A woman woke up excitedly on her birthday and enthusiastically told her husband, “I’ve just dreamt that you gave me a pearl necklace for my birthday! What do you think it means?” With certainty in his voice, the man said, “You’ll know tonight.” That evening, the man came home with a small package and handed it to his wife. With…
“It’s the most wonderful time of the year” for religion-bashers, and Christianity in particular. Christmas offers such people an opportunity to “debunk” it on two main bases. One is the presence of supernatural elements in the story, like angels and a wandering star, as we’ve just heard (as we heard at Midnight Mass). I’m sure such people are equally enraged…
This weekend is predicted to be one of the busiest of the year travel-wise. Many people will crisscross the country, the continent, and the entire world in order to come together in one place as a family or a group of friends to celebrate Christmas, either in a religious or secular sense. For a practical man like me, this is…
A dramatic vision of an apocalyptic set of events, from natural disasters of biblical proportions to wars and political upheaval, set the scene two weeks ago, on the First Sunday of Advent. Although terrifying at first hearing, in biblical times, it was invoked as the means of consolation to and liberation of the oppressed and the helpless. It was combined…
Today’s gospel began with quite a detailed list of people in charge of various lands or holding certain influential positions. I wonder how much you know about each of those people, or the regions they were in charge of, or the positions they held – such as a tetrarch? Let’s be honest: unless you have a degree in biblical studies…