VIEWS

The humanitarian and strategic disaster of Syria should focus Catholic minds on the hard fact that there is no easy or quick path to peace in the Middle East, a very dangerous part of the world where Christians of all persuasions are at daily risk of their lives.

Chesterton’s rollicking humor, which bound both friend and foe to him, was not a quirk of personality. It was an expression of his Christian faith, hope and love.

A recent headline in The Wall Street Journal caught my attention: “Hard-wired for Giving.” The lead into the story questioned the Darwinian assumption that humans are basically selfish and pointed to a recent study in which scientists discovered the human brain is actually built for generosity.

Recently we have been looking at eight tasks Catholics need to be about in order effectively to bear witness to Christ at this time in America. Today, we shall look at two more: Make Sunday the center of our life and defend the life and dignity of all persons.

We are called by Christ to respect and love our fellow human beings — regardless of their beliefs, or even their actions. That is what Christ instructs to do — period!

Even now, four years after the day we lost him, I still hear the voice of my father resound within me day by day, guiding me through life’s twists and turns.

Key ways to evangelize today’s culture: Trust the truth; live God’s plan for marriage; and be pure of heart.

Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body is a fresh re-presenting of the Church’s teaching on the gift of human sexuality and the mission of married couples. It lays out more clearly and persuasively what Paul VI taught in Humanae Vitae, while rooting the presentation in a richer biblical context.

Last month when the heat threatened the 120-degree mark, and I was cursing the sidewalk for reflecting it onto my sweated brow, I came upon a homeless man looking for a handout.

Even with many Americans still professing faith in God (sort of) we are clearly in a post-Christian era that finds its roots in the so-called sexual revolution and drug culture of the 1960s that embraced contraception, abortion and “free love.”