be rife with difficulty. I’m not entirely certain I can succinctly tell you why I love Jesus, and my inability to point to a specific time or way in which Jesus was fully present in my life often tempts me to silence. When I hear someone tell of a very concentrated moment of Christ being made known in their lives, I have to fight a twinge of jealousy. My relationship with Jesus has been a lifelong journey and even after more than fifty years, I still struggle to give reason for the hope that is in me (1 Peter 3:15). Don’t take that struggle as doubting Christ as much as it is doubting myself. For this reason, I’m so thankful for St. Louis Marie de Montfort, who I’ve come to call “my dear, dear frie...

The parish family initiative is part of the archdiocese’s extended Partners in the Gospel renewal initiative.  Northwest Catholic, the news outlet of the archdiocese, said in a report on Saturday that the merger will see 170 “parishes, missions, and stations” grouped into 60 parish families. Pastoral leadership for the families will be announced in April, while the mergers themselves will take effect in July.  In a letter announcing the mergers, Etienne said he was “grateful to the thousands of people who engaged in the consultation process by providing insights during the input phase, sharing new ideas, and praying for this renewal effort.”  “My hope is that parish families will benefit from the shared gifts of people, time, finances, talents, and more so tha...

Something the past year of knockout punch after knockout punch of grief has opened my eyes to is the absolute main character energy of suffering.  I’m 41 years old now, and in the midst of year two of the most grueling calendar expanses of life so far, and what I’m recognizing as I come up for little gulps of air and little lulls of “normalcy” is that the “life is good, vibes are high” mentality I’d accidentally internalized from the ambient culture is not only a philosophical fallacy, but it’s toxic to the Christian soul.  The unwritten expectation is just a 21st century adaption of the heresy of health and wealth: Live a good life, be a good human, take care of your body, and your life’s path will unroll before you...

St. Augustine famously said, “Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee,” but what exactly is the “restlessness” from which we’re being rescued? I think Augustine was thinking of people like himself, who moved from philosophy to philosophy and their associated ways of living, never finding any of them satisfying. But we can feel restless, we can be restless, in all sorts of ways. The 17th century mathematician-philosopher Blaise Pascal described one kind of restlessness I know well, and think afflicts many more people today than Augustine’s kind. He describes it in his “Pensees,” a collection of his notes for a book of apologetics he never got to write. (He died in 1662 at the age of 39. For more on his insights, read Pope Francis’s apostolic letter Sublimitas et Miseria H...

If you know anything about world religions, then you know that Easter is a big deal in Christianity. In Eastern Orthodox churches, the Big Idea is stated this way, over and over, in rites for Pascha (Easter): “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life” (see this flash mob celebration in Lebanon).” I don’t bring this up as a matter of evangelism or some other #triggerwarning behavior. I am noted that this is an essential fact about Christianity, the world’s largest religious faith. Easter isn’t a “bunny” thing. This brings us to one of the more unusual “religion ghosts” we spotted several times during the 20-year history of GetReligion. Here’s a case study at Newsweek and another at Facebook news. However, the classic version of...

Grace Powell was 12 or 13 when she discovered she could be a boy. Growing up in a relatively conservative community in Grand Rapids, Mich., Powell, like many teenagers, didn’t feel comfortable in her own skin. She was unpopular and frequently bullied. Puberty made everything worse. She suffered from depression and was in and out of therapy. “I felt so detached from my body, and the way it was developing felt hostile to me,” Powell told me. It was classic gender dysphoria, a feeling of discomfort with your sex. Reading about transgender people online, Powell believed that the reason she didn’t feel comfortable in her body was that she was in the wrong body. Transitioning seemed like the obvious solution. The narrative she had heard and absorbed was that if you don’t transition, you’ll kill ...

EDITOR’S NOTE: Archbishop Charles J. Chaput is the emeritus archbishop of Philadelphia. His books include “Things Worth Dying For: Thoughts on a Life Worth Living and “Strangers in a Strange Land: Living the Catholic Faith in a Post-Christian World.” Also recommended: This 2009 lecture and Q&A session with reporters at the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, including his thoughts on mainstream media coverage of religion. ————— A free press is part of the American identity. It’s also one of our essential institutions. A responsible press and a faith shaped by the God of charity and justice share two things in common: a concern for human dignity, and an interest in truth. This is why — to be specific — journalism coverage of religion is so important. Believers and non-believers mig...