Growing up, Pope St. John Paul II was one of my dziadzius, or grandfathers. His spirit infused the house of my Polish grandparents, the sprawling, piecemeal...
Church history
While researching the history of Catholic feminism for her first book, Mary Henold, a professor of history at Roanoke College, stumbled across the work of a...
Would it surprise you to learn that some people believe St. Augustine, St. Monica, and St. Cyril of Alexandria were Black? Well, were they? “It’s hard to say...
The whole world had collapsed. Once he lived by the sea, embraced by ancient traditions in a thriving community of thousands. Now he was on the run in mountain...
Making the sign of the cross is a gesture that says, in shorthand, that a person is Catholic. It appears as an icon in popular culture, and as a gesture it is...
September 8 is celebrated by Catholics as the feast of the nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It should also be honored in a special way by all Americans...
Years ago, not long after I graduated from college, my mother gifted me an assortment of patron saint medals that had belonged to my grandmother. As I fingered...
Four hundred years ago, Brother Lawrence (1614–1691), born George Herman, spoke of spirituality as the “practice of the presence of God.” This lay Carmelite...
Some Catholic traditions are strange. After all, our “big tent” of traditions includes relics—oftentimes the body parts of saints—apparitions, weeping statues...
According to no less an authority than Etsy, the patron saint of cats is a woman named Gertrude of Nivelles. Not to be confused with St. Gertrude the Great (of...
