Today on NPR, I paid special attention to the show On Point. During the two-hour show today Hour 1 discussed the current conflict in Honduras. Hour 2 talked about the recent NY Times article by Laurie Goodstein titled "U.S. Nuns Facing Vatican Scrutiny." Both of these topics were of
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Truly, I am a little more interested in child and adolescent literature than I probably should be. I am just as happy curling up with an installment of the Chronicles of Narnia as I am with... anything more age appropriate. I'm a big fan though. I was grilling my 8 and 10 year old cousins
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If Holy Week isn't proof enough that spring is just around the corner, today is Opening Day at Fenway Park! (Opening Day: Take Two due to yesterday's storm.) The Red Sox are hoping that Senator Ted Kennedy will be able to throw the first pitch this afternoon, which reminded me to put up a post
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NPR this morning was all abuzz about the first day of trial for the Khmer Rouge. The former prison guard, Duch, although he has been accused "of crimes against humanity, torture and premeditated murder for his alleged role in the deaths of more than 10,000 people" is seeking
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Happy St. Patrick's Day! Even though here in Boston, city officials and schools have the day off (thanks "Evacuation Day"), Washington D.C. is busy hosting Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams who has "called on Irish Americans to participate in the conversation about Ireland's future
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This article is a little bit dated, but I think the idea of these schools is too cool to let it go un-posted. This particular BBC NEWS article looks at the Max Rayne Hand in Hand School in Jerusalem where the student population is intentionally half Jewish, half Arab in order to foster fellowship
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Hi Friends -
Peter Kreeft has some interesting answers to 35 questions about heaven from Christianity Today. Read them here.
Among the thoughts I found most intriguing were:
13. Will we all be equal in Heaven?
We will be as we are now: equal in worth and dignity, equal in being loved
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An article in today's Boston Globe reports that Vatican Observatory director, Fr. Jose Gabriel Funes, S.J. has given the O.K. to belive in aliens.
"How can we rule out that life may have developed elsewhere?" Funes said. "Just as we consider earthly creatures as 'a brother,' and '
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An article appearing in today's Boston Globe states that yesterday, Cardinal O'Malley and Mayor Menino announced the reconfiguration of several Boston Catholic schools. Seven local Catholic schools will be closed next fall and will be replaced by the Pope John Paul II Catholic Academy which will
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It has been a few months since we had some good Potter discussion here on dotCommonweal so I thought we might be due.
Special reporter to CNN.com, Yale freshman Patrick Lee wrote an article about the surge of academic classes that are built around the Harry Potter books. At Yale
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Boston.com has put together a quick photo-essay titled "New England's Catholic shrines" which features eleven different Catholic sites from New Hampshire down to Connecticut. The introduction reads:
They're titanic and tiny. They're tucked between Boston buildings and in the boonies.
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I know that Stephen Colbert gets a lot of press here on dotCommonweal, but it's probably because he's got a lot of good stuff going on. For example, he announced last night that he wants to help the public schools of Pennsylvania by working with DonorsChoose.org, the website that earned
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In her famous autobiography Dorothy Day says, "We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community."
In Seattle, community is the key to the success of the Capitol Hill coworking space, Office Nomads.
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Last week, Mary Ann Glendon officially took up her new post when she presented Pope Benedict XVI with her credentials as "Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Holy See." In her address to His Holiness, she mentioned the importance of "
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I had a great time this past weekend at the Los Angeles Religious Education Congress, hanging out at the Commonweal booth and talking to both loyal present subscribers and potentially new subscribers. People came by to talk about all sorts of things but two of our more enthusiastic visitors
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I first heard of Fr. Greg Boyle, SJ when I was a student. In one of my theology classes, we listened to a taped interview that Fr. Greg had done on NPR about his work with the gangs of Los Angeles. I think we may have also read excerpts from his book "G-Dog and the Homeboys."
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It was a tough week in my hometown of Boston last week. After a devastating Super Bowl 4th quarter loss, people weren't sure what had happened to the New England Patriots. Where had we all gone wrong? Well, thanks to a recent CNS story, we Patriots fans have someone new to blame for
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This morning's Boston Globe held a story of about fifty people who were protesting yesterday outside of the Church of Scientology headquarters in Boston wearing Guy Fawkes masks. Upon further investigation, it seems like a worldwide Scientology protest took place yesterday and cities involved
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On the subject of Lenten observances, one idea that I had about what to do for the next forty days is to try to make my life a little more eco-friendly. While looking for suggestions, I stumbled across a New York Times article about Ireland's hatred for plastic bags and a CNS story about a
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Sadly, two prominent church leaders have passed away and within 48 hours of one another. The two men, the leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the leader of the Greek Orthodox Church are both praised in The New York Times for the work that they did in their
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I haven't seen it, but Rob Reiner's The Bucket List has not received great reviews. Despite that, the idea of getting things done before it is too late seems to be a growing trend. In today's New York Times, another movie that deals with mortality and how to spend our dwindling days, Amy Redford's
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I received an e-mail with this same title from one of my good friends. As far as I can tell, these images are making their way around the Internet so you may have already seen them, but I think that they are pretty striking. They show families of different sizes from around the world and how much
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Kerry's for Obama. What do we think about this
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I didn't even know that they had Boy Scouts in Maldives, but this article in USA Today caught my eye. Apparently, a teenage scout in full uniform saved the president of Maldives when a potential assassin came towards him with a knife.
I don't know what kind of popularity rating President
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Had I responded to Joseph A. Komonchak's post a few days ago, I would have mentioned that one of my favorite, albeit not Christ-centerd, Christmas Carols (or let's just say "songs that you hear at Christmas") is Do They Know It's Christmas by Band Aid. I'm sure you are probably pretty
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After I had been volunteering in the Gulf Coast for a few months, my parents started to get nervous that I would spend the majority of my life as a full-time volunteer. One day I received an envelope in the mail from my tax-attorney father. I opened it up and did not find a letter or even a
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According to today's Boston Globe, one police official in South Africa referred to the killing of 11 would-be robbers as "splendid work." Since the shootout in Johannesburg ended in what is being considered a rousing success, people have started emphatically talking about lifting the
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Since tomorrow is the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and this Patroness of the Americas is currently gracing the covers of Commonweal, I thought she deserved an appearance here in our blog as well. My best friend is currently in her second year as a Jesuit Volunteer in Managua, Nicaragua
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