Two months before Christmas, like clockwork, the Christmas Wars have begun.  In the first battle of the 2009 Christmas season, a federal lawsuit has been filed to allow a public Nativity scene in Warren, Mich.

For 63 years, a privately maintained Nativity scene has been displayed on a public median in Warren. Every year, Warren resident John Satawa has filed for and received a permit to display the Nativity.

Not this year. That tradition was abruptly ended by the Macomb County Road Commission after it received a threatening letter from the atheist organization the Freedom From Religion Foundation. The commission, in response, decided to ban the display.

Last Friday, the Ann Arbor,...READ MORE

Debate continues to rage over abortion coverage in all of the health-care reform bills. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has made it clear that they cannot and will not support any proposal that includes abortion coverage.

Responding to the bishops, Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I., recently slammed the Church, saying that it was fanning “the flames of dissent and discord” by opposing the health-care reform bills under consideration unless they are amended to explicity prohibit abortion funding.

“I can’t understand for the life of me how the Catholic Church could be against the biggest social justice issue of our time, where the very dignity of the human person is being respected by...READ MORE

Bothered by the frequent talk about the number of Catholics on the Supreme Court, Justice Samuel Alito voiced his concerns in a recent speech to an Italian-American law group in Philadelphia, reported The Associated Press.

“There has been so much talk lately about the number of Catholics serving on the Supreme Court,” said Alito. “This is one of those questions that does not die.”

Alito voiced his concern about “respectable people who have seriously raised the questions in serious publications about whether these individuals could be trusted to do their jobs.”

According to Alito, the U.S. Constitution settled the question long ago, with its guarantee of religious freedom.

This morning, at 9 a.m. CST, marks the launch of a new radio program on Relevant Radio affiliate KYES - 1180 AM, featuring myself as host.

The inaugural show of “Voice from the Cloud” focuses on the topic of religious vocations and features guests Father Gregory Mastey, vocations director of the Diocese of St. Cloud, Minn., and Father Michael Najim, vocations director of the Diocese of Providence, R.I., and author of Radical Surrender: Letters to Seminarians and the blog Live Holiness. Program director David Rydberg chose the music and is operating the equipment. KYES hopes to air the program every Friday from 9-10 a.m. CST.

While I’ve been a frequent guest on radio programs such as Lino...READ MORE

Best-selling novelist Anne Rice’s fictional stories have followed her faith journey and reversion to the Catholic faith of her youth. Best known for her vampire novels, after returning to Catholicism, Rice penned a novel about the young Jesus Christ. Now she’s tackling angels.

Next week, her novel Angel Time, hits the stands.

“In my earlier books, I never had the courage to put someone on the side of the angels,” Rice said.

“I’ve always been fascinated with angels and by the passages in the Bible pertaining to angels,” said Rice. “Angels are evidence of God’s love for us.”

In the book, she writes about the angelic character Malchiac.

“I’m dealing with the...READ MORE

Well, the media mantra about the Vatican’s welcome to Anglicans has begun, and the anti-Catholicism is about as ugly as it gets.

Venues such as National Public Radio, the London Times, and the Kansas City Star describe the Church as “poaching.” USA Today says the Church is “rustling.” Other media outlets used the term “luring.” Some question whether the move was a “hostile takeover.” And London Times’ Columnist Libby Purves says that “converts may choke on the raw meat of Catholicism.”

Mainstream newspapers such as the New York Times and Washington Post have used the word “bid.” The Boston Globe uses both the words “lure” and “bid.”

No matter how you look at it,...READ MORE

With the news about the Vatican’s change for Anglicans desiring to come into the Church, I decided to ask the perspective of an American who has taken that journey.

Father Douglas Grandon, pastor of Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Moline, Ill., is a former Anglican pastor who is married and has children. He came into the Catholic Church in June 2003 and was ordained a Catholic priest in May 2008.

“It’s a monumental and historical event,” said Father Grandon. “I’m absolutely delighted. We’ve been hoping for this for a long time.”

According to Father Grandon, while this move is something that Anglicans were hoping for for quite some time, particularly those in England, many were hesitant...READ MORE

The inventive continue to come up with new techie ways to spread the Gospel. You can get the Bible on a USB. You can have a verse a day sent to your iPhone or mobile phone. And now, there’s the “Twitter Bible,” which summarizes the over 31,000 verse Bible into nearly 4,000 short-form tweets.

Formally titled “And God Decided to Chill,” the German language book was released at the Frankfurt Book Fair. The project was launched by the Protestant web site www.Evangelisch.de, who wanted to encourage debate about the Bible and demonstrate modern possibilities for making known the word of God.

It’s the compilation of tweets by more than 3,000 German Christians who participated in the project...READ MORE