Failures Real and Imagined 

   This past Tuesday marked the third anniversary of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, the 2022 Supreme Court decision revoking the “constitutional right” to abortion invented by Roe v. Wade. For those of us who want to see unborn children protected by law, Dobbs was a great...
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Teach Truthfully and Minister Mercifully

    Let’s be honest. Congregations, as well as their pastors and priests, are hesitant, even unwilling, to address abortion either publicly or from the pulpit. We are afraid that we might make somebody in the local church mad. Nevertheless, faithful ministry involves...
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The Gift of Age

    The room is not quite big enough for everyone who has come. In her reclining chair, the 95-year-old woman takes it all in, with smiles. Her hearing is spotty, her eyesight rather darkened, and her walker ever close to hand. But she is full of delight, for gathered around...
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Livin’ Easy in God

  “Summertime, and the livin’ is easy . . .” So goes the opening aria in George Gershwin’s 1935 opera Porgy and Bess. Summer is upon us now and easy it is—or is supposed to be! School is out; vacation time beckons. It is the season to put aside, as much as possible,...
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Reflection for Pentecost

  Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them. (John 20:22-23) The scene of our Lord’s first resurrection appearance to the disciples, when all of them are together, from the Gospel of John, is sometimes called “St. John’s Pentecost.” John doesn’t give the...
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The Sermon on the Mount

  The late John Courtney Murray, S.J., once told me that at a convention he attended, a Protestant theologian said to him in a rather worried tone of voice, “I don’t see how we can base a foreign policy on the Sermon on the Mount.” Replied Fr. Murray, “I never thought we...
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A Way of Escape

    This post originally appeared on this website on Feb 3, 2017. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you...
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A Pro-Life Field Hospital

    [This reflection was written and filed in the interregnum between Pope Francis’s death and Pope Leo XIV’s election.] ___________________________________________________________________________________   It has long been observed that the Church is not a museum...
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AN OPEN LETTER: TO THE CARDINALS OF THE CONCLAVE FROM A PROTESTANT PASTOR

  Dear Cardinals: Easter Season grace and peace to you and yours. With the help of God the Father, who displayed glorious power and good providence in raising His Son Jesus Christ from the dead, you can approach your duty of electing the next pope not with anxiety, not with...
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An Ordinary Person

  C. S. Lewis, a character in his own story, saw her approaching from afar. She was radiant. Leading her were bright angels, joyous children, and musicians. Multitudes of animals followed after. It was a great procession coming down from the high country. Lewis thought he was...
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