James Hart "Hootie" McCown didn't just have an amazing nickname. He was one of Flannery O’Connor’s best friends and spiritual advisors.

Regardless of what one thinks of the advisability of a pope known for his off-the-cuff remarks partaking in long interviews, the fact remains that Pope Francis is more willing than both candidates to sit down one-on-one in front of a camera.

A Reflection for Saturday of the Sixth Week of Easter, by James T. Keane

Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman,” which turns 75 this year, was a huge hit by any commercial or critical standard. In 1949, it pulled off an unprecedented trifecta, winning the New York Drama Circle Critics’ Award, the Tony Award and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. So attention must be paid!

"3 Body Problem" is an imaginative Netflix adaptation of Cixin Liu's trilogy of sci-fi novels—and yet is mostly true to the books.

Elizabeth Cullinan's literary output was not prodigious—but her memorable characters and close attention to the Irish-American culture in which she lived made her a prominent fiction writer in the '70s and '80s.

Gerhard Lohfink, who died last week in his native Germany at the age of 89, leaves behind an impressive legacy of faith-informed scholarship on the New Testament and Christian discipleship.

A Reflection for the Memorial of St. Stanislaus, bishop, martyr, by James T. Keane

“It is not easy to be a Catholic, and it is not easy to be a writer. To be a Catholic writer is doubly difficult,” wrote Jacques Maritain, who nevertheless became one of the most influential 20th-century Catholic writers on either side of the Atlantic.

Parody, Ernest Hemingway said, is a step up from writing on the wall above the urinal. He was wrong.