There has been some talk recently about a new book by Cambridge University professor Colin Humphreys that proposes the Last Supper was held on Wednesday of Holy Week (GET IT HERE), rather than on Thursday as it has been traditionally commemorated. I haven’t had a chance to review his arguments yet, but there is room for discussion here. In fact, in his recent, second volume of Jesus of Nazareth (GET IT HERE!), Pope Benedict wrestles with the subject of the Last Supper without coming to a definite conclusion.

Regardless of when precisely the Last Supper took place in Holy Week, one thing both the Cambridge professor and the pontiff are agreed upon is that the Crucifixion took place on...READ MORE

You may remember that back in 2008 the Holy See held a session of the synod of bishops devoted to the theme “The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church.” The synod of bishops is a gathering of bishops from around the world, shy of a full ecumenical council, who gather in Rome to reflect on a particular topic and then deliver their recommendations to the pope. In 2008 they were called to reflect on the word of God, as contained in Scripture and Tradition.

Among the topics that they dealt with, at least in brief, was the inerrancy of Scripture. This has been a fractious subject in the last several decades, with many people claiming that Scripture is not, in fact, inerrant or free...READ MORE

Let me begin this post by offering an apology to priestly readers for using a rather provocative headline. It is not my intention to question whether you are doing your job in general. Nobody likes that kind of question, and I don’t mean to put you on the spot in that way.

I do, however, need a strong headline of some sort to call attention to a particular task that many priests, at least in recent years, have not been very good at.

The priestly readers of the Register are almost certainly above average on this point, but we all—priests and laity alike—are called to continual conversion, to an ongoing improvement of how well we are serving Christ, and periodic self-assessments are...READ MORE

Recently I was getting into my truck, and a gentleman I didn’t know came over to talk to me.

He was out front having a smoke and spotted me while I was getting into my vehicle, so he came over and introduced himself.

Turns out he’s my neighbor’s father-in-law.

He wanted to talk to me about Jesus and the end of the world.

Now, he wasn’t one of the Family Radio people who think that Judgment Day is going to occur May 21, 2011 (just watch; Harold Camping’s prediction will turn out to be wrong again), but he was—if I understood him correctly—a Calvary Chapel Evangelical who, like many in that community, think the end of the world is near, that people will be suddenly raptured away before...READ MORE

Properly catechized Catholics know that, when we have committed mortal sins, we are obliged to confess them, how many times we committed them, and any circumstances that affect the moral species of the act (e.g., stealing from a church is different than ordinary stealing because of the element of sacrilege is involved, ditto for lying after having taken an oath before God as opposed to ordinary lying, adultery vs. fornication, etc. Note that these distinctions all involve the kind of sin being committed, not the degree of sinfulness; the Church has not required that we confess circumstances that affect the degree of sinfulness, only the kind).

Often times it is difficult for one reason or...READ MORE

Pope Benedict’s remarks concerning Jewish individuals in his recent book Jesus of Nazareth (vol. 2) (GET IT HERE! GET IT HERE!) have attracted considerable attention.

For example, the book contains a passage which some have interpreted as saying that the Church should not seek to convert Jewish individuals. It is not at all clear to me that this is what the Pope is saying. The passage is complex and bears more than one interpretation. So let’s dive in and see what we can make of it.

The beginning of the discussion (which is not usually quoted by people commenting on the text) is this. Starting on p. 44 of the book, Pope Benedict writes:

At this point we encounter once again the...READ MORE

Like many bloggers, I’ve been getting requests for information on the situation with Father John Corapi. I don’t know him personally, and I don’t have any insider information, so that leaves me in the same position as everyone else: trying to figure out the situation based on the information that is available.

I’ve looked at the official statements that have come out so far, which Pat Archbold has been helpfully linking and quoting, and I’ve been reading commentary on the subject on the blogosphere and around the Internet.

I thought I would comment briefly based on what I’ve been reading.

I’ve seen several people say that they hope that the allegations made against Father Corapi aren’t...READ MORE

In the years I have been maintaining my personal blog (www.jimmyakin.org), I have uploaded something over 4700 posts (according to current statistics). This makes it a bit hard to remember everything I’ve put up.

Fortunately, I have the memories of readers to remind me, and one reader in particular has reminded me that there are some posts that I had forgotten to include in the Annual Lent Fight that I uploaded yesterday.

These posts concern, in particular, the Church’s laws concerning Ash Wednesday and its laws regarding fasting.

As a result, I’ve done some link updating.

Since Ash Wednesday is a day of both fast and abstinence, I have chosen to repeat here the relevant links, along...READ MORE