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I'm half Irish--and proud of it. But I have never been what some of my friends call 'professionally Irish,' the kind of Irish-American who knows all the verses of 'The [...]

The dying is not the most important part of the Gospel story of the raising of Lazarus, which is traditionally called Jesus' 'greatest miracle' and which, in John's Gospel, will [...]

Not long ago a woman came tome for spiritual direction. As most spiritual directors do, I started by setting out some guidelines: how often to meet, what times, what direction [...]

Whenever I say that I am pro-life, it always surprises some people--which always surprises me. Last summer I attended a conference on polarization in the Catholic Church, held at Georgetown [...]

Martin Scorsese, the acclaimed filmmaker, has completed a film about 17th-century, Portuguese Jesuits ministering in Japan, based on Shusaku Endo's novel Silence. The film, to be released this month, stars [...]

I do not know anyone who didn't love and admire John W. O'Malley, S.J. This great Jesuit priest, dean of Catholic historians and author of groundbreaking historical works who taught [...]

I found out from two women. At first, I dismissed what they said. On Sept. 11, 2001, I was at my desk at the old America House on 56th Street [...]

Since Building a Bridge, a book on ministering to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Catholics, was published, I have been asked--at Catholic parishes, retreat centers, colleges and universities and conferences--a [...]

Whenever I speak to groups on the spirituality of joy, I am usually asked some excellent questions afterward. These questions always prompt me to think more deeply about the topic, [...]

Daniel Berrigan, S.J., who died five years ago, was always a presence in my Jesuit life, which began in the late 1980s. In those days, all the Jesuits in formation [...]

In the 10 years since My Life With the Saints was first published, I hope that I have gained a bit more wisdom on the Christian life. This has come [...]

Brian Kolodiejchuk, a Canadian priest of the Missionaries of Charity, was the official postulator for the canonization of Teresa of Calcutta, who will be declared a saint on Sept. 4. [...]

During the 20th century, the United States consistently took a reactive stance on gun control, pushing for stronger controls and greater restraints on gun sales based on perceived social crises [...]

When it was noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. At three o'clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice, 'Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?' which [...]

In the first chapter of the Gospel of Luke, the angel Gabriel appears to a young girl named Mary, who lives in the small, backwater town of Nazareth. The angel [...]

You would think that the book many Scripture scholars agree to be the oldest in the New Testament would garner a great deal of respect. You would think that a [...]

The industry term for the appeal of a Web site is 'sticky.' Visitors (or 'eyeballs') stick to a site if it is interesting, lively, useful, provocative and generally appealing. Conversely, [...]

ONE CHALLENGE for readers of Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light, the collection of Blessed Teresa of Calcutta's letters published last fall, is to distinguish among the terms darkness, dryness, [...]

'SO WHAT DO YOU WANT TO SEE in New Mexico?' asked my friend. For two days last October, I had been speaking at a meeting of Catholic foundation directors in [...]

PERHAPS CATHOLICS SHOULD NOT have been surprised by the revelations in Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light, a new collection of letters by the 'saint of the gutters' that show […]

THE STATISTICS ARE ALARMING. According to the Center for Applied Research on the Apostolate, a survey in 2005 showed that 42 percent of Catholic adults, when asked how often they […]

I do not think I can properly thank Daniel J. Harrington, S.J., for all he has done for me, for my brother Jesuits, for all of his students, for Catholic [...]

The Resurrection is the center of my faith. Other Christians may focus more on, say, the Incarnation--how God became human, how God understands us in the most intimate way possible. [...]

This is a broad topic, I know--but one with which I've recently become familiar. A 'chronic' illness, I have discovered, is defined as any that takes longer than six months [...]

The weeks following the election of Pope Francis, the first Jesuit elected to that office, saw more people asking questions about Jesuits than at perhaps any other time in the [...]

One of my favorite sources of laughter is the 1975 film 'Monty Python and the Holy Grail.' Briefly put, the British comedy is based on the story of King Arthur [...]

After two years of work in East Africa, puzzling over which malaria pills to take, elbowing onto crowded, diesel-spewing mini-buses, muddling through a Swahili course, fighting food poisoning, carefully arranging [...]

IT WAS A QUINTESSENTIALLY AMERICAN QUESTION that was posed to me a few weeks ago by a close friend: 'How do I find God?' The question was asked by a [...]

She is everywhere. In the past few months, Helen Alvare has appeared on the 'Today' show, 'Good Morning America,' 'CBS This Morning,' CNN's 'Healthline' and on a 'Firing Line' panel [...]

`KWANZA BEGINS TODAY.' the radio announcer said, launching into an explanation of the cycle of January African-American feast days. 'The word Kwanza, ' he said brightly, 'means `first' in African.' [...]

It was three years ago, in 1992, when the ethnic nations of the one-time Federation of Yugoslavia split, staked out their own independent national territories and began the bloodshed that [...]

THE REV MARK RAPER, an Australian Jesuit, has served since 1990 as international director of the Jesuit Refugee Service, which was founded in 1980 by the Very Rev. Pedro Arrupe, [...]

OPUS DEI IS THE MOST CONTROVERSIAL group in the Catholic Church today. To its members it is nothing less than The Work of God, the inspiration of Blessed Josemaria Escriva, [...]

CAMILLE PAGLIA has been called 'America's premier intellectual renegade,' 'the most charismatic scholar to appear in years' and 'Hurricane Camille.' After she worked in relative obscurity for 20 years, her [...]

Over the past few years, I have spent a good deal of time speaking to groups both large and small about the saints. After listening to the comments and questions [...]

Desire is a key part of Christian spirituality because desire is a key way in which God's voice is heard in our lives. And our deepest desire, planted within all [...]

THE HOLOCAUST BY BULLETS A Priest's Journey to Uncover the Truth Behind the Murder of 1.5 Million Jews By Father Patrick Desbois Palgrave/Macmillan. 272p $26.95 Not a book for the [...]

Lourdes, Fatima, Vatican City, Fairfield--the first three of these sites are well known among Catholics; and each boasts the dazzling artistry of Marko Rupnik, S.J. His richly colored mosaics adorn [...]

During my retreat this year, I broke a longstanding rule. Many years ago, when I was a Jesuit novice, my first spiritual director counseled that the only books one should […]

What do you get when you take a handful to a dozen of the most energetic and inspired students from almost every Jesuit high school or college in the country [...]

THE MEMBERS OF THE Order of Malta, or at least its American branches, concluded their annual one-week pilgrimage to Lourdes in May. As in the past few years, I participated [...]

IN OCTOBER 2004 I found a surprising message on my voice mail from the actor Sam Rockwell. 'I'm working on a play about Judas Iscariot,' he said. 'Could I ask […]

Merton & Friends A Joint Biography of Thomas Merton, Robert Lax, and Edward Rice By James Harford Continuum. 352p $35.95 ISBN 0826418694 In November 1949, the year after the publication [...]

Some people believe that Jesuits can be characterized as follows: We all have doctorates; we all know the pope personally; and we all travel to Rome frequently. But, like many [...]

'If you want to meet the poor, take the bus.' That's a saying I've heard many times from my brother Jesuits. It refers not so much to transportation within cities [...]

Everybody knows that same-sex marriage and homosexual acts are contrary to Catholic moral teaching. Yet that same teaching also says that gay and lesbian people must be treated with 'respect, [...]

Toward The End of The Summer, I received a manila envelope from ABC-TV. Inside was a video of a new fall show centering around the life of a priest. Naturally [...]

This year on Holy Thursday I found myself in a video store searching for 'Jesus of Nazareth,' a movie that my Jesuit community had decided would make good Easter-Triduum viewing. [...]

Jesus of Nazareth (1978). Franco Zeffirelli's magnificent film, despite an often distracting list of big-name stars (Ralph Richardson is Simeon; Laurence Olivier is Nicodemus.), offers the following credentials: It was [...]

The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965). Similar in scope and intent to 'Jesus of Nazareth,' this movie boasts a star lineup almost as impressive. Chief among the attractions of this [...]