The great English convert and Cardinal Blessed John Henry Newman (1801-1890) was convinced that the issue of liturgical reverence was of decisive importance in every age of the Church.

In fact, he contended that the presence or absence of this virtue distinguished true believers from fraudulent Christians.

With audacious verbiage, Newman declared, “There never was a time since the apostles’ day when the Church was not; and there never was a time but men were to be found who preferred some other way of worship to the Church’s way. These two kinds of professed Christians ever have been — Church Christians and Christians not of the Church; and it is remarkable, I say, that while, on the one...READ MORE

Pope Benedict XVI’s most gripping remark during his four-day state visit to Germany may have been his veiled reference to his homeland’s legacy of Nazi war crimes: “We have seen how power became divorced from right, how power opposed right and crushed it, so that the state became an instrument for destroying right — a highly organized band of robbers, capable of threatening the whole world and driving it to the edge of the abyss.”

Delivered during his address before the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, the warning could be described as a shot across the bow of the nation’s collective conscience. The statement carried additional potency because it was uttered by a German...READ MORE

Jackie Francois, 27, lives her dream. From her roots as a youth minister, her career has taken her all over the country as a singer/songwriter, worship leader and speaker. Most recently, the Orange County, Calif., native traveled to Spain to sing for World Youth Day.

What moved you to make the change from youth ministry to your present career as singer/songwriter and speaker?

I still feel like a youth minister who travels around the country, but the change came when Spirit & Song/OCP asked me to be one of their “artists” in 2006. At the time, I was a full-time parish youth minister, so I discerned for six months where God wanted me. I discerned that God was calling me to do full-time...READ MORE

Praying the Rosary through Art: The Joyful Mysteries - Maria Stella Ceplecha, Crisis Magazine

Famed Blind Chinese Pro-Life Activist Chen Guangcheng May be Dead - John Jalsevac, LifeSiteNews.com

Is Smoking Morally Wrong? - Rachel Howell, VirtuousPla.net

Religion and Occupy Wall Street - Joseph Knippenberg, First Things/First Thoughts

Lepanto - Donald R. McClarey, The American Catholic

So Long, Freedom of Thought - Colleen Carroll Campbell, Catholic Lane

Real Confession - Marc Barnes, Patheos/Bad Catholic

Disturbing New Evidence on Contraception & AIDS in Africa - Joe Heschmeyer, Shameless Popery

“The Spirit of Vatican II” - Howard Kainz, The Catholic Thing

Jesuit Compares Steve Jobs...READ MORE

The Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Spain is one of the top pilgrimage destinations in the world. Its uniqueness lies in the fact that it is the burial place of St. James the Greater.

In Discovering the Camino de Santiago, Father Greg Markey takes the reader on this 500-mile pilgrimage route, which has been well worn since the ninth century. This Connecticut pastor hiked the route over 34 days in 2009.

What an enjoyable, insightful, enriching journey it turns out to be. In prose that flows like a conversation with friends, Father Markey recounts his experiences through villages, hostels and churches, arriving for the feast of St. James on July 25.

We’re at his side through the...READ MORE

This Oct. 22, the new feast day for Blessed John Paul II, will have special meaning for artist John Petermeier.

He had worked full time at several radio stations in Iowa, Wisconsin and the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. But after seeing John Paul during a visit to Rome in 2000, he returned in earnest to his art, focusing mainly on portrait drawings, with Blessed John Paul II the subject of several of those works.

In September, Petermeier discussed his art and John Paul II from his Elk River, Minn., home.

Did you always want to be an artist?

I had an interest in art all my life and as a child knew that is what I’d be someday. In college my initial major was art. But I quickly learned I couldn’t do...READ MORE

Fall is the time of year when high-school seniors apply to the colleges they want to attend, and my nerves are getting a workout. How should we pay the college bills and deal with the complexities of the financial-aid process?

Here are several ways you can be equipped to better assist with your children’s college plans and minimize the negative impact of debt:

Make use of solid college-guide resources such as the Register’s annual “Catholic Identity College Guide” to help you understand the “Catholic” identity of the colleges you are considering. (See “Resources” online at NCRegister.com.)

Familiarize yourself with the financial-aid options available to you and your child. Helpful...READ MORE

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court this week heard oral arguments in the closely followed 1st amendment case, Hosanna Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church & School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 10-553, and some constitutional scholars are hopeful that religious liberty will emerge unscathed.

“I am cautiously optimistic. The Court was visibly skeptical of the government’s position,” said Douglas Laycock, the Robert E. Scott Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Virginia School of Law who represented Hosanna Tabor before the high court.

In the Hosanna Tabor case, the justices must decide whether a Lutheran church in Michigan, which fired a teacher at a...READ MORE