. . .several French dioceses, seeking to promote their 2018 fundraising drive, had a few young Catholics take a selfie with a young priest. It was the perfect marketing image of diverse, democratic youth—but for one problem. The priest wore a cassock. This long black garment, with its thirty-three buttons, is favored by young priests who have made it the uniform of resurgent tradition. It is the symbol of what young Catholics are, and of what older Catholics don’t want them to be. . .
. . .I prayed with the St. Faustina Prayer Book for Adoration during my daily holy hours. As I progressed through the book, my mind was blown away with the beautiful prayers of St. Faustina. . .
. . .although he died in 1853, the legacy of Friar Andrés Garcia Acosta is as alive as ever in Santiago, Chile, through a soup kitchen bearing his name that feeds 150 people per day. . .
. . .culture has odd ways of supplying spontaneous correctives, even when the vanguard of a cultural wave or ideology recognizes no bounds of taste or decency. . .
. . .in the past few decades, some parts of the church that tend to reject the trappings of religion have tried desperately to appear “normal”. But for a generation that prizes authenticity, maybe that’s just a turn-off. Rather than being just a slightly rubbish version of the rest of the world, with slightly rubbish coffee & slightly rubbish music, maybe Christianity needs to embrace its difference, its strangeness, its weirdness, its mystery. Christianity as a norm, gone for good? Maybe that’s good news for everyone (Peter Ormerod of The Guardian, slightly edited). . .
. . .November 2018 will mark the beginning of Archbishop Naumann’s new leadership of the USCCBs’ Pro-Life Activities Committee. November also will determine the political fate of those whom Archbishop Naumann has labeled “cafeteria Catholics”. . .
