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A priest I know shares this story. Recently, on their priests’ retreat, the retreat director began his opening presentation with these words: we take for granted that most people are going to hell. Then he tried to ground this assertion by quoting Jesus: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the way that leads to life, and only a few find it.” (Matthew 7, 13-14)

I once lived in community for several years with an Oblate brother who was wonderfully generous and pious to a fault. But he struggled to pick up symbol and metaphor. He took things literally. For him, what the words said is what they meant!

Dreams have always fascinated me – especially when I can actually remember details from them. Like John Lennon noted in his Imagine song, “You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.” And I, like most folks, really get goose bumps when I hear Martin Luther King's famous “I Have A Dream” speech! Sometimes, I've actually noticed how much in sync a dream's message may have been with some resolution to a concern or problem that I had been coping with.

“God behaves in the psalms in ways he is not allowed to behave in systemic theology.”

All Saints Day causes me to reflect upon what a blessing it was to join the JMJ Youth Pilgrimage to Rome. While there our group was present for the Sept. 7 canonizations of Sts. Carlo Acutis and Pier Giorgio Frassati This reminded me of my devotion to another saint who also died when she was young.

As we are currently in the midst of the serious part of hurricane season, I'm drawn back to tough memories of Hurricane Katrina, whose 20th anniversary will be coming up on August 29, 2025.

Perhaps in its ideal form, innocence might be described as a human heart stripped of ego and lust, something akin to what James Joyce describes in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man when his hero, young Steven, sees a half-naked girl on a beach and instead of being moved by sexual desire is moved only by an overwhelming wonder and admiration.

As we celebrate, honor and pray for our new holy pontiff, Pope Leo XIV ­­– who has cool Louisiana familial connections and who is calling all if us to be a missionaries in our own states of life, I can't help but recall some Eucharistic missionary experiences I've had in the past.

What do you do when a wound or a loss leaves you hopelessly disconsolate and there’s nothing you can do to amend the situation?

This Memorial Day is very special for me, as I reflect upon the innumerable ways in which veterans have contributed to all of us in this country and around the world.

As we are all threading through Lent with prayer, fasting and almsgiving efforts in our own states of life, it may well be helpful to review how we can specifically strive to incorporate works of mercy through the people we are blessed to meet - like Melissa taught me in the past.

Several years ago, a Presbyterian minister I know challenged his congregation to open its doors and its heart more fully to the poor. Initially the congregation responded with enthusiasm and a number of programs were introduced to invite people from the less-privileged economic areas of the city, including a number of street-people, to come to their church.