Hawaii Catholic Herald

Newspaper of the Diocese of Honolulu

Christina Capecchi: A cure for election overload

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TWENTY SOMETHING It’s almost as if November’s Mass readings were written for election-weary Catholics, with their foreboding tones and calls for “perseverance” and “endurance” amid distress. “They will seize you and persecute you,” St. Luke warns. “Let us then throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light,” St. Paul exhorts. […]

Christina Capecchi: Listening at the keyholes

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TWENTY SOMETHING When two 20-somethings slung a wire across rooftops in Boston, they were hoping to hear each other’s voices transmitted across that line. It worked, and they did, but in the process, they also picked up a far more exotic sound: powerful radio waves emitted from the sun. Alexander Graham Bell was 26 and […]

Christina Capecchi: What George Washington and Pope Benedict have in common

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TWENTY SOMETHING I’ve been listening to Lillian Cunningham’s “Presidential” podcast, trying to glean insights into our nation’s earliest leaders. In a month that is sure to contain fireworks — from the Fourth of July to the Republican and Democratic conventions — it feels quieting and introspective to cast my mind back to our first presidents. […]

Manaolana | Christina Capecchi: The nun who kissed Elvis, ditched Hollywood and found her home

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TWENTY SOMETHING Dolores Hart was 19 when she filmed her first movie scene: kissing Elvis Presley. The aspiring actress was dressed in a polka dot dress with her honey-brown hair swept in a ponytail. He wore a denim jacket with the collar turned up, his glossy bangs grazing his brow. They were directed to kiss […]

Manaolana | Christina Capecchi: Oh what a tangled web: rising above Instagram envy

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TWENTY SOMETHING Melina Birchem has uploaded 777 images to her Instagram account over the past two years: sushi, Starbucks, her new tattoo, rosary beads, cowboy boots. Sometimes the juxtaposition is jarring. A glowing monstrance, a chilled margarita. A snapshot from waitressing, a prayer journal documenting her consecration to the Blessed Mother. As a freshman at […]

Manaolana | Christina Capecchi: Tackling the new year one heroic minute at a time

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TWENTY SOMETHING Oprah Winfrey has joined Weight Watchers, which means she is not only a card-carrying, point-counting member of the weight-loss club, she is also a part owner. That’s how you do it when you’re Oprah: You go big (“you get a car, you get a car, you get a car”) or you don’t bother. […]

Manaolana | By Christina Capecchi: 13 sons, no daughters, no reality TV show

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TWENTY SOMETHING The wedding that Tyler Schwandt and his fiancée are planning could’ve been broadcast on national TV. But he’s perfectly content with a quieter, more intimate wedding Mass. The 23-year-old Catholic from Rockford, Mich., has the distinction of being the firstborn of 13 boys, the family whose improbable boy streak went viral with the […]

Christina Capecchi | Twenty Something: Life after the convent: finding the courage to start over

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There is no scrapbook of Kathy Webb’s life as a Dominican sister. No picture frames or friendship bracelets, no nun memorabilia perched in a closet or buried in a trunk. The only artifact from her convent days is the long apron she wore to protect her white habit, bearing her former identity on a tiny […]