COMMENTARY My wife took Christ off our living room wall the other day. It was a postcard image of a mosaic created by Jesuit Father Marko Rupnik. She couldn’t bear to have it up. Rupnik is a remarkably gifted artist. His mosaics adorn chapels and buildings from the St. John Paul II National Shrine in […]
Greg Erlandson: The advent of population decline
AMID THE FRAY As we celebrate the birth of the Savior Child, it seems fitting to note that in many parts of the developed world, the lack of babies is a growing concern. This is a surprising change for those of us raised on “The Population Bomb,” a wildly inaccurate prediction that the world’s population […]
Greg Erlandson: In defense of funerals
AMID THE FRAY “Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man.” (Mercutio, “Romeo and Juliet”) In the past two and a half months I’ve been to four funerals. Friends. A spouse of a friend. A child of a friend. It has been a cumulative sense of mortality and loss set against […]
Greg Erlandson: Giving birth to a new movement
AMID THE FRAY In the 50th year since the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision allowing abortion on demand, that same court has judged that case wrongly decided and kicked America’s most neuralgic issue back to its elected representatives. Pro-lifers have responded with joy that a goal so long desired has been attained. But whether […]
Greg Erlandson: Appreciating good homilies
AMID THE FRAY Here’s an answer that should show up on Catholic Jeopardy: “Eight minutes.” The question is: “What does Pope Francis think the ideal length of a homily should be?” This pope, who has not been afraid to weigh in on controversial issues, recently addressed a topic that every practicing Catholic has probably thought […]
Greg Erlandson: A tale of two weddings
AMID THE FRAY How do we attract people to our church? How do we invite people to “come and see”? These are questions being asked with greater urgency these days. The “nones,” that is, those with no religious affiliation, are growing in number, while too many Catholics are walking away from any sort of consistent […]
Greg Erlandson: My sense, your nonsense
AMID THE FRAY A friend of mine is threatening to run for office. His slogan will be “Stop the Nonsense.” I think it’s a slogan an increasing number of us could get behind. Nonsense is in the eye of the beholder, however, and the trick is defining what the nonsense is. For some, it may […]
Greg Erlandson: Evening news despair and Easter hope
AMID THE FRAY One of the best decisions my wife and I ever made was to keep our television out of the bedroom. We’ve never fallen asleep bathed in the blue glow of some late-night comic or some not-quite-funny comedy. The bedroom is our oasis. We may, however, do something almost as bad these days. […]
Greg Erlandson: The struggle for hearts and minds will continue
AMID THE FRAY In advance of the Supreme Court’s much-awaited decision on the Mississippi law that would ban most abortions after 15 weeks, the abortion wars have heated up again. When pro-lifers rallied in Washington Jan. 21 for the 49th time to mark the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, there was by all accounts a […]
Greg Erlandson: Bridging divides
AMID THE FRAY The anniversary of the Jan. 6 riot that humiliated Congress and horrified a good portion of our nation has gone more or less as one might have predicted during these divided times. The two political parties went to their respective corners, one to commemorate the anniversary and the other to criticize the […]