Commentaries
Physician-assisted suicide: Dead in some states, routine in others
Legalized euthanasia efforts have slowed in several states. However, in California and other states where it is approved, the practice has become sadly commonplace, warns Richard Doerflinger.
Stale beer and dirty socks led to adoration, and my conversion
Megan Mastroianni was an ordinary Catholic teenager, and not very religious. When she started running with a partying crowd her brother took her to eucharistic adoration and a youth group meeting. It changed her life.
‘Not a sparrow falls’: With a God like this, how could you not feel loved?
Effie Caldarola considers the sparrow of Jesus' parable that meets its end like the rest of us, and a robin that somehow survived a tornado. God is with us through it all, so we should fear nothing.
Young people: Tell the pope what you think
For the first time the Vatican is inviting direct public responses to prepare for a synod. The survey is directed at young people -- who have been offering their opinions online all their lives.
The wisdom of calling God our Father
Gender neutral language -- try Godself instead of himself -- is more about us and our sexual politics than about God, writes John Garvey. We must embrace the language of a child.
How an unknown lobbyist became a hero for life
Richard Doerflinger recounts four ways that Mark Gallagher, the late deacon and lobbyist who crafted the Hyde Amendment, helped save 2 million unborn lives. Washington needs more people like him.
The coming synod and the need to really listen to Hispanic youth
Hosffman Ospino hopes dioceses can see the results of a Vatican questionnaire to Hispanic youth. The church must rely not only on a survey but on going out to where young people are.
In a ‘dismal time,’ what is a Catholic voter to do?
It's easy to fight over politics, but it's harder to understand those with whom we disagree, writes Greg Erlandson. To do so, Catholics must find a way to express the entire ecology of Catholic moral teaching.
Praying for immigrants
Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez prays that Americans see themselves in the faces of new immigrants to the U.S. -- may we see in them our own desire for happiness and to be welcomed and loved.
A call to oppose the rise of rudeness
The climate of courtesy in the U.S. may have plunged, but Effie Caldarola believes we should make our lives speak of respect and mercy. We should "go high" even as other folks are "going low."