Catholic Church

By Richard A. Spinello, Crisis Magazine - John Allen, editor of Crux and longtime Vatican reporter, interprets the rebuke of this book as part of an orchestrated campaign aimed at undermining the authority of Fiducia Supplicans. Allen goes on to claim that we find the same sort of graphic sexual imagery and explicit prose in one of the works of Karol Wojtyla (John Paul II), called Love and Responsibility. He chides conservative Catholics and argues that if they are distraught over the content and tone of Mystical Passion, they should have been equally distraught over Love and Responsibility. ...

By Aidan Mays, The College Fix - A small Catholic college has produced 104 priests, in addition to other religious vocations, during its almost 50-year history... These 104 priests come from Christendom College’s alumni pool of just 4,053 total graduates – and since only men can be ordained, the rate is much higher. About 47 percent of Christendom’s alumni are men, meaning the 104 priests came from a pool of about 2,000 men.

By Tod Worner, Catholic World Report - How does worldly power, which measures itself in bullying strength and vain influence, reckon with the impossible and unworldly nature of God’s chosen ones? Not very well. If Pontius Pilate offers any guidance, worldly power is utterly befuddled in its encounter with God and his designs. Spending precious moments with the King of the Universe, the Roman Governor of Judea could sputter little more than a query, “What is Truth?” when Truth Incarnate stood before him.

By Staff, Catholic Herald - Pope Francis has attempted to further clarify the Vatican document permitting non-liturgical blessing for couples in same sex or irregular relationships, saying the newly authorised practice is a pastoral gesture directed at the people involved and not their union itself... Speaking to members of the Vatican’s DDF, Francis said the intention of offering “pastoral and spontaneous blessings” to couples in irregular situations, including same-sex couples and divorced and remarried couples, is to express pastoral closeness.