by Christine Schenk in The National Catholic Reporter, 17 January 2019 Over the holidays I had the pleasure of taking my niece and two grandnieces to see the movie "Little Women." Directed by Greta Gerwig, the superb casting of the four March sisters includes Saoirse Ronan (Jo), whose breakout performance in "Lady Bird" (also directed…
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Gaza “Open-Air Prison” say Bishops
by Madoc Cairns in THE TABLET, 16 January 2020 A group of Catholic bishops from Europe and North America have returned from their visit to the Holy Land, releasing a joint statement that highlights the “profound humanitarian crisis” in Gaza, which they claim has become an “open-air prison”. As part of this visit the bishops…
Homily, The Baptism of Our Lord (A)
It is generally understood that his baptism was the moment when Jesus became fully aware of his true identity – that is, who he truly was and what God was calling him to do. It may have taken some time for him to reach this conclusion but it appears that his baptism was THE moment,…
Walking with RJ
The church must face its own role in violence against women Jan 7, 2020 by Jamie Manson
by Jamie Manson in The National Catholic Reporter (USA), 7 January 2020 Of all of the religious instruction classes that my mother took as a girl, one lesson in particular always seemed to stay with her: the day that the nun explained the church's teaching on divorce. A girl in the class asked the sister…
‘I Hear My Beloved’ – Cardinal Vincent Nichols Golden Jubilee Homily
Homily of Cardinal Nichols at his Golden Jubilee Mass, 21 December 2019 Year by year, and increasingly so, I love hearing the first Reading of our Mass today, from the Song of Songs. It is so full of emotion and of the language of love. I hear my Beloved. See how he comes leaping on…
People who sneer at tin-openers should can it
From Carol Midgley in THE TIMES, 6 January 2020 Sorry to dazzle you with sheer glamour but my first purchase of 2020 was a tin-opener. Quite a snazzy one, too: £8 and promising easy handling if I get arthritis, so there’s much to look forward to there. But people said: “Oh. You know that owning…
Homily, Epiphany 2020
The visit of the Magi was the first public revelation or appearance of Jesus. It is symbolically enacted in the crib before our altar. In addition to Mary, Joseph, the shepherds and some animals (including the Holy Name rabbit), the figures of three Magi are kneeling in homage before the Infant Jesus. In the cultural…
Boris Johnson and the Churchill factor
What does Boris Johnson stand for? Perhaps his admiration for Britain’s wartime leader reveals some clues as to where the new prime minister will take the country in the 2020s By Jimmy Burns in THE TABLET, 2 January 2020 I first met Boris Johnson in early 1988. Johnson was a slightly chubby trainee reporter with…
Wave your arms, kick your feet, do the 2020
By Garrison Keillor I don’t do New Year’s Eve anymore because the parties never were that much fun and we wound up trapped in corners in the usual intense conversations (kids, schools, political lunacy), and some people drank too much and forced the rest of us into a guardianship role and the sheer awkwardness of…
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