Advent is a season of preparation, prayer, and discernment. For me, it is both my favorite liturgical season and the most challenging. The people of God are...
Christmas
It is hard for a baby in a manger to compete with eight reindeer and Santa holding a huge pack of gifts. The anticipatory pause of Advent—quiet and dark...
The Christmas story is one of forced travel, of uncertainty, of a search for a safe place to stay in an unfamiliar city. For Joseph and Mary that safe place...
Often, the acting is awkward, the plots shopworn, the wardrobes odd, and the holiday decorations tacky. The scripts are hardly witty and what passes for humor...
You won’t hear Christmas carols in church during the Advent season, but you will hear them everywhere else. How do we keep Advent a time of quiet preparation...
In my opinion, you’re either an Advent person or a Lent person. Me? I’m an Advent person. First, the wait time is much shorter. And for a person who counts...
In the mid-1960s a Roman Catholic cardinal and a priest who was a scripture scholar found themselves seated at the same table at a dinner party. The cardinal...
The first biography of St. Francis of Assisi, written by fellow friar Thomas of Celano, recounts an event in the Italian town of Greccio in 1223 that continues...
It sounds like a trick question akin to “Who’s buried in Grant’s tomb?” Of course Jesus’ birth is Christmas Day. But did the Incarnate Word arrive on December...
My father hates Christmas. We have a picture of him lying on my parents’ couch, wrapped up in a blanket, wearing both a Santa hat and a look of utter...
