After years of neglect by her drug-addicted mother, the social worker finally put eight-year-old Carol, into foster care. She was adopted by a loving family, but the damage had been done. Carol was wounded at a very deep level. Racked with…

One of the favorite activities for young children is a book at bedtime. When parents, grandparents, or big brothers and sisters curl up with a young child to read a good book, relationships are strengthened, bonds are built, and both heads…

Five hundred years ago, the Church and the world plum­meted into crisis. The Protes­tant Revolution split Europe into warring factions. In the wake of Martin Luther’s preaching, Germany erupted in a revolt among the peasants that…

When is New Year’s Day? Everybody assumes it is Jan.1, but for centuries Catholics observed March 25 as the start of the new year. March 25 is around the beginning of spring, but in the Church’s calendar it is the Solemnity of the…

In the Evangelical church in which I was raised, we didn’t hate Catholics, but we thought they were wrong. One of the areas we were convinced they were in error was their “Mary worship.” As I followed the path to the Catholic Church, I came…

I first met Thérèse of Lisieux when I was an Anglican priest. I had three months free between jobs and decided to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem from England. One of my first stops was in the French town of Lisieux. I knew of St. Thérèse,…

All it takes is a few years or even months of dry weather before we realize how dependent all of us are on fresh water for life. When California was hit by drought conditions, the whole nation was affected. Because California grows a huge…

(offer it up!)

At a conference my sister met a missionary who was working with people in the jungles of Southeast Asia. The atheist government there had banned all foreigners. They had especially banned religious workers from having contact with the…

We were heading home from church when our twelve-year-old daughter complained, “Why do we have to listen to all that boring music at church? I hate that stuff!” My wife jumped in to correct her. “You can’t say that! You apologize for…