In this month of Thanksgiving and table fellowship, many people struggle to buy groceries while government cutbacks to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programs (SNAP) have limited food aid to low-income citizens and their families. As happens more than we want, while political partisans point fingers and blame those in rival camps, people of goodwill step […]
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), which represents the church’s moral and political views, seems to be at an impasse with the Trump Administration regarding issues of immigration. The irreconcilable differences are rooted in The Catholic Social Teachings, specifically the dignity of personhood that calls us to look at illegal aliens and see, […]
When I was a kid in middle school, I broke my left arm at the elbow. It has never since been straight. In my twenties and again in my thirties, I had orthoscopic surgery on my left knee. For most of my life, I have favored my right side and now, in my sixties, I […]
Herman Melville once wrote, “We cannot live for ourselves alone. Our lives are connected by a thousand invisible threads and, along these sympathetic fibers, our actions run as causes, and they return to us as results.” “Catholic” means universal. The Catholic Church has been a good reminder through time that all humanity is part of […]
I think that the way we drive says a lot about the way we live. Many motorists on our roadways are aggressive drivers; some go to extremes and become angry drivers or even suffer road rage. Others claim to be competitive but not aggressive drivers who fiercely reach their destination by outsmarting others in their […]
Among the numerous contributions that the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. (MLK) has given to our nation and world is the simple yet profound message that we, by our mere existence, have an obligation—and simultaneous privilege—to make our community a better place to live, learn, work, and worship. As children of the earth and children […]
After a tornado, cyclone, hurricane, or other storm hits us, we can feel both relieved and devastated at the same time: relief that we survived yet devastated by the destruction. After a grueling game or sport season, team members can feel both exhilarated and exhausted. Feelings can be similar on the day after a general […]
Though I don’t suppose most churches have a designated parish bar, many of those that I served happened to. Down the street from my first assignment, Visitation Parish, was the (original) Peanut; members of Vis often shuffled there after meetings, games, prayer, or community gatherings. Teachers periodically assembled there on Friday afternoons for happy hour. […]
Billie Joe Armstrong, lead singer of the American rock band, Green Day, wrote a famous song called Wake Me Up When September Ends. It is a lament about his father who died when the boy was only ten. Released in 2005, it was adopted by the citizens of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast after […]
The origins of Mardi Gras can be traced to Medieval Europe. Our American rituals are rooted mainly with practices dating back to 17th Century France when King Louis XIV commissioned explorers to establish colonies in the New World. French-Canadians, Jean Baptiste Bienville and Pierre d’Iberville, went south around modern-day Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and eastern Texas, […]
UPON THIS ROCK 