A New Catholic Reformation

Though most lay Catholics are unaware of it, the discipline of secular psychology has been a powerful force in almost every seminary and religious community in the Western Church since the early 1970's. During the naive enthusiasm of the years just after the Second Vatican Council, secular psychology was imported, usually uncritically, into the life the Church in her seminaries and religious communities, and we are still tallying the cost in vocations lost or destroyed and communities cut loose from their foundations. I think of that today because the Church keeps the feast of St. Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church, who -- among the many accomplishments of his long life -- rendered the Holy Scriptures from Hebrew and Greek into Latin. He was also famously (or, depending upon your point of view, infamously) cantankerous, and I suspect that in most seminaries today, such a man would be sent away because he doesn't play well with others. I am not suggesting that we shou...

With whom are you in ecclesial communion? Archbishop Donald Wuerl of Washington, DC has been appointed by the Holy See to direct the implementation in the United States of Anglicanorum Coetibus . Any Anglican parish, association, religious community or other group which desires to be restored to full, visible communion with the Catholic Church should write to him immediately: The Most Reverend Donald W. Wuerl Archbishop of Washington Post Office BOx 29260 Washington, DC 20017 It has been eleven months since Benedict XVI responded to the request from groups of Anglicans around the world for a way to come into full communion with the Catholic Church while at the same time preserving all of their Anglican patrimony that is in harmony with the Catholic Faith. So, you've had a year to think and pray and talk and argue and pray some more. Enough. The time for excuses, evasions, rationalizations, dithering, and delaying is over. It's time to become Catholic or decide once and for...

Here's a splendid introduction to the life and work of John Henry Newman, who will be beatified by Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday 19 September during the pope's pastoral visit to Britain. My own journey to the Catholic Church almost thirty years ago was guided by this man's writing.