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One of Isaiah’s Visions
In this life there is no such a thing as a clear cut, pure joy. Everything comes mixed. As Henri Nouwen once put it: Every bit of life is touched
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Purgative Embrace
“Let me be punished by a kiss.” That is a prayer Therese of Lisieux used to say. What a curious, paradoxical phrase! Few of us, I suspect, pray that way,
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Living Beyond Doubt
There is a story about St. Christopher, probably more legend than truth, which runs this way: As a youth, Christopher was gifted in every way, except faith. He was a
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No Exempt Areas
110697 One of the constants within the writings of the saints is the idea that spirituality and morality are all of one piece. Every area affects every other area and
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God as Victim
“And there shone on them in that dark hour a light that has never darkened; a white fire clinging to that group like an unearthly phosphorescence, blazing its track through
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Some Christian Koans
Zen masters, when they teach meditation, occasionally give their pupils something they call a “Koan”. A koan is a puzzle which, prior to long hours of meditation, appears ridiculous, an
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Dark Memory
Inside each of us, beyond what we can name, we have a dark memory of having once been touched and caressed by hands far gentler than our own. That caress
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On God’s Gender
100997 The issue of God’s gender is not one that can be trivialized and seen simply as something arising from feminist ideological concern. “It is important for women that God
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Chastity: Not Our Virtue
Sublimation, waiting, and chastity, these are not the virtues of our time. American educator, Allan Bloom, in his controversial book, The Closing of the American Mind, suggests that lack of
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Remembering Mother Teresa
When I was in graduate school, an American feminist once shocked our class with the following comment: “There are three women who really irritate me: Mary, the Mother of Jesus;