In this article I shall examine his career, leadership style, his faith and some of the posthumous controversies about him, concluding that, despite his many faults, Mandela’s greatness remains. Indeed, I shall suggest that he was above all a public figure who embodied many of the central precepts of Catholic Social Thought.
Job questions the very fact of his existence, screaming at God a question that is ultimately rhetorical, one that often recurs in those who suffer. In addition, over the course of the book’s 42 chapters, he becomes angry with God, disputes with God, attacks God. But at other times he keeps silent, listens, allows himself to be touched by God’s word, allows the Lord to correct him.
Holy is really a synonym for successful, fulfilled, well-rounded. Each of those words describes what God intended fully evolved human beings to be. Each of us must discover the directions in which we will find fulfillment. This is—or ought to be—the goal of a lifelong education: not merely to make a living but to find out what living is for.
There are more than 300,000 people currently homeless across the UK, which includes those who are stuck in hostels and temporary accommodation, living in cars and sofa-surfing, as well as people who are rough sleeping. As well as preventing homelessness, there is an aim to change attitudes and show how many people can be affected.
Casín, possibly Spain's oldest cheese, has been made since at least the 14th Century. However, in a culinary landscape now dominated by Manchego, its survival is an open question.
Current advances in science have meant that medicine has been able to prolong life, but not enhance its quality; very often medicine succeeds only in postponing death. This has given rise to the act of “euthanasia,” by which, rather than a good death, people mean a good path toward it, and claim “the right to die with dignity,” which, according to the egotistical way we humans tend to reason, confuses dignity with the absence of discomfort and with not needing others.
Love can grow numb between two people, just as it can within a whole culture. And that has happened in our culture, at least to a large part. The excitement that once guided our eyes has given way to a certain numbness and resignation. We no longer stand before life with much freshness. We have seen what it has to offer and have succumbed to a certain resignation: That’s all there is, and it’s not that great!
One only has to take a look at the media and its coverage of current events to see that in this 21st century the virus of populism has spread far and wide, settling in virtually all corners of the globe. It stirs conflicts, waves flags, undermines institutions. It destabilizes governments and breathes life into ridiculous conspiracies. It lurks in right-wing and left-wing groups alike, is endorsed by progressives, nationalists and conservatives in the service of seemingly noble and just causes, and in other cases works to foment rancor, a thirst for revenge and discontent.
For some young converts the path to God is lengthy and tortuous, for others it is instinctive and quick; some travel in the company of others, others prefer one-to-one instruction from a priest. But every journey shows the excitement, variety and unexpectedness of life in the Holy Spirit.
Happiness is hard to define precisely. It has a vast array of synonyms with slightly different meanings that can take us in different directions (wellbeing, satisfaction, gratification, pleasure, joy, contentment). At the same time, people of all ages and cultures are familiar with it; happiness is understood all over the world.
In much of the secularized world, we live in a climate that is somewhat anti-ecclesial and anti-clerical. It’s quite fashionable today to bash the churches, be they Roman Catholic, Protestant, or Evangelical. This is often done in the name of being open-minded and enlightened, and it’s the one bias that’s intellectually sanctioned.
“On the plane they gave me a painting by a boy, Daniel, who paints his anguish as he is drowning and wants to save his sinking partner. I recommend a book, Hermanito, that is ‘Little Brother.’ It came out a year ago. It is the story of an older brother who leaves Guinea in search of his younger brother. It makes us understand what the desert crossing is like: the trafficking of migrants, imprisonment, torture, the sea journey…”
Christian discipleship calls all of us to be prophetic, to be advocates for justice, to help give voice to the poor, and to defend truth. But not all of us, by temperament or by particular vocation, are called to civil disobedience, public demonstrations, and the picket lines, as were Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King, Daniel Berrigan, and other such prophetic figures. All are asked to be prophetic, but for some this means more wielding a basin and towel than wielding a placard.
Inside the rite for Christian baptism there’s a little ritual that is at once both touching and unrealistic. At one point in the baptismal rite the child is clothed in a white garment symbolizing innocence and purity. The priest or minister officiating says these words: “Receive this baptismal garment and bring it unstained to the judgment seat of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
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The “prosperity gospel” is a well-known theological current emerging from the neo-Pentecostal evangelical movements. At its heart is the belief that God wants his followers to have a prosperous life, that is, to be rich, healthy and happy. This type of Christianity places the well-being of the believer at the center of prayer, and turns God the Creator into someone who makes the thoughts and desires of believers come true.
Temperance is the fourth of the cardinal virtues. It is listed last not because it is least important, but because it touches the intimate dimension of the human being, unlike the other virtues, which concern the common good. Precisely for this reason it is indispensable for virtuous action, which has as its condition the integrity of the person: “Prudence looks at the concrete reality of all beings; justice regulates relations with others; with fortitude the human person, forgetting the self, sacrifices goods and life.
Hard to believe that, a few centuries ago, this hushed north Norfolk village was one of Europe’s greatest pilgrimage sites. Yes, quiet little Walsingham, sitting unassumingly in the shallow Stiffkey Valley, is England’s Nazareth. In the Middle Ages it was almost as important as Canterbury, and up there with Santiago de Compostela and Rome.
Simon Peter is a key figure in the New Testament. He was present for many stages of the establishment of the canon. It seems he wrote nothing during his lifetime, but many other Christians wrote about him. How did this fisherman from Galilee come to die a martyr’s death in the capital of the Roman Empire? Let us try to retrace some key episodes of his journey.
Creating the human race may be the single biggest mistake that evolution made. Douglas Abrams writes this in The Book of Hope, a book he co-authored with Jane Goodall. While that is a rather despairing view, in the end, this book is a book of hope, though not without it issuing a dire warning: There are now over eight billion people on this planet and already we are using up nature’s limited resources faster than nature can replace them. In less than thirty years from now, there will probably be ten billion of us and if we carry on with business as usual, that could spell the end of the earth as we know it.
To fall in love! We use the expression to cover many things. You can fall in love with a baby, a sports team, a city, a job, or another person. However, we reserve the prime analogate for this expression for one thing, emotional infatuation, that intoxicating feeling we first get when we meet someone who we sense as a soulmate.
