Read & Reflect
Articles, reflections, news, and homilies — thoughtful Catholic content for the faithful, published regularly.
Spirituality
Spirituality
Teaching Ethics “The Little Way”
Many Catholic ethics courses are badly organized. If the end of Catholic ethics is to make people virtuous, teachers would do well to put the “hot button” issues on the backburner and bring the daily, commonplace virtues to the fore. A high school teacher and tenured associate professor, I taught et...
Spirituality
Toward a Restoration of Secondary Education for Girls
There is no institution more in need of reconsideration than the public high school. We have inherited a model constructed largely from industrial assumptions: age-segregated cohorts, prolonged adolescence, generalized curricula, and an educational trajectory that extends dependency well into early...
Spirituality
Modernism’s Effect on the Eucharistic Prayer
What is the longest prayer prayed by Christ in the gospels? It is the High Priestly Prayer of Christ in the 17th chapter of John, which is one long conversation between Christ and His Father. Centuries before, Moses petitioned God on behalf of his stiff-necked people: If I find favor with you, O Lor...
Spirituality
Reaping the Whirlwind of the Contraceptive Mentality
“John Paul II taught that the body has a ‘spousal meaning.’ It is made to express love as a free, total, faithful, and fruitful gift.” I graduated from high school in May of 1968. With my whole adult life ahead of me and college on the horizon, I wasn’t paying much attention to what was happening in...
Spirituality
Hosts in the Sewer: A Nun’s Dream and the Silent Desecration of Our Time
A few years ago, a religious sister shared a dream that has remained with me ever since. Her life is devoted to caring for those with severe mental and physical disabilities in Mumbai. In the dream she saw ordinary city streets. Open drains and sewers brimmed with filthy water and refuse. Floating a...
Spirituality
Remembering the Lesson of the Good Samaritan
Shortly after turning 50, my late father had to leave behind two decades of practicing law to go on full-time disability. At 7 years old, he had contracted Rheumatic Fever. That was the beginning of 61 long years of suffering. He spent a year of his childhood paralyzed. He spent a year homeschooling...
Spirituality
From Gift to Product: The Logic of IVF, Abortion, Eugenics, and Transhumanism
A few definitions will help at the outset. By IVF, or in vitro fertilization, I mean the generation of human embryos outside the body, ordinarily in a laboratory setting, with later transfer to the womb (Donum Vitae II.B; Dignitas Personae 12–18). By abortion, I mean the deliberate termination of th...
Spirituality
We Have the Holy Spirit—Why Do We Need the Eucharist?
When Jesus ascended to Heaven, He sent the Holy Spirit to His followers to give them the divine life of the Trinity. Why, then, did He also give them a meal of Bread and Wine to attain eternal life? Gospel (Read Jn. 6:51-58) Our Easter lectionary readings moved us through Christ’s Resurrection, Asc...
Spirituality
Eucharistic Miracles and the Ordinarily Miraculous
Eucharistic Miracles are instances where consecrated bread and wine no longer appear as bread and wine. The veil of ordinary appearances is lifted, and we see, in a way our eyes of faith already trust, the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Risen Lord, Jesus Christ. Though tradition assures us th...
Spirituality
The Eucharist is Truly Jesus—Does This Shock You?
The Holy Eucharist is a shocking teaching of the Catholic Church. Indeed, the Lord’s teaching on the Eucharist has been shocking from the beginning. Today, followers of Christ still have trouble believing in this unwavering teaching from Jesus and His Church: that He is truly present—Body, Blood, So...
Spirituality
Worshipping the Rising Son: The Temple, the Lamb, and Facing East
What happens after we die? Someone once gave examples to help formulate an answer. His help was in the form of questions: Have you tried to describe a rainbow to a man born blind? Or a Tchaikovsky symphony like Sleeping Beauty or Swan Lake, to a person born deaf? Explain the exquisite fragrance of a...
Spirituality
Why Water Baptism Is Necessary for Salvation
Jesus, Scripture, and the Catholic Church teach that water baptism is necessary for our salvation. It washes away our sins, infuses our souls with grace, and puts us in communion with God and His Church. Still, many wonder why we need water for baptism. Why can’t faith in Jesus be enough? Accordingl...