It is difficult to believe that it has been fifty years since I joined my religious community, the Sisters of Social Service, and began a lifetime of commitment to the quest for justice based in the Gospel. Over the decades my spirituality and prayer life have deepened to be a contemplative life of “walking willing.” Read more
It may not make his family wealthy, but Devran Mankar is still grateful for the pearl millet variety called Dhanshakti (meaning “prosperity and strength”) he has recently begun growing in his small field in the state of Maharashtra, in western India. “Since eating this pearl millet, the children are rarely ill,” raves Mankar, a slim man Read more
There were many striking images during the extraordinary 72 hours that Pope Francis spent in the Middle East. The Pope at the River Jordan, visiting with Syrian refugees, celebrating mass in Bethlehem, praying at the separation wall, uniting with the Ecumenical Patriarch, visiting the Dome of the Rock, leaving a note at the Western Wall, Read more
In the aftermath of Islamic jihadis — the Boko Haram — enslaving Christian school girls in Nigeria, the Muslim intelligentsia, instead of doing some serious introspection, has chosen to exercise damage control. Columns by my co-religionists have appeared in newspapers ranging from the Toronto Star to The Independent in London and on CNN.com, where they Read more
Lulu Mitshabu tells us to close our eyes. ‘Imagine your brothers, sisters, your mothers, your nieces, your nephews, your children, everybody that makes you smile, the good time you’re having,’ she says. ‘Open your eyes. The time that you took closing your eyes and thinking of your people, imagine now everybody you thought of disappeared Read more
There’s something quite peculiar and absurd about being a Nigerian. It’s a country of—so to speak—unspecified data and dimensions. Nigeria is not simply plagued by inexactitude; it cultivates numerical and other forms of fuzziness. The other day, Ikhide Ikheloa, one of Nigeria’s most pugnacious gadflies, was waxing indignant on Facebook and Twitter. His grouse? Nigeria has Read more
An image of the Child Jesus stands in the midst of the rubble, leaning – naked and homeless – against a wall that is about to be torn down. Images of the Child Jesus, popularly known as the Santo Nino, have been dislodged from their altars as the shanties of slum dwellers in five villages Read more
“Egali-what?” Even as New Zealand’s income gaps have yawned open in recent decades, public concern about that inequality has fallen. Egalitarianism used to be one of New Zealand’s touchstones, a term that conveyed a kind of pride in being a country with relatively small income gaps. Even among the politically active, the word has little Read more
Do you recall The Great Jubilee Year 2000? For a few years before the turn of the century, almost every statement by a bishop or other church leader or organization contained some paean to the jubilee. The pope had called for it, and so all sorts of people either sincerely or for show acted as Read more
New Zealand minister of Justice, Judith Collins is hailing the success of restorative justice conferences as a way to bring down crime rates. She says it’s clear restorative justice conferences are a useful tool in keeping offenders from going on to commit other crimes. “It’s estimated from the 1569 meetings held in 2011 and 2012, Read more