Category: Columns

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John Joy, For the Catholic Herald

Knowing your faith: What does it mean to be a ‘practicing Catholic’?

Knowing Your Faith column

John Joy

You might run into the term “practicing Catholic” in various contexts: if you teach in a Catholic school, for example, or if you serve as a catechist in your parish, or as a Confirmation sponsor or a godparent, you are supposed to be a “practicing Catholic”. But what does that mean exactly?

According to the Wisconsin Catholic Conference’s Standards for Educators in Catholic Schools and Parishes, it means: “a Catholic in good standing who participates fully in the worship and life of the Church, and who understands and accepts the teachings of the Church and moral demands of the Gospel, as articulated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.”

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Fr. Steve Grunow

Dedication of St. John Lateran Basilica

Word on Fire
Fr. Steve Grunow

This month, the Church remembers the dedication of the great basilica church of St. John Lateran in Rome. The Lateran Basilica is the cathedral church of the Holy Father as he is bishop of Rome. The magnificent building stands on land that was given to the bishops of Rome by the Emperor Constantine.

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Fr. Donald Lange

Thank God for blessings seen and not yet seen

Thanksgiving’s roots go back to the Pilgrims. After a long hard year during which more than half died from scurvy or exposure to the elements, survivors held a feast of thanksgiving during which they shared their blessings with Indian friends.

The Pilgrims thanked God that enough of them survived to start a new life for themselves and their descendants. As the colonies grew more prosperous, however, people tended to forget about Thanksgiving. Consequently, Thanksgiving was celebrated sporadically, if at all.

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Fr. Steve Grunow

In Christ, we are baptized to become saints

Word on Fire
Fr. Steve Grunow

Each November the Church celebrates the Solemnity of All Saints. The saints are the great heroes of our faith. The Church describes a saint as a person of “heroic virtue.”

This means that while many Christians might be willing to settle for lackluster accomplishments as disciples, the saints engage their relationship with the Lord Jesus with vigorous creativity and absolute dedication. Most often, the work of the saints will go unnoticed and unseen.

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Bishop Robert Barron

Barron book released with faith and fire

Bishop Robert Barron’s latest exploration into the life and truth of the Catholic faith, To Light a Fire on the Earth, was released recently.

To Light a Fire on the Earth is Bishop Barron’s anticipated follow-up to his book Catholicism: A Journey to the Heart of Faith, which was released in 2011. This book differs from the first as it is written in partnership with Vatican journalist, John L. Allen, Jr.

The WordonFire website offers the synopsis shared below.

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Julianne Nornberg

Turn problems into prayers, teach forgiveness

Everyday Faith column by Julianne Nornberg

I’d like to say that every day in our house is peaceful, that no one ever fights, that we ride out problems prayerfully and lovingly.

But it would be a lie.

Yesterday was particularly challenging, with tired children shirking household duties and worn-out parents losing patience. Throughout the rainy day we had to help solve quarrels, enforce obedience, redirect whining. In the face of all our little problems, we got stuck in the muck of anger and impatience.

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Fr. Greg Ihm

Chosen and called

Fr.Gregory Ihm

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart . . .” (Jer. 1:5).

CHOSEN

Each person is willed by God to be, which is another way of saying that we have been chosen to exist.

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Bishop Robert Barron

‘iGen’ are perhaps least religious in U.S.

Jean Twenge’s book iGen is one of the most fascinating — and depressing — texts I’ve read in the past decade. A professor of psychology at San Diego State University, Dr. Twenge has been, for years, studying trends among young Americans, and her most recent book focuses on the generation born between 1995 and 2012.

Since this is the first cohort of young people who have never known a world without iPads and iPhones, and since these devices have remarkably shaped their consciousness and behavior, Dr. Twenge naturally enough has dubbed them the “iGen.”

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Jackson Fonder

Hope shines here!

Fonder Ponders column by Jackson Fonder

For the past year, we’ve been anticipating the opening of The Beacon, the new homeless day resource center operated by Catholic Charities.

The day finally happened, and The Beacon shined as a light of hope in the lives of over 200 men, women, and children experiencing homelessness in Dane County.

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