When the church gets you down, you can always serve the poor. I met Sister Maura on my first night working in an overnight shelter on Chicago’s Southwest Side...
The Examined Life
Am I to judge a mentor and friend only by his greatest sin? A death in the family is often an occasion of mixed emotions—sadness and gratitude, maybe even a...
What’s so odd about talking to God over a cup of coffee? It’s not often that you turn on the radio and hear someone talking about you—well, not you personally...
Even Jesus had to spend some time–Holy Saturday to be exact–waiting to see if things were going to work out. In this column from the archives...
Our American Spirit is stuck–and I’m not talking about that intangible dimension of our national identity that keeps us upbeat and confident in...
Life’s unexpected twists and turns need time to reveal the lessons they offer. Mowing the grass doesn’t rank high on the list of major life events, but when...
Would we so willingly cut programs for the poor if we knew them by name? When I was in high school, I bagged groceries for my pocket money, and I often saw a...
How do we honor a pope whose complexities are still fresh in our memory? As Pope John Paul II is beatified May 1 before hundreds of thousands in St. Peter’s...
Lent is a good time to ask whether the stuff we hold on to is actually holding us back. Extra Space Storage is the bluntly self-descriptive name of one of many...
A bishop’s authority cannot replace the graced conscience of the baptized. I’ll never forget my first serious argument with a priest: I was a senior in high...
