Discover
Jesus has already won the victory. It is true that we get there through the cross, but never forget what the end shall be…..
The Passion, which we read in the liturgy for Palm Sunday, is too long to comment on in detail, so we will only examine a portion of it here. It may be of some value to examine the problems associated with the more moderate range of personalities involved. The usual villains (the Temple leaders, Judas, and the recruited crowd shouting, “Crucify him!”) are unambiguously wicked and display their sinfulness openly. But there are others involved whose struggles and neglectfulness are more subtle, yet no less real. It is in examining these figures that we can learn a great deal about ourselves, who, though we may not openly shout, “Crucify him,” are often not as unambiguously holy and heroic as Jesus’ persecutors are wicked and bold. As we read the Passion we must understand that this is not me...
The ‘Pope of the Little Guy’ finds himself caught up in the heavy lifting of reform…
ROME – In the past week several intriguing news stories moved across the Vatican wire, and the mere act of listing them likely is enough to illustrate what they have in common. In the latest hearing in a Vatican sex abuse trial, an official of the former head of St. Peter’s Basilica testified he’d been made aware of concerns about inappropriate sexual behavior at a pre-seminary on Vatican grounds but denied there were any suggestions of “violence” or “abuse.” A former pre-seminarian who first brought the charges to light also testified, saying he witnessed “dozens” of acts he considered abusive. The principal defendant in the trial is one former pre-seminarian, now a priest, charged with abusing another at a time they were both minors. The pope’s Vatican charity announced this week that 1,...
Suicide bomb hits Palm Sunday Mass in Indonesia, 20 wounded…
MAKASSAR, Indonesia (AP) — Two attackers believed to be members of a militant network that pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group blew themselves up outside a packed Roman Catholic cathedral during a Palm Sunday Mass on Indonesia’s Sulawesi island, wounding at least 20 people, police said. Rev. Wilhelmus Tulak, a priest at the Sacred Heart of Jesus Cathedral in Makassar, said he had just finished celebrating Palm Sunday Mass when a loud bang shocked his congregation. He said the blast went off at about 10:30 a.m. as a first batch of churchgoers was walking out of the church and another group was coming in. ADVERTISEMENT He said security guards at the church were suspicious of two men on a motorcycle who wanted to enter the building and when they went to confront them, one of the men...
How to love bad thinkers while rejecting their bad thinking…
We have become conditioned to not only reject the opinions of others, but to reject those who hold those opinions. “What this country needs is fewer people who know what this country needs. We’d be better off, in my opinion, without so many opinions. Especially without so many political opinions. Including my own.” Thus pronounced political humorist P.J. O’Rourke last year. Whether O’Rourke meant it that way, these words constitute a call for humility and charity. To put it mildly, we’ve been lacking both. We Americans — irrespective of background, training, and/or education — routinely hop on Facebook and pontificate about domestic and geopolitical policies, as though these multi-faceted problems have simple answers. As though we have discovered those perfect answers. The Greeks had a wor...
5 Catholic books you should read this Easter season…
Sign up for our weekly email newsletter to never miss a story. Religion Unplugged is a non-profit online religion magazine funded by The Media Project. Our journalists around the world bring you the latest religion news and views on the world’s religions in public life. Through our stories and editorial partnerships, we aim to increase religious literacy and go deeper into stories that affect people of faith the most. Join Our Telegram Group : Salvation & Prosperity
This is what we should do in the face of any conspiracy against Jesus…..
By Tom Hoopes, March 25, 2021 You hear it all the time, from left and right: We feel like we are victims of forces that are lined up against our freedoms, using whatever is at hand — notably, the COVID-19 pandemic — to force us to comply. Call it a “conspiracy” if you must. It is real, it is total, and it has targeted each of us as a victim. The Gospel for Sunday, Passion Sunday Year B, proves it, and tells us exactly how we need to act when we are victims of a conspiracy. The reading of the Passion in Mark starts with a clear description of the conspiracy against Jesus. “The chief priests and the scribes were seeking a way to arrest him by treachery and put him to death,” says the Gospel. They even strategize, saying, “Not during the festival, for fear that there may be a riot ...
Pope Francis to Vatican tribunal: Be guided by ‘founding principles of ecclesial life’…
Vatican City, Mar 27, 2021 / 06:00 am MT (CNA).- Pope Francis said on Saturday that the Vatican’s quest for transparency should be inspired by “the founding principles of ecclesial life” and conform to international standards. The pope made the remark March 27 as he opened the 92nd judicial year of the Vatican City State Tribunal in the Apostolic Palace’s Hall of Blessings. He began his address by noting that the gilded hall is situated between St. Peter’s Basilica and St. Peter’s Square. He said: “In this singular position one could see the meaning and the task of the Church, constituted and sent by Christ the Lord to carry out the mission of upholding the truth and — as the Second Vatican Council teaches — proclaiming, ‘even by its own example, humility and self-sacrifice,’ w...
Before Steve Jobs changed the world, ‘Koyaanisqatsi’ captured a moment in history…
‘Koyaanisqatsi’ reminds us that, in spite of our technological advances, we remain human. Ko.yaa.nis.qatsi (from the Hopi language), n. 1. Crazy life. 2. Life in turmoil. 3. Life disintegrating. 4. Life out of balance. 5. A state of life that calls for another way of living So starts Godfrey Reggio’s 1982 film Koyaanisqatsi. Released almost 30 years ago this film remains an avant-garde, original documentary. Reggio’s at-times haunting images of the urban world with all its hustle, bustle and confusion is juxtapositioned with sublime photography of the natural world. That visual experience presented with a hypnotic soundtrack from the American Minimalist composer Philip Glass. The film’s title also expresses its premise, namely, that mankind has it all wrong: our lives are...
Vatican now in crisis management mode with German bishops…
VATICAN CITY — In January, two Vatican cardinals wanted to summon the president of the German bishops’ conference to Rome and correct him about a media interview in which he expressed his dissent from Church teaching in a number of areas. Such a meeting, which some believe should have been used to give the Vatican’s formal opposition to the Synodal Path, never happened and now the German bishops are blazing ahead unfettered, drawing grave concerns of possible schism. Jesuit Cardinal Luis Ladaria, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and Cardinal Kurt Koch, the Swiss president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, were concerned about comments Bishop Georg Bätzing made in a lengthy interview with the German publication Herder Korresponden...
Planned Parenthood’s mission is to deny science, exploit people and make profits…
March 23, 2021 “Planned Parenthood’s mission is deny science, exploit people and make profits,” said Mary Szoch, director of the Center for Human Dignity at the Family Research Council, which recently published the 2021 edition of “The Real Planned Parenthood: Leading the Culture of Death.” “Planned Parenthood took the lives of 354,871 unborn children in 2019, the most in any given year. It is also the second largest provider of hormone therapy to those who identify as transgender/have gender dysphoria,” according to a key-point summary in the report. “They say that they’re about ‘Care, no matter what,’” said Szoch in this Respect Life Radio interview. “But they don’t actually care that the teenagers that they’re giving these cross-sex hormones to will h...
5 reasons everyone in Church work could use a mentor or coach…
I was about to start my first full-time job working for the Church (at the campus ministry at Texas Tech) and I realized I didn’t know a thing about what I was supposed to do. I needed help and I needed it more than I knew. So, before I started, I was blessed to go to a conference where I met my first mentor / coach. It changed the trajectory of my professional life. I was the least experienced person in the room and I was matched with my new mentor / coach – Msgr Vince Krische – who was the most veteran person in the room. Msgr Vince was the Godfather of modern campus ministry. He learned the hard way, by being a trailblazer who had fewer examples than I did. After being assigned by his Archbishop to the University of Kansas, he learned they had a small house and a budget of $...
Vienna’s Cardinal Schönborn ‘not happy’ with Vatican statement on same-sex unions…
BERLIN (CNS) — Austria’s Cardinal Christoph Schönborn has said he cannot deny same-sex couples a blessing if they request one and that he was “not happy” with the Vatican’s mid-March statement on same-sex unions. On March 24, the cardinal tweeted, “A mother will not deny her children a sincerely requested blessing. Neither will the mother church. Whether a church blessing is always the right form of expression is something that still needs to be given careful consideration.” Since the March 15 clarification by the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith that any form of blessing of a same-sex union is “illicit,” there have been many critical responses from individuals, theologians and organizations in the Austrian Catholic Church. Some parishes declared solidarity with homosexua...
