Today is the feast day of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha. Now I have only read one book on Blessed Kateri, so I am by no means an expert on the Lily of the Mohawks. I know that she underwent much suffering and discrimination to become a Christian, and that she was also known for her chaste life. She is perhaps most renowned for being a Native of North America....
Frank Capra's beloved classic It's a Wonderful Life explores a number of themes, but perhaps the final word was left to the angel Clarence, who leaves his copy of Tom Sawyer to the redeemed protagonist George Bailey with these words inscribed: "Remember George, no man is a failure who has friends."...
The Barque of Peter: Wednesday morning about 10:30, the popemobile entered St. Peter's Square. It wove back and forth along the narrow lanes kept clear so that the Holy Father could greet as many as possible. From where I sat in front of the Basilica's façade, it looked like a little white boat, the Pope its captain standing at the wheel, the popemobile sailing through a sea of cheering, waving, clapping, loving pilgrims....
I don't get up at 5:30 am very often. It takes something special to get me out of bed that early in the morning. But on the morning of Wednesday, February 27, I was up and out of bed and out the door before 6:10 because something very special indeed was happening that morning. Pope Benedict XVI was to give his final public audience before retiring from his duties as Supreme Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church. It was an historic day, and a rare opportunity. I wasn't about to miss it....
Overnight the skies wept copious tears, but after daybreak of this Second Sunday of Lent, the rain stopped, and the day proved variable, undecided: cloud cover alternated with sunny patches, moments of welcome warming us between unfriendly blasts of biting wind. The Roman weather; utterly unable to make up its mind, seemed accurately to reflect the mixed feelings in the crowd of more than 100,000 who witnessed the 15 minutes of Pope Benedict XVI's last public Sunday Angelus....
I don't know about too many other Canadians, but I've been smitten with the television series, Downton Abbey. A period-piece if ever there was one, post Edwardian English society has been on colourful display. Of course, as one London critic observed, no one actually lived in quite that way....
Remember that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return. (Genesis 3:19) These words are said by the priest when we receive the ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday. Remember it we shall, as that grey spot is rather distinctive in a culture that heaps praises upon cleanly-kept foreheads....
Novices in the English Canada Province of the Society of Jesus have the opportunity to experience cultures different than their own, oftentimes those outside of Canada, during what is referred to as the novitiate "Long Experiment". The Long Experiment is a 4-5 month assignment that is completed in our second year. It is a critical step in each Jesuit's formation....
The New Yorker film Critic, Anthony Lane ends his review of Les Miserables with the line – " I screamed a scream as time went by." His fellow New Yorker critic, David Denby, called the movie " Terrible, dreadful, overbearing, pretentious, and madly repetitive."...
I am the Jesuit superior of a community with an average age of just over 82 years. In three years in the role I have seen a wide range of attitudes toward peoples' approach to the end of their life and the diminishment of their mind or body. Some accept the situation with serenity and are grateful for more time to pray and read....
