A summer road trip to reunite with friends around the country became a 10,000 mile hope-based pilgrimage to find unexpected grace in the ordinary.

Maureen Day is an assistant professor of religion and society at the Franciscan School of Theology and the author of Catholic Activism Today: Personal Transformation and the Struggle for Social Justice.

The Catholic Church needs to recognize that moved from a secular public sphere—marked by separate and specialized spheres of economy, science, faith and so forth that manage their own concerns in an insular way—to a postsecular public sphere, in which a multiplicity of voices and expertise are welcome to weigh in on an issue.

Newness comes easily for infants, but a Lent practiced with intention provides newness for the rest of us.

Three times zones, 17 states and 6,891 highway miles. Could be magic, could be tragic.

The laypeople were the experts—the ones who live the challenges of family life every day—at the San Diego synod responding to Pope Francis' “Amoris Laetitia."