The first that I ever saw was worn by Father Lawrence, an elderly priest who said Mass for the rubber-plantation workers in the Kerala village where I spent a Catholic childhood. When he came to our house for coffee, he lifted the curiously rounded hat and bowed with grave courtesy, a gesture I remember vividly Read more
In many ways, the story of the church starts with Peter. With the words, “And I tell you, Peter, that on this rock I will build my church,” Jesus appoints Peter as head of his new church and charges him with the responsibility to build it from the ground (Matt. 16). Throughout the centuries, biblical Read more
“80% of what the Pope says is based on real-life experiences: when I listen to him I am often able to make the connection with situations that actually occurred. He is not a theorist, he’s hands-on. And he is able to learn from the faith of the holy people of God.” Fr. Guillermo Ortiz is Read more
One never ceases to be astonished by the huge discrepancy between one assessment of the number of Copts in Egypt and another: the figures range from 5.7 percent of the overall population (and therefore a little less than 5 million people), according to the official census taken in 1996, to the 15 percent or even Read more
The notion of papal infallibility enjoys an unhappy distinction. One of the most widely known memes of the last one-hundred-and-fifty years, it is also one of the most utterly misunderstood. The media’s reporting of two recent events illustrates the issue. First, consider the retirement of Pope Benedict XVI. After Benedict’s dramatic announcement, serious and respected Read more
In the world of Graham Greene’s 1940 novel, The Power and the Glory, it’s a bad time to be a Catholic. The book’s hero is an unnamed priest on the run from Mexican authorities after a state governor has ordered the military to dismantle all vestiges of the religion. Churches are burned. Relics, medals, and Read more
The United Nations has released a 2015 update on the state of the world’s migration stock – those who have left the land of their birth to work and live overseas (usually as economic migrants, but also as refugees). The results have been reproduced in a number of interesting and colourful graphs and infographics (as Read more
If a sociologist from Mars were to come down to earth to study popular religion in Italy, the conclusion might easily be that the Christian “Holy Trinity” in il bel paese is not actually composed of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but rather of God, the Virgin Mary, and Padre Pio. Looking Read more
In “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop,” the soaring and chilling speech he delivered the day before his assassination, Martin Luther King Jr. ponders the thought of life in other places and times. Among other eras in history, he considers the prime of classical Athens, when he could have enjoyed the company of luminaries “around the Read more
Catholics talk about natural law, but what’s it all about? Basically, it’s a system of principles that guides human life in accordance with our nature and our good, insofar as those can be known by natural reason. It thereby promotes life the way it evidently ought to be, based on what we are and how Read more