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1. Using Metaphors to Teach Prayer

   September 07, 2017 | Ronald K. Bullis

   Scriptures pulse with metaphorical phrases and images (“The Lord is my shepherd . . .”). Jesus’s description of the Kingdom of God is a metaphor. The National Directory for Catechesis [NDC] urges catechists to recognize...

   

2. "Come, Holy Spirit": The Vulnerable Bravery of Fr. Hesburgh's Favorite Prayer

   June 01, 2017 | Carolyn Pirtle

   The late Fr. Ted Hesburgh, C.S.C., beloved former president of the University of Notre Dame, stated again and again in homilies and interviews that his favorite prayer was “Come, Holy Spirit.” He said: The Holy Spirit is the ...

   

3. "You can eat with us": On Poverty and Community

   May 19, 2017 | Brad Klingele

   Twenty years ago, I asked Paul, the tall, burly, blunt, and opinionated leader of the Catholic soup kitchen, if I could take my youth group to serve dinner. “Nope!” he barked. Startled, I squeaked out, “Um, why?” ...

4. The Rosary: Back to the Basics

   March 03, 2017 | Sami Burr

   ND Graduate Sami Burr on teaching Catholicism to middle-schoolers.

   

5. Does a Catholic School Evangelize?

   January 30, 2017 | Timothy P. O’Malley

   Our weekly post describing what you'll find in this week's Church Life. Celebrating Catholic Schools week, Church Life will ask this week: does a Catholic school evangelize?

   

6. The Feast of the Holy Family: Not Just a Model

   December 30, 2016 | Timothy P. O’Malley

   Those of us suspicious of the pious platitudes that too often make their home in Catholic homiletic practice know that the feast of the Holy Family is a "code-red" day for such platitudes. We families assemble in our parishes a...

   

7. Weeping with Rachel, in Sorrow and Hope

   December 28, 2016 | Hope Feist

   Hope Feist on the Holy Innocents

   

8. Auden on the Feast of St. Stephen

   December 26, 2016 | Samuel Bellafiore

   Well, so that is that. Now we must dismantle the tree, Putting the decorations back into their cardboard boxes— Some have got broken—and carrying them up to the attic. The holly and the mistletoe must be taken down and burnt...

   

9. Advent Fun and Festivity: St. Lucy's Day

   December 13, 2016 | Carolyn Pirtle

   Today the Church celebrates the feast of St. Lucy, a third-century Sicilian girl who pledged her virginity to Christ and endured a martyr’s death when she refused to renounce her faith. Numerous versions of St. Lucy’s martyrd...

   

10. The Virgin of Guadalupe and the Season of Advent

    December 12, 2016 | Maxwell Johnson

    For some Christian people throughout the world, especially Mexican and Mexican-American Christians, December 12, of course, is the celebration of the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe. The feast commemorates her December 9–12, 1531 appearan...

    

11. The Immaculate Conception: A Dogma of Consent

    December 08, 2016 | Renée D. Roden

    Renée Roden on freedom to love.

    

12. The Politics of the Saints

    November 01, 2016 | Timothy P. O’Malley

    On this feast of All Saints Day, we remember that the saints present to us a politics of praise that are the ultimate vocation of the human being.

    

13. The Word Made Beautiful: The Saint John's Bible

    October 25, 2016 | Carolyn Pirtle

    A few years ago the McGrath Institute for Church Life welcomed Donald Jackson, the visionary calligrapher commissioned by St. John’s University in Collegeville to create a hand-written illuminated Bible using techniques that date b...

    

14. Three Views on 'Having a Vocation'

    October 18, 2016 | Charles Kestermeier, SJ

    When I was in grade school, the whole idea of having a vocation seemed rather clear to me: I learned that I had a vocation either to the priesthood or to marriage, and that was it. Anyone not choosing to be a priest (or brother) or a nun...

    

15. Confessions of a Post-RadTrad Millennial: The Perfect Sacrifice

    August 12, 2016 | Novice Joseph Wagner, O.S.B.

    I grew up in a parish that was very much steeped in the “Spirit of Vatican II”: our priests used glass chalices, wore their stoles over their chasubles, and there wasn’t a Sunday in Ordinary Time when we didn’t sw...

    

16. The Stinginess of the Sinner

    June 09, 2016 | Timothy P. O’Malley

    We often think about sin as extravagance. The sinner is the one who drinks too much, gambles too much, who desires pleasure too much. On the 11th Sunday of Ordinary Time, we consider the stinginess of the sinner. The sinner who loves not...

    

17. The Marriage Begins

    April 21, 2016 | Timothy O'Malley

    The Book of Revelation does not contain a series of esoteric predictions about the end of the world. Rather, Revelation presents a world in which the final union of God and humanity is taking place in the presence of the slain Lamb. This...

    

18. Easter in the Busyness

    April 18, 2016 | Kimberly Belcher

    Scripture readings: Psalm 126, Psalm 127, Colossians 1:12–20, Hebrews 7:24–27 As usual, it is in the Psalms, today, that the Word of God seems to draw near to our Easter experience here at Notre Dame. I am speaking, of cours...

    

19. The Dignity of a Human Person: A Catholic Doctrine

    April 04, 2016 | Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan

    If perchance there might be a person in this audience from Wisconsin, Missouri, or New York, whom I had the honor of confirming, be patient with me, please, for, odds are that I used this same story during my sermon that day. In July 200...

    

20. Asceticism as Healing Art

    March 07, 2016 | David Fagerberg

    Healing takes many different forms because it is a response to many different kinds of threats. A cut and a broken leg are each healed differently because the damage is different; nevertheless, the same end is sought in both cases. The r...

    

21. Juan Diego and Latino Lay Spirituality

    February 18, 2016 | Peter Casarella

    In light of the recent trip of Pope Francis to Mexico and his visit to the Basilica of Guadalupe, the person of St. Juan Diego provokes an invitation to consider his virtues and those of other Latinos who have imitated his “practic...