The anniversary of the death of Thomas Merton Dec 10 1968 nbsp is coming up and I offer this meditation from a few years back Spots of time rdquo is what the poet William Wordsworth called those places that imprint themselves so deeply into our minds that simply remembering them can lift our

A great short piece by Melinda Henneberger at Politics Daily nbsp Actually I like to see pieces like just as much in these surprising places--like PD--as in in the Catholic blogosphere since they reach the seekers the curious the doubtful and disbelieving and make them think nbsp Happy Feast

Cardinal Jorge Lozano Barragan who had been quoted nbsp by Pontifex nbsp as saying nbsp that nbsp gays and lesbians could not enter the Reign of God says that he has been misquoted nbsp nbsp After his remarks were made public in Pontifex and made several Italian papers not to mention AP the

Well I ll bet that you re just now starting to receive or send Christmas cards this year nbsp And I ll bet that most of them include pictures of the Virgin and Child nbsp Our upcoming Christmas issue has a special image--with a fascinating history--of Mary and her infant son on its cover n

What rsquo s not to admire about a blockbuster exhibition of American narrative paintings that includes acknowledged masterpieces by the likes of John Singleton Copley Charles Willson Peale Winslow Homer Thomas Eakins John Singer Sargent Mary Cassatt George Bellows and Frederick Remington Thi

Seems like many of our posts have generated a lot of heat lately nbsp Here s some light from the Ignatian Schola a group of Jesuits and their lay friends who perform contemporary and traditional religious songs nbsp Here s how they describe themselves on their website The Ignatian Schola is a

This week on EWTN where it is playing in heavy rotation I saw once again this marvelous film--written and produced by two Jesuit scholastics Jeremy Zipple SJ and Jeff Johnson SJ who also raised the funds for this amazing video on their own nbsp Their filming took them from Spain to Paris to

A fascinating piece in Chiesa by the veteran Vaticanologist Sandro Magister on the church s approach in Argentina regarding baptism nbsp Rather than withholding baptism for children for parents who are on the fringes of the church Cardinal Jorge Maria Bergoglio SJ nbsp reminds us nbsp that the

NPR on the U S bishops including interviews with Rep Bart Stupak Archbishop John Myers George Weigel and yours truly nbsp It is to my mind a fair overview of the bishops new activism

With the over-the-top rave review by New York Times reviewer Ben Brantley of the new Broadway production of A Streetcar Named Desire you might want to revisit the Rev Robert Lauder s fascinating interview with the director of the play Liv Ullmann from a few months back in our Culture section