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Will you make it through this article? You have been re-programmed in the media-saturated age of consumerism and internet galloping to skim this article.  You’re here to grab enough of it to sense a completion after reading, perhaps gaining a sense of gained knowledge, maybe feeling part of a tribe or something. I’ve been trained as a “content” writer to keep this article skimmable (shallow), but with a feel of depth and wisdom, but in a form that – if we’re honest – will pass quickly as you move on to the next site.  Writing for the internet is a specific gig and has very specific (and effective) rubrics.  I believe in the power of the written word, naturally, but I know what’s going on here too. I use very short paragraphs to allow enough white space to accommodate your sk...

By Tom Hoopes, February 15, 2020 Archbishop Joseph Naumann publicly corrected a state legislator’s misrepresentation of Church teaching in a strong, straightforward column about abortion. He also revealed more of what Pope Francis told U.S. bishops regarding the abortion issue when they visited him last month. His column is published in the Feb. 14 edition of The Leaven and is not yet available online. Last year the state’s Supreme Court, emboldened by a new governor who wants to ease restrictions on the abortion industry, which helped fund her candidacy, “discovered” a right to abortion in the very language of the Kansas state constitution that was written to protect the right to life. This year, an effort to put a state Constitutional amendment on the ballot for Kansas voters to dec...

By Dr. Jeff Mirus ( bio – articles – email ) | Feb 11, 2020 In the wake of unusual vocations of married persons to the consecrated life, there is always speculation about the superiority of a consecrated single vocation, as compared with marriage, or of virginity over marriage generally. Some have gone so far as to argue that the “higher” calling to a form of consecrated life justifies breaking up a sacramental marriage to accommodate a “new vocation” of either the husband or the wife. This question was raised again last month after I explored the strange vocation of the Servant of God Rose Hawthorne, who set aside her husband’s will, with ecclesiastical permission, in order to undertake a special service to the poor who were suffering from cancer (Ecclesiastical judgment: Sain...

The commercial below shows a glimpse of the special kind of love that we call familial love. The Greeks called it storge (στοργή), and the Romans called it pietas. Both words refer to familial love, the natural or instinctual affection between parent and child. Michelangelo’s “Pieta,” depicting Mary cradling the dead body of Jesus with tenderness and sorrow, demonstrates beautifully the meaning of pietas. Familial love has some unique qualities. For example, we don’t choose our family; we are born into it. We can choose friends, and for the most part we select them because they are agreeable to us. Not always so within the family! And when couples marry, although they establish their own nuclear family, each brings to the marriage his or her own family and extended family. Because we ...

By Tom Hoopes, February 13, 2020 In This Sunday’s Gospel, the Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time Year A, Jesus continues the Sermon on the Mount and demands that his followers not just behave well, but change who we are on the inside, as well. There is a big difference. We are used to being able to fake our life. We know what we need to do to get by in nearly every situation: at work, at home, with our friends, with our enemies, in church and at prayer. We are not so good at interior change. Given what Jesus sets as a standard, we Christians have a huge problem on our hands. “You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, You shall not kill,” he says. “But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgement.” He adds: “and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liabl...

Pope Francis celebrated the closing Mass of the Synod of Bishops for the Pan-Amazon region, in St. Peter’s Basilica, Oct. 27, 2019. (Daniel Ibáñez/CNA) This would have been the most likely time of his pontificate for Pope Francis to endorse viri probati, women deacons or an Amazonian rite — yet he declined to do so. On Feb. 12, Pope Francis released a document responding to the October 2019 Synod of Bishops on the Amazon. The document has been expected for several months and has been the subject of intense speculation on several controversial topics. These included proposals to ordain married men to the priesthood, to ordain women to the permanent diaconate, and to create a special Amazonian rite with its own form of liturgy. Pope Francis did not accept any of these proposals. Here a...

> Italiano> English> Español> Français > All the articles of Settimo Cielo in English * What is most striking in the post-synodal apostolic exhortation “Querida Amazonia,” made public today, February 12 2020, is its total silence on the most anticipated and controversial issue: the ordination of married men. Not even the word “celibacy” appears in it. Pope Francis desires “to configure ministry in such a way that it is at the service of a more frequent celebration of the Eucharist, even in the remotest and most isolated communities” (no. 86). But he reiterates (no. 88) that only the ordained priest can celebrate the Eucharist, absolve from sins and administer the anointing of the sick (because it too is “intimately linked to the forgiveness of sins,” footnote 129). And it sa...

St. Anthony’s RCIA class of 2019. Courtesy | Phil Bernston At a college where more than 90% of stu­dents actively practice a religion and where debates about tran­sub­stan­ti­ation versus con­sub­stan­ti­ation, the sig­nif­i­cance of Christ’s incar­nation, and, most con­tentiously, Mary’s per­petual vir­ginity echo through the halls, Catholicism seems to be gaining new ground.  Between 2016 and 2019, 76 people con­verted to Catholicism at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church and were con­firmed after under­going the Rite of Christian Ini­ti­ation of Adults. Many of them were Hillsdale stu­dents. In 2019 alone, 12 out of 24 con­verts were Hillsdale stu­dents.  Nationally, the per­centage of Catholics declined from 24% to 21% of the pop­u­lation since 2014. Approx­i­mately 2% of U....

Pope Francis at the Opening Mass of the Synod of Bishops on the Amazon region, Oct. 6, 2019. (Daniel Ibáñez/CNA) “The entire letter is written in a personal and attractive tone. The Successor of Peter [wants] to win all Catholics and Christians of other denominations, but also all people of good will, for a positive development of this region,” so that “all living there may experience the uplifting and unifying power of the Gospel.” A Document of Reconciliation On Pope Francis’ Post-Synodal Letter Querida Amazonia  By Cardinal Gerhard Müller Amid great hopes and anxious fears, the post-synodal letter has arrived. It refers to the final document of the Amazon Synod on October 6-27, 2019, and the Pope does not draw from it any dramatic and disconcerting conclusions.  Rather, ...

My friend is a Southern Baptist pastor and his statement about the Catholic Church floored me and it wasn’t about what you are probably thinking it was. He told me a story about when he was in seminary in the 80s. One of his seminary professors was teaching a class on missiology, which is the study of Christian mission. They did an exhaustive historical study on the spread of the Gospel. Toward the end of the class, one student asked what we could do to reach the world with the Gospel. Was it a matter of greater missionary zeal? His response was, “it isn’t just missionary zeal. We will reach the world with the Gospel when the Catholic Church recaptures her mission given to her by Jesus.” In other words, the Catholic Church holds the key to reaching the world with th...

ROME – We’re now fully immersed in election season in America, even if the Democratic caucuses in Iowa weren’t exactly the most promising beginning, and once again it seems likely the “religious vote” will be a contentious and important force in the outcome. Every time religion and politics collide in the U.S., someone is sure to object that church and state are supposed to be separate, that religion is a private matter that shouldn’t be injected into the public bloodstream, etc. That’s always been a rule more honored in the breach than the observance, but Western societies nonetheless pride themselves on a strong sense of distance between the religious and political spheres. In other parts of the world, however, religious leaders often show no such reticence about wading into political de...

Over the past eighteen months, we’ve heard a great deal about the need for lay activism and lay collaboration in the management of Church affairs.  I’m all for it.  Such action items are, in principle, good and necessary.  And also admirably American in their practical focus.  But a caution:  They also risk obscuring a deeper problem.  The chronic, underlying illness of the Church in our country, in our day, isn’t prone to quick fixes, and real lay “power” doesn’t reside in money or professional skill or positions of influence within or over a Church bureaucracy.  It proceeds from a personal witness of holiness. The abuse scandals of the past two decades are a brutal indictment of those priests and bishops who helped create the catastrophe.  Nothing ...