The Examined Life

Certifiably Catholic

Our place in the church isn’t determined by politics or policy. If there’s one lesson Americans can take from the last 12 months of our political...

Priests off the pedestal

A holy-card priest is not the best patron to lead 21st-century ministers into the future. Father Albert Henkel was a good priest. Though gruff and grumbly on...

Watch your steps

Mass could use the hard dose of reality offered by those recovering from addiction.  I go to church every Sunday with a bunch of addicts. Well...

Above and beyond the call

U.S. women religious deserve better than the nunsense of a Vatican investigation. It must be hard being a Sister in America. You spend a century creating a...

Commencement duress

Catholics shouldn't let single-issue politics deprive us of our hard-won place at the heart of America's democracy. Ah, spring. A warming sun melts the...

Proceed with caution

Now is not the time to rush World War II's pope to a place among the beatified. "But why now?" came the bewildered question from my fellow...