Raymond J. de Souza

Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis’s recent encyclical on “fraternity and social friendship,” will generate work for theologians for some time. Continue Reading »

Good and evil are so intertwined that sometimes it is hard to recognize which is which. Continue Reading »

Pope Francis has less to worry about from “enemies” than he does from his “friends.” Continue Reading »

Though the guilty did not suffer for far too long, now some innocents suffer too much in the correction. Continue Reading »

Twenty years ago today, on the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Richard John Neuhaus was ordained a Catholic priest. Cardinal John O’Connor ordained Father Neuhaus in 1991 at St. Joseph’s Seminary, just north of the city in Dunwoodie. Exactly one year previous, on September 8, 1990, Cardinal O’Connor had received Richard into full communion with the Catholic Church, in a ceremony held in the private chapel of the cardinal’s residence… . Continue Reading »

The Holy See’s official “Response” to the Cloyne Report, released in Rome on September 3, 2011, marks a significant development in the sexual abuse crisis in Ireland. It has significance beyond Ireland, for the summer of 2011 has brought not just the latest iteration of Irish investigatory commissions, but a serious dispute about the role of the Catholic Church in Irish life. The Response, at some 11,000 words, is comprehensive, even tedious in its detail, and adopts an understated and humble tone… . Continue Reading »

We come today to pray for a righteous man, the Honorable Shahbaz Bhatti, who died early, at age 42. The words of the Book of Wisdom comfort us: “Being perfected in a short time, he fulfilled long years.” He was “pleasing to the Lord [who] took him quickly from the midst of wickedness.” … Continue Reading »

The homily from the Mass for the twentieth anniversary of the reception into the Catholic Church of Richard John Neuhaus: The genealogy of Jesus Christ is something of a homiletic challenge. But Saint Matthew recorded it, and so the Church presents it to us, though not often. We find it, appropriately enough, on this feast of the nativity of Our Lady, and also as the gospel for the vigil Mass of the Nativity of the Lord… . Continue Reading »

The Future Church: How Ten Trends Are Revolutionizing The Catholic Church by John L. Allen Jr. Doubleday, 480 pages, $28 About three hundred pages into his comprehensive analysis of the Catholic present and likely future, John Allen sketches a scene that summarizes his book: “Ironically, . . . . Continue Reading »

Cardinal Ratzinger said in his funeral homily for John Paul the Great: “This is not the time to speak of the specific content of this rich pontificate.” Likewise, this is not the time to speak about the specific content of the rich literary life and public achievements of Fr. Richard John . . . . Continue Reading »