The Dispatch
Christ the King, exalted by the Cross
Readings: • 1 Sam 5:1-3 • Ps 122:1-2, 3-4, 4-5 • Col 1:12-20 • Lk 23:35-43 “Eighty and six years have I served Him, and He never did me any injury: how then can I […]
Saint Paul
The Dispatch
The Solemnity of All Saints and the pursuit of holiness
Several years ago I was having a mild altercation with one of my high school students. He ended his presentation with this thought: “The reason I hate Catholic school is that you priests and nuns […]
The Dispatch
Humility, Wisdom, and Moral Realism
Readings: • Sir. 3:17-18, 20, 28-29 • Psa. 68:4-5, 6-7, 10-11 • Heb. 12:18-19, 22-24a • Lk. 14:1, 7-14 “Humility,” the Evangelical theologian James Houston once wrote, “is moral realism.” That simple definition stuck with […]
The Dispatch
Sinners, Apostles, Martyrs: On the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul
Readings for Sunday, June 29, 2025: • Acts 12:1-11 • Psa 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9 • 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 17-18 • Matthew 16:13-19 One denied Christ after having been chosen by him. The other was […]
The Dispatch
The Trinity: A Mystery for Eternity
Readings: • Prov 8:22-31 • Ps 8:4-5, 6-7, 8-9 • Rom 5:1-5 • Jn 16:12-15 The apologist and novelist Dorothy Sayers (1893-1957) dryly noted, in an essay titled “The Dogma is the Drama,” that for […]
The Dispatch
We are called to be fishers of men
Readings: Is 6:1-2a, 3-8 Ps 138:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 7-8 1 Cor 15:1-11 or 15:3-8 Lk 5:1-11 God initiates. Man responds. Jesus calls. Man answers. Such is the dynamic relationship at the heart of salvation history […]
The Dispatch
The Immaculate Conception Revisited
In December 2018, I wrote an article for Catholic World Report on the Immaculate Conception: “Why I came to believe that Mary was conceived without sin.” I argued that it was (1) a matter of […]
The Dispatch
Pentecost Sunday: Three essential truths about the Holy Spirit
Readings: • Acts 2:1-11 • Psa 104:1, 24, 29-30, 31, 34 • 1 Cor 12:3b-7, 12-13, or Gal 5:16-25 • Jn 20:19-23, or Jn 15:26-27; 16:12-15 “Spirit and fire are united—a true miracle, air and […]
Essay
Saint Charles Borromeo and other holy bishops
“For a bishop, as God’s steward, must be blameless.”1 When Saint Paul wrote these words to Saint Titus in the first century, he was reminding Titus to be careful in his appointment of bishops for […]
The Dispatch
Dying with Christ so that we shall also live with him
Readings: • 2 Kgs 4:8-11, 14-16a • Psa 89:2-3, 16-17, 18-19 • Rom 6:3-4, 8-11 • Mt 10:37-42 A great paradox—perhaps the paradox—of Christian belief and spirituality is that true and everlasting life comes through […]