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“It wasn’t that there was a failure on the part of the church at all,” says Millie Cain, a parishioner at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Richmond, Virginia. “It was just that I was hungry for a more visceral experience of the divine. And it’s such a gift to experience that together in community, that awakening of the God within.” More
“People want to be their own theologians. People don’t just want to receive truth from an institution. They want to participate with a tradition and make a truth that is meaningful for their own lives.”
“The thing that’s dying is a kind of old allegiance to particular institutions or institutional manifestations of the divine. There’s just not much interest in that. The thing that seems to be coming alive is this awareness of God, a … More
A new papal exhortation called “The Joy of Love” tries to “see the grace in people’s lives”; Religious leaders are working to foster empathy and forgiveness among the survivors of shooting victims; The ushers at Hemingway Memorial AME Church in … More
“There’s no abstract family. There’s no ideal family,” says Father Tom Reese, SJ, senior analyst at National Catholic Reporter. The pope, he adds, “is tired of the church being judgmental and laying down rules. Instead, he wants us to walk with these couples with compassion. Treat them as Jesus would treat them.” More
“I look at crime or violence as a violation of relationships. Some people are harmed, some people do that harm. So the role of restorative justice is to repair, as best we can, those relationships” says Father Dave Kelly. He directs the Precious Blood Ministry of Reconciliation on Chicago’s South Side, a center that offers support to survivors of gun violence. More
Faith groups and religious leaders try to defeat the city’s gun violence crisis; a former US senator questions whether religion has any place in politics.
“Sometimes the pain that’s resident in the community—it can be overwhelming,” says Rev. David Watkins III, pastor of Greater Bethesda Missionary Baptist Church in Chicago’s Washington Park neighborhood. “However, part of the hope of the gospel is that even in the midst of despair, you always have a way out…This community should be better off because as a church we are in it.” More
In The Relevance of Religion: How Faithful People Can Change Politics, former Missouri senator John Danforth, an Episcopal priest, explores how an over-emphasis on religion has changed the tone of American politics and whether religious values can help to mend a badly fractured political system. More
In six simple words, the Danish firebrand philosopher and theologian Soren Kierkegaard illuminated the difference between faith and human understanding, and Vice President Joe Biden found the expression that has provided him with sustenance in the midst of suffering. More