Mark P. Shea's Blog, page 60

Kathryn Lopez Recently Interviews My Friend Dr. Dawn Eden Goldstein

I love Dawn.  She was out her in Seattle last week and we had lunch and she was her sensible, sweet self.  She’s a fascinating character.  Raised in a Reformed Jewish household, became a rock and roll journalist, as well as somebody who did an interview with one of my heroes, Stan Freberg, she went […]

An Invitation to Talk about Healing in My Comboxes

I did this with my Facebook readers a couple of weeks ago and it was fruitful for them so I wanted to try it here. I feel moved by the Spirit to ask readers, “What can I do for you that would help in your healing?” I’ve spent a couple of years banging away at […]

Today’s New Facts I Learned About the Palace Coup

So I’m, like, blissfully unaware of how the complexities of the Vatican work as it maintain relationships with the various countries in which the Church exists.  For example, I just learned this yesterday when a reader wrote: OK. This is weird. I did not know that local ordinaries have no authority over a Cardinal. This […]

Today’s Palace Coup News

Here is all we actually, documentably know. A man with a huge grudge against Francis and various others in the heirarchy accuses the one guy who actually got rid of McCarrick of being The Villain and the Usual Suspects instantly start screaming “RESIGN!” Me: I’m having trouble wrapping my mind around the concept that the guy […]

My series on Catholic Social Teaching

Back in 2016, I wrote a series of pieces on Catholic Social Teaching for the National Catholic Register.  Recently, one of my readers suggested I should make that series available again since there is growing interest in that Best Kept Secret of Catholic teaching. So, la voila!: The Dignity of the Human Person,  The Common […]

The Vatican Soap Opera Continues

John Allen is usually a pretty good guy to turn to for sorting wheat from chaff.  Here’s his take on The Story So Far: Here’s my bottom line response: Take it seriously, but with a large grain of salt. One certainly can’t dismiss the charge out of hand, if for no other reason than never […]

Part Six of my Series on God the Father

…is up over at The Catholic Weekly: Last time, in this space we talked about the simplicity of the First Cause Argument for the existence of God. This very simple insight is so simple that a lot of people who dislike it have spent a lot of time trying to come up with ways to avoid […]

On Awful Bishops and the Retention of Faith

So the other day I posted this on the Book of Face: “I didn’t come to the church for the bishops, so I won’t leave because of them. Much of this is very understandable lashing out in rage, but there are a lot of people who really have lost faith because of it. I wish […]

Here’s a little blast from the past…

…made timely again by the various calls from various sectors for us to do penance and pray for the Church in this hour of monstrous scandal: Doing Penance for Others A reader asks: My question is, and I am asking you in email because I just am not sure how to word it to pick-up […]

Part 5 of my series on God the Father

over at The Catholic Weekly is up: Babies come from mommies and daddies, cars come from builders, and trees come from acorns. And though adults may simply rest content with that explanation, little children inevitably ask, “Where do the parents, builders, and acorns come from?” And so we find that everything participates in a ‘Great […]