Today is the Feast of St Francis of Assisi and I m happy to say the publication date of my book on joy humor and laughter Between Heaven and Mirth nbsp To celebrate both an excerpt on the joy of St Francis nbsp And that s him on the cover holding the turtledoves and laughing nbsp in betw

There is something very sad mdash or perhaps I should say obscene mdash about the President of the United States standing before the press corps and personally taking credit for another death It is as if he was bragging about a basketball score after his side had won Worse by rubbing out Anwat-al

Cambridge MA One of the bonuses of blogging for America is to read the comments that ensue on any given issue Not that I agree with all such comments of course and it is ok that the flow of debate among commenters sometimes travels far from the original posted piece as if it were merely an occ

Tonight after the ldquo Pro-Queer Life rdquo Conference at Union Theological Seminary I have spent the evening in Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan participating in the Occupy Wall Street protest that is showing surprising staying power since 17 September and gaining increasing media coverage

We held the first conference in the More Than a Monologue series at Fordham University two weeks ago and videos from the conference are now available here The series continues today at Union Theological Seminary I look forward to seeing America readers there

A couple of CNS stories are worth reading today before we close out for the week In the first Tommaso Di Ruzza desk officer at the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace OK I m not sure what that means either I m picturing someone in a naval uniform attempts to dispel the continuing confus