Parents need to give their kids more responsibilities like walking to school, a psychologist specialising in kids’ neuroscience says. Parents wanting to prepare their children for the modern world need to let their kids get out and explore it — sometimes without them. That is the message visiting psychologist and TED talker Kathryn Berkett shared Read more
For decades, multiple studies have shown that women are more religious than men, especially if they’re Christians. Women are more likely to belong to a congregation, pray regularly and say they feel close to God than men are. Meanwhile, other studies have shown that until about 2010, men were more likely than women to be Read more
The celebration of Migrant and Refugee Sunday in the Catholic Church has been a minority activity this year. The times do not favour it. It’s not that there are few migrants and refugees to bother about. The difficulty is that they are many and growing. Welcoming, not blaming People who are doing it hard, as Read more
The second session of the Synod on Synodality will take place this October as a follow-up to the first session that occurred last October. Here are five things to look for as the synod delegates gather in Rome. How is the second session similar to the first session of the synod? The first session of Read more
There is a long tradition of wondering about the mental health implications of religious practice. The psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Jung famously claimed to have seen almost no practicing Catholics in decades of clinical practice. Others have failed to replicate this result, but the idea that religious practice has some meaningful impact on mental health Read more
Pope Francis made headlines recently when, during an interfaith meeting with young people, he made the following statement: “All religions are paths to God. I will use an analogy, they are like different languages that express the Divine … There is only one God, and religions are like languages, paths to reach God. Some Sikh, Read more
In May 2023, Kerlin Richter, then a priest at an Episcopal Church in Portland, Oregon, attended an adoption ceremony that legally recognized her baby’s three parents. The event, featuring a large, celebratory danish pastry and a Mary Oliver poem, was a step toward formalizing Richter’s family, which includes her husband with whom she has an Read more
At the end of August, the European Synod on Synodality participants in Linz met to discuss the working document for the second session of the Synod in the autumn. Among the 43 participants were the President of the Council of European Bishops’ Conferences (CCEE), Archbishop Gintaras Grusas (Vilnius), and the Presidents of the Bishops’ Conferences Read more
“Jesus Christ was a sportsman.” Or so claimed a preacher at one of the regular sporting services that were held throughout the first half of the 20th century in Protestant churches all over Britain. Invitations were sent out to local organisations, and sportsmen and women would attend these services en masse. Churches would be decorated Read more
Controversial advertising holds a mirror up to society. It can unite us in laughter or outrage, spark debates that shape our beliefs – and sometimes expose our political differences. But where do lines of acceptability or offensiveness get drawn? Earlier this year the New Zealand Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) announced the most complained about ads Read more