Thank you to Deacon Andrew Bennett for his inspiring article and to the editor for posing this challenging question. It is one that needs to be asked on a regular basis to assist every person that dares to call themselves Catholic to stop, ponder, reflect and respond. For us, our Catholicity began at our baptism, was nourished through our parents, family, parish communities, faithful priests who guided us (and continue to do so), faith-filled elementary school teachers, receiving the sacraments and taking advantage of the many opportunities our Church offers today, encouraging us to learn and grow in our faith as we journey through adulthood, marriage and our senior years.
Being Catholic, for me, is believing in the Apostle’s Creed and the sacraments.
Did wearing my big brother’s army jacket make me a soldier? Does attending the Eucharistic celebration and praying aloud, while “going our own way” otherwise, make me a Catholic? Certainly not. Bishop Fulton Sheen wrote that attending Mass religiously is the least one “must” do to be Catholic. There is knowledge, education, training and an absolute “way of life” to be lived, to be a soldier, and probably even more so, to be a genuine, mature, Catholic. Belief in acceptance of, and surrender to, Christ and “all things Catholic” is of course necessary for true Catholicism.
The Catholic faith is to submit to the Good Shepherd and the rock, His Church. Humans are flawed so we fall short. Humans are culture and the dominant culture is skewed from the way, the truth and the life so I was neither shocked nor surprised by the results of the poll. A devout Catholic is one who enters through the narrow gate because that is where the treasure resides.
The appalling contemporary throwback known by its cutesy euphemism “medical aid in dying” (MAiD) is now making its death fingered presence felt in the nation’s jail houses.
A recent Sunday Gospel was about the puzzling “sin against the Holy Spirit.” Puzzling and terrifying because Jesus is clear about its consequence: this sin “will not be forgiven in this life or the next.” (Mark 3:20-25) How can an all-loving God, full of mercy, who will forgive our worse offences, also tell us there is such a thing as an unforgivable sin? Most of all, how can I make sure I never commit this sin?
My father was a frugal man who categorically rejected going into debt. He warned me against this way of life more than I can recall. When he and my mother bought their modest home in Regina in 1954, they paid cash. Dad bought used cars, again always paying up front.
Structurally, within our very life, the human person is one who thirsts and expects something beyond ourselves. Consequently, faith is a response to these authentic needs already ineradicably embedded in us.
Pizzelle. Pizzelle?
I was intrigued. Is it a miniature pizza?
No, it turns out, it’s a delicious Italian wafer, and was part of a joyful parish project that manifested God’s love and compassion during recently challenging times.
Canada’s Catholic bishops deserve full credit for sticking with their commitment to, as Edmonton Archbishop Richard Smith has framed it, walk the whole long path of Indigenous reconciliation.
It all sounded so safe, so ‘progressive’. The 2018 Cannabis Act promised to “minimize harms” to Canadians as it enabled ‘recreational’ users to legally possess and consume cannabis without fear of a criminal record, which would stigmatize them for life.