This week…

We owe a lot of people thanks for their help bringing the Register to you each week — our subscribers most of all. You are the reason we exist. We also thank our contributors, especially those who sponsor a week or fund other projects. But a word of thanks should also go to our advertisers.

The Register couldn’t meet our expenses without them. Sometimes, Catholics get used to avoiding the advertisements in a publication altogether. Too often, what is advertised is useless or worse. In the Register, it’s different.

True, our advertisers are separate companies from the Register, and we haven’t exhaustively studied each advertiser’s catalogue. But we do have a strict advertising policy. Sometimes, a stray ad will get past our small staff, but you can feel confident that what is advertised in our pages will be not only unobjectionable and wholesome but also helpful for strengthening Catholic identity and building a Catholic family culture.

In a way, when you buy from our advertisers you are helping yourself and us, because the more success advertisers have from promoting their projects in our pages, the more they will turn to the Register in the future, thus ensuring the Register will be there for you. So, please do check out what these companies have to offer — for the sake of yourself and your family, and for the sake of the Register.

Keeper of the ‘Christmas Conversion’

The Church celebrates the feast of St. Thérèse of Lisieux in October, but two months later many hold her memory close again because of a life-changing conversion experience she underwent interiorly on Christmas Day of 1886. An Advent visit to St. Teresa’s Church in Lincoln, Neb. By Kimberly Jansen.

Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki of Cologne attends a German Synodal Way assembly on March 9, 2023.

Four German Bishops Resist Push to Install Permanent ‘Synodal Council’

Given the Vatican’s repeated interventions against the German process, the bishops said they would instead look to the Synod of Bishops in Rome. Meanwhile, on Monday, German diocesan bishops approved the statutes for a synodal committee; and there are reports that the synodal committee will meet again in June.

Palestinian Christians celebrate Easter Sunday Mass at Holy Family Church in Gaza City on March 31, amid the ongoing battles Israel and the Hamas militant group.

People Explain ‘Why I Go to Mass’

‘Why go to Mass on Sundays? It is not enough to answer that it is a precept of the Church. … We Christians need to participate in Sunday Mass because only with the grace of Jesus, with his living presence in us and among us, can we put into practice his commandment, and thus be his credible witnesses.’ —Pope Francis