On 8 December of last year, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, Pope Francis released his message for the celebration of the Fiftieth World Day of Peace. It was titled, “Nonviolence: A Style of Politics for Peace.” In addition to this message, Pope Francis used Twitter in the days following its release to Read more
Recently I logged on to Facebook to find this lovely meme from Thomas Merton: “If the you of five years ago doesn’t consider the you of today a heretic, you are not growing spiritually.” It’s a great sentiment, but my malarkey radar went off at the attribution to Merton. This language of “growing spiritually” is awfully modern Read more
The writer and Trappist monk Thomas Merton, the famous British writer, Graham Greene, and our current pope, Pope Francis, have a lot in common. Merton died in 1968 – from accidental electrocution whilst touring in Thailand, and Greene died peacefully in 1991. Both men were converts to Catholicism. Like Pope Francis, Merton engaged in interfaith Read more
Once I believed that when you found faith, it rarely wavered. Then I learned that even saints had massive doubts about God. How reassuring. If even the holiest of the holy had second thoughts, why not me? Maybe we Catholics should talk more about doubt. It actually is an intrinsic part of the pilgrimage, a Read more