Mulvarosa Pibilra Perote is one of more than 500 survivors of Typhoon Haiyan who are taking shelter in a seminary in Tacloban city. The building has been turned into an evacuation centre, where Caritas and its partners are delivering aid. Mulvarosa, a 57-year-old grandmother, was at home when the storm hit, along with five of Read more
In The Unquiet Grave Cyril Connelly, the 20th century Anglo-Irish critic, writer, and editor, having acknowledged the existence of the thousands of people like him (“…Liberals without a belief in progress, Democrats who despise their fellow-men, Pagans who still live by Christian morals, Intellectuals who cannot find the intellect sufficient—unsatisfied Materialists…”), concludes nonetheless that “there can be no Read more
Papa Francisco is full of surprises. You never know what’s going to come out of his mouth, but it often has something to do with what goes in. “Buon pranzo” (have a good lunch) has become his signature sign off. This summer, he shook things up in Rio by insisting that faith is not a Read more
The presbytery of St. Alipius is a redbrick gothic bungalow built when gold money was still washing through Ballarat. It sits in a Catholic compound of brick and granite schools and convents where the road from Melbourne reaches town. White crosses stand on the gables of the house as if to ward off evil from Read more
Are we moulding Pope Francis into an image and polishing him to a high gloss, that we might better see ourselves reflected in him? Are we treating him as we would a god? Read more
She sat beside the bed, tears brimming. ‘Mum’s dying.’ ‘Yes.’ We sat in silence for a bit. ‘I’ve lost my faith.’ ‘Uh huh.’ ‘When my friend died.’ ‘Mm.’ We held hands and Mum’s too, wondering in our own ways, about God and faith and people dying and what the universe meant, if anything. As we Read more
There has been The outbreak of measles in a faith-healing megachurch Eagle Mountain International Church. EMIC co-pastor Terri Copeland Pearsons denied that she ever opposed vaccination (which is pretty much true. Her co-pastor and husband George Pearsons attributed the end of the measles outbreak not to vaccines, but to a two-minute long communal prayer he Read more
On my regular walks around my neighbourhood, I pass by a property where two large dogs live. If they are running free on the fenced property, they come up to the gate, relaxed, curious, and quietly watch until I pass. It is a different scenario should they be tethered on their chains. As I approach, Read more
Traditional theories of secularization maintain that religious decline led to the deterioration of the family. Not so, argues Mary Eberstadt in her new book How the West Really Lost God: A New Theory of Secularization (Templeton Press, 2013). Eberstadt is a leading cultural critic and a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center Read more
John Barron says he thought I’d write in this Twitter post, “Not so much because I feel a need to offer proper answers, more so because I am always amused at what Atheists offering these kinds of questions or challenges believe they are ‘difficult’ or substantive challenges to Christianity. It makes one wonder, if these are Read more