December 2025
VOL. 90, NO. 12
Scroll through the Table of Contents to view what’s in this month’s print issue. Some articles are available only in the print issue: Subscribe today to get full access to all the material you see listed below. And remember to sign up for our weekly email so you never miss an online article!
Features
Ever ancient, ever new
Digital artists are transforming centuries-old churches into canvases of light.
The women behind the pulpit
Catholic women are forming a new generation of preachers—and, sometimes, preaching themselves.
Columns
THE EXAMINED LIFE
Lift the veil
BY REBECCA BRATTEN WEISS
Revelation can sometimes feel like the end of the world.
CULTURE IN CONTEXT
That small-town feeling
BY PAMELA HILL NETTLETON
Canadian show Sullivan’s Crossing is comforting, addictive, and familiar.
SALT & LIGHT
Edifice of hope
BY DAVID CLOUTIER
Look to objects of love to find things we have in common across societal divides.
MARGIN NOTES
Winter of discontent
BY KEVIN CLARKE
A government in crisis needs the people’s leadership.
TESTAMENTS
Gather the fruit
BY EMILY SANNA
Stories of Mary’s life show us both the importance of saying yes to God and the importance of acting on that “yes.”
GLAD YOU ASKED
Why do we celebrate Christmas on December 25?
Departments
Editors’ Note
You May Be Right (Letters to the Editor)
From the Archives
Poetry
Reviews (Music, Film, Books)
Eye of the Beholder (Art meditation)
Practicing Catholic
Be a maker
BY DANI JIMÉNEZ
God created us in the divine image. That means we, too, are called to create.
Essays
Consider the goon
BY PATRICK GALLAGHER
A closer look at a beloved holiday classic inspires a meditation on liberation.
In the bleak midwinter
BY ELLYN SANNA
Advent wasn’t a season of joy for medieval Catholics. Maybe we can learn from their approach to anticipation.
Sounding Board
Comfort-food Jesus
BY STEVEN GREYDANUS
What’s the point of a Jesus movie, if it doesn’t shake us out of our complacency?
Expert Witness
The mothers we missed
An interview with Jennifer Houston McNeel
From Mary to Herodias, biblical mothers defy expectations and reveal God’s surprising ways, says this biblical scholar.
Home Faith
Traditions alive
BY SHANNON WIMP SCHMIDT
A living family tradition grants stability and continuity, but is never set in stone.
