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In an interview released on Wednesday, Pope Francis endorsed a practice that used to be frowned upon but now is a robust phenomenon among practicing Catholics: choosing their own parish. Pope Francis granted an interview to Norah O’Donnell of CBS News — his first such television interview with an American network. While the full interview will be aired on 60 Minutes next month, excerpts were released on Wednesday dealing with the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, as well as climate change. The Holy Father’s responses were in line with his recent and frequent comments on those issues. This comment though will not be considered as newsworthy, but remains noteworthy: “I would say that there is always a place, always,” Pope Francis said, addressing those who do not see a place for themselves in the Ca...

In a certain sense, the Sexual Revolution is over; at the very least, the walls have been breached and the consequences are serious and long-lasting. The Reign of “Gay” is proud, loud, and quite unwilling to tolerate dissent or discussion. And until we face that fact and come to grips with the situation as it really is, we will not be able to respond, regroup, and rebuild in any meaningful way. After all, if the kings and queens of this reign—assisted by their grim, willful lackeys—are going to denounce and shout down Andrew Sullivan, who is openly homosexual, what do you think they want to do to the Catholic Church? That paragraph concluded an editorial I wrote ten years ago, in April 2014. Titled “Welcome to the Reign of ‘Gay,’” it drew up Robert R. Reilly’s excellent Making Gay Okay to ...

While Lent offers us a clear path of conversion, turning away from the world, Easter invites us into God’s own life. In Lent, we seek to die with Christ; in Easter, we must live with him. It appears an anticlimactic season after the rigors of prayer and fasting, but Lent is ordered to Easter as a period of training to live a more joyful and integrated life in Christ. The word “chastity” might take us right back to the battle of Lent. Isn’t that one of those negative words focusing on prohibitions? The Church’s teaching, however, leads us to a positive vision focused on integrity: “Chastity means the successful integration of sexuality within the person and thus the inner unity of man in his bodily and spiritual being” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, §2337). This vision focuses more on l...

The last time the Vatican’s doctrinal office issued a general document on apparitions was in 1978, during the final months of the pontificate of Pope Paul VI. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith is putting the finishing touches to a new document that sets out clear rules on discerning apparitions and other such supernatural events. The dicastery’s prefect, Cardinal Victor Fernández, told the Register April 23 that he and his staff are “in the process of finalizing a new text with clear guidelines and norms for the discernment of apparitions and other phenomena.” The cardinal, who met with Pope Francis in private audience on Monday, did not divulge any further details on the document, nor exactly when it will be published. The last time the Vatican’s doctrinal office issued a genera...

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Readings:Acts 9:26–31Psalm 22:26–28, 30–321 John 3:18–24John 15:1–8 In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells us that He is the true vine that God intended Israel to be—the source of divine life and wisdom for the nations (see Sirach 24:17–24). In Baptism, each of us was joined to Him by the Holy Spirit. As a branch grows from a tree, our souls are to draw life from Him, nourished by His word and the Eucharist. Paul in today’s First Reading seeks to be grafted onto the visible expression of Christ the true vine—His Church. Once the chief persecutor of the Church, Paul encounters initial resistance and suspicion. But he is known by his fruits, by his powerful witness to the Lord working in his life (see Matthew 7:16–20). We too are commanded today to bear good fruits as His disciples so that our lives...

The first reading from  Sunday’s Mass features an excerpt from a sermon by  St. Peter. The contents of the sermon are very similar to others recorded in the Acts of the Apostles by Saints Paul and Stephen. What is interesting is that these ancient sermons break almost every rule (written and unwritten) of modern preaching! Consider the clip from yesterday and not the areas highlighted in red: Peter said to the people:“The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob,the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus,whom you handed over and denied in Pilate’s presencewhen he had decided to release him.You denied the Holy and Righteous Oneand you asked that a murderer be released to you.The author of life you put to death,but God raised him from the dead; of this we...

The death of Jesus Christ on the cross revealed the greatest act of love that destroyed the works of the Devil, defeated the authority of sin and death, and provided a salvific path for all God’s children to embrace if chosen. Jesus’ death was not an accident or a mistake in judgment by a few unruly men. The entire mystery of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection reveals a divine plan of redemption to free men from the slavery of sin.[1] St. Paul reminds us of this when he proclaims that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures.[2]        Jesus explained his role as the suffering servant to his disciples on the Road to Emmaus carefully narrative the salvific events that had taken place and culminating this narrative with the celebration of the...

Many years ago, a friend visiting an Eastern European country diligently wrote several postcards, stamped them, and then dropped them in what he thought was a mailbox. It turned out to be a very elegant trash can. Of course, his postcards never made it to their intended recipients. In the pro-life movement, messaging can often be like my friend’s simple mistake where we think we are doing one thing, but with unintended results. For decades, pro-lifers have tried to communicate rich and important truths about babies, motherhood, and the family, yet the polls and the culture continually show these efforts are falling upon deaf ears. We make impassioned and intellectually rigorous arguments, and then they dissolve in the red robes and bonnets of “The Handmaid’s Tale” activists. That one image...

By Clement Harrold April 19, 2024 One of the more puzzling elements in the Gospel descriptions of the post-Resurrection appearances of Jesus is the fact that Matthew’s Gospel ends on a mountaintop in Galilee, while Luke’s account concludes near Bethany and the Mount of Olives, just a short distance from Jerusalem and almost a hundred miles south of Galilee. To make matters worse, in Luke 24:49 Jesus is recorded as commanding His disciples to “stay in the city, until you are clothed with power from on high.” This is further corroborated by Acts 1:4: “And while staying with them he charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father.” Being clothed with power from on high and waiting for the promise of the Father seem to be allusions to the event of Pentecost...

By Phil Lawler ( bio – articles – email ) | Apr 19, 2024 “What is truth?” That cynical question, memorably posed by Pontius Pilate, is enjoying new currency today, thanks to public statements by Katherine Maher, the newly installed head of National Public Radio (NPR). ”We all have different truths,” Maher told a TED talk audience, explaining that there are “many different truths.” So she is not worried by the fact that, as she sees it, NPR reporters “are not focused on the truth.” They’re focused on something else, which is the best of what we can know right now. …. Perhaps, for our most tricky disagreements, seeking the truth, and seeking to convince others of the truth, might not be the right place to start. In fact, a reverence for the truth might be a distraction that’s get...

Don’t think that Jesus is only saying sweet consoling words when he proclaims himself the good shepherd on the Fourth Sunday of Easter, Year B. He is, certainly, doing that. But he is also saying something uniquely challenging. What he said about the Good Shepherd almost got him killed. The Gospel we hear on Good Shepherd Sunday is the climax of a three-chapter-long confrontation in the Gospel of John between Jesus and Jewish leaders. It starts with Jesus teaching in the Temple during the Feast of Tabernacles and in the course of the showdown, he compares himself to “living waters” and calls himself “the light of the world.” He twice references his own divinity saying, “Before Abraham was, I am,” and “I and the Father are one.” He doesn’t just teach astonishing things, he does astonishing ...