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Tag: America Magazine

  • A Prayer for Frustrated Catholics

    “Help me to be peaceful when people tell me that I don’t belong in the church, that I’m a heretic for trying to make things better, or that I’m not a good Catholic. I know that I was baptized. You called me by name to be in your church, God.” – Fr. James Martin, SJ,…

  • America on the new translation

    “Can we talk about a new edition of the Missal, not someday, but soon? (A costly question, for sure, but something tells me that many a priest would gladly help foot the bill.) Can we keep talking, not letting weariness with the whole business or indifference or fear of reprisals prevent us from talking and…

  • Thank You, Sisters

    “The Vatican document, no matter what you think of it, has saddened and demoralized many Catholic women, many generous Catholic sisters who have given their lives to the Church. So I think it’s a good time for us to say to them two words: Thank you.” From a video by by Fr. Jim Martin, SJ

  • Declining with Grace and Creativity

    Today the [Catholic] church in much of the country is contracting. Schools have closed, hospitals merged, novitiates shuttered—moments rarely captured on film. With priestly and religious vocations and Mass attendance in decline, the church can no longer do all it once did.

  • Save the altar girls!

    “Is it wise to re-enforce the sense of the priesthood as a clerical caste? Is the acolyte supposed to be like the page who serves Sir Galahad until King Arthur dubs him a knight?” – America editorial

  • Space, Art and Liturgical Consciousness

    “Full, active and conscious participation occurs in space; the space matters.” — Dennis McNally, SJ

  • What We Learned: A Byzantine priest recounts the transition to a new translation

    I admire my parishioners for their openness to this new translation. There are no revolutions to report, although there has been much eye-rolling and often a suppressed giggle. On the national level, there is a serious and continuing call from some clergy and laity to suppress the new “old-way.” When all is said and done,…

  • The New Missal in Letters to the Editor: Mostly Thumbs Down

    When the subject of the new Mass was raised at our annual meeting of my own parish council, one highly respected parishioner asked on simple question: “Why?” That was greeted with an immediate round of loud applause.

  • An Open Letter from Anthony Ruff, OSB

    The forthcoming missal is but a part of a larger pattern of top-down impositions by a central authority that does not consider itself accountable to the larger Church.