Since it came out, some have argued that Amoris Laetitia permits Communion for the divorced and remarried. This is often based on a few lines rather than going back and analyzing the text as a whole in line with tradition.[1. I will deal … [Read more...]
Does the Text of Amoris Laetitia Allow Communion for the Divorced and Remarried?
Part 1
February 12, 2019 by Fr. Matthew P. Schneider, LC
The “Experience” of Modernism
February 12, 2019 by Jeffrey Tranzillo
The Instrumentum Laboris (IL), or working document, of the recently concluded synod on youth states quite starkly that “personal experiences cannot be placed in question” (IL 55).[1. Instrumentum laboris, XV Ordinary General Assembly of Syn … [Read more...]
Conscience
The Echo of God's Voice
January 28, 2019 by Brent Withers
Conscience is the voice of God, whereas it is fashionable on all hands now to consider it in one way or another a creation of man.[1. John Henry Newman, in The Genius of John Henry Newman: Selections from his Writings, ed. Ian Ker (Oxford: … [Read more...]
Questions Answered – January 2019
January 17, 2019 by Fr. Brian Mullady, OP
Mortal Sin and the Individual Conscience Question: My question is about the “full knowledge” element for mortal sin. My belief has always been in line with the following statement from the FAQ section of the popular program “The Light Is On … [Read more...]
A Surprising Beatitude
Dashing the Little Ones upon the Rock
January 1, 2019 by Kevin M. Clarke
In a 2007 class on the Epistle to the Hebrews, Jesuit Fr. James Swetnam passed along to us two words of wisdom from German Biblical scholar Joachim Jeremias. The first word: read a chapter of New Testament Greek every day. Indeed, very wise … [Read more...]
The Necessity of Confession and Its Seal
November 30, 2018 by Fr. John M. McDermott, SJ
Any Catholic reading the report of Australia’s Royal Commission of Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse must be appalled by the multiple instances of child abuse in ecclesial institutions perpetrated by priests, religious, and l … [Read more...]
The Revised Catechism on the Death Penalty
A Careful Reading
September 18, 2018 by Joseph Arias
With popular news articles beginning on August 2, 2018, various media agencies have been proclaiming: “Pope Francis has declared the death penalty wrong in all cases, a definitive change in church teaching . . .” (New York Times), “Pope Fran … [Read more...]
The Gift and Rights of Being Conceived, Part 2
September 2, 2018 by Francis Etheredge
Even if, as we have seen in Part I of this essay, there are unresolved questions concerning the definition of the moment of conception, an irreversible moment involving the action of God, each one of us is nevertheless evidence of an actual … [Read more...]
When Does Sin Stop Being Sin?
July 31, 2018 by Dr. John M. Grondelski
Imagine I’m poor. Not dirt poor. Not homeless. Not living on the edge of extreme poverty. Just poor. Poor enough not to be able to afford some of the nicer things in life. Now, let’s imagine that I’m riding on the subway. I happen to noti … [Read more...]
The Gift and Rights of Being Conceived, Part 1
July 31, 2018 by Francis Etheredge
In the first of this two-part essay there is an examination of the wholeness of human being, the complementarity of faith and reason, and what human conception is, and what is said about it in the teaching of the Church (Part I). In the … [Read more...]
Psychopathy
A Deeper Reality Revealed Through Catholicism
March 30, 2018 by Brent Withers
It is my hope that through the lens of the wisdom of the Church’s tradition, I am able to reveal the deeper reality that remains hidden behind the label of psychopathy. By its very nature, an exploration into the world of the psychopath s … [Read more...]
The Dilemma of Pope Francis: The 2018 World Meeting of Families
March 15, 2018 by Fr. Regis Scanlon, OFMCap
By now everyone — especially Catholics — should know that the 2018 World Meeting of Families, sponsored by the Vatican Congregation of Marriage and Family Life, will gather in Dublin, Ireland this August. In recent months, stories about t … [Read more...]
Being Open to Life—Abstract Norm, or Embodied Word?
January 23, 2018 by Francis Etheredge
Preamble We have a temptation to separate a moral norm from its existential reality and, in so doing, to imagine that we have “an abstract norm”[1. Although the expression, ‘abstract norm’ (ncregi … [Read more...]
My Side of the Confessional
A Scrupulous Penitent’s Plea to Confessors
December 12, 2017 by Monica Lyons Montanaro
For months, I had been mustering the courage to go to confession. I had faced the terror of Hell to marshal my sins. I had waited in the empty church for half an hour, palms in a cold sweat, rehearsing my lines. It had been three months and … [Read more...]
Questions Answered
December 12, 2017 by Fr. Brian Mullady, OP
Question: Please explain why “even attachment to venial sin” prevents one from obtaining a plenary indulgence. It seems no one can receive one as we all are attached to, and even commit, venial sins. Answer: The answers to this question a … [Read more...]
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