October 24, 2018
by Mary Cuff
When I was a kid, I found a book that featured dozens of Eucharistic miracles. I was enraptured by the dramatic situations that led up to the glorious moment when a host dripped blood or turned into human flesh before an astonished congregation. For years after discovering this book, I didn’t bow my head during [...]
December 27, 2016
by Amir Azarvan
Tis the season to attack traditional Christianity by pedaling, through social networks and the mass media, speculative theories that contradict orthodox Christian beliefs. On Christmas Eve (predictably), the Washington Post revived a 2014 article promoting the discredited theory that the "historical Jesus" never even existed. Yet even the agnostic New Testament scholar, Bart Ehrman, famously [...]
December 18, 2013
by Gerard Gaskin
I have a friend, Adrian, whom I have known for nearly thirty years. He and his family of eleven children and some grandchildren live in our state's capital, Sydney, more than five hundred kilometers away, so we do not see as much of each other as we would like. A few weeks back he called [...]
March 30, 2012
by Fr. George W. Rutler
As the Plymouth Bay Colony was starting up, the scholar Robert Burton back in England published the philosophical reflection,“Anatomy of Melancholy,” analyzing his own tendency to depression which he attributed to “black bile.” It is not clear whether his death was by hanging, but he certainly made it fashionable for philosophers to be gloomy. Yet [...]
February 27, 2012
by Howard Kainz
Kenneth Woodward in The Book of Miracles makes a distinction among various types of miracles and their significance. In the multiple branchings-out of Hinduism, miracles are taken as signs of spiritual power as well as compassion for others. Miracles of Hindu gods like Krishna and holy men like Shankara and the “poet saints” consist of [...]
April 1, 1987
by Charlotte Hays
One of the most confusing vocations in the post-Vatican II Church is being a missionary. When the Council Fathers came out with their historic statements about religious freedom and the existence of “salvific elements” in other religions, they threw many missionaries into a quandary. To convert or not to convert? A baffling question. Father Joseph [...]
February 1, 1986
by Rett R. Ludwikowski
In the 1970s I began to make some reflections in my diary concerning the situation in Poland. Sometimes they were quite trivial descriptions of daily living conditions and situations. A part of these materials I had to throw away when I was questioned by customs officers as I was leaving Poland. The second copy of [...]
