I must have skipped the chapter in my ‘how to parent’ instruction manual where it talked about weddings. Not my wedding, of course, but all the weddings of my kids, the friends of my kids and the kids of my friends. For me, the year 2024 is turning into a banner year for nuptials, including…
Category: Features
A reflection on time’s fleeting nature and our relationship with God
As I’m sitting in the chapel, I hear the clock in the sacristy ticking in the silence. The tick of every second is the ever-fleeting present leading to the next moment – the future St Teresa of Kolkata’s words come to mind, “Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let…
Sacred permission to be in agony
We live this life “mourning and weeping in a valley of tears.” This was part of a prayer my parents prayed every day of their adult lives, as did many others in their generation. In the light of contemporary sensitivities (and one-sided spiritualities), this might sound morbid. Are we to understand our lives as time…
Trusting along the journey
In the second book of his Dialogues, Pope Gregory the Great tells of the holiness of St Benedict, whose memorial is celebrated on the 11th day of July. We learn that Benedict lived for three years in Subiaco, some 40 miles outside of Rome. He fled the ancient city that was self-destructing in its moral…
Seeking the sacraments – From Protestantism to Catholicism
Born and raised as an evangelical Christian in the South of England, I grew up immersed in Protestant Christianity. My father was one of the three leaders of the congregation I attended. Every Sunday, I was brought to church and participated in youth groups throughout my childhood. Christianity was a significant part of my upbringing.…
‘Totality’: A sci-fi thriller grounded in the theology of the body
In the 21st century, a sense of spiritualism has taken over. This is the sense that people are really made up only of their souls – their bodies do not matter. This is an attractive philosophy because it says that all that really matters is that someone is a good person ‘on the inside’, and…
The family’s call to change – and sway
Watch what parents do when they pick up a baby. Whether a swaddled newborn, a smiling infant or a squirmy toddler, parents start to sway when they hold their child. Swaying is our primal rhythm, the instinct to move to calm and comfort. Slow, steady rocking can soothe a baby, relax their body, soften their…
How to celebrate Sunday as a Catholic
Do you feel like you’re on a treadmill that never stops? Do you need some quiet time? Some family time? Some time when you can renew your mind, your body and your spirit? Then maybe it’s time to reclaim Sunday as a day of rest! There was a time when Sunday was a special day.…
The little way to pray all day, even if you have no time to spare!
There is a saying, dubiously attributed to St Francis de Sales but it sounds more like Venerable Fulton Sheen to me: “Every one of us needs half an hour of prayer every day, except when we are busy – then we need an hour.” It’s a clever phrase – and true, too. When parenthood and…
Peter, Paul and the messiness of Christian discipleship
We all like things neat, uncomplicated and in good order. But as we step over the threshold into the virtual world created by artificial intelligence, it seems to me that inclination may be more problematic than ever. Over the past few weeks, I’ve seen a number of images circulating on social media. A baby dolphin,…