Beauty surprised me last week when I walked out to the car with a small hand in mine: “Mommy, the road is sparkling!” 

VATICAN CITY - As people in Paris and around the world watched in horror as flames consumed the roof of Notre Dame Cathedral, the blaze also stirred genuine emotions that could come only from witnessing the loss of beauty, art historian Elizabeth Lev said.

VATICAN – Of the many traditions and penitential practices observed during the season of Lent, one of the more visible is the stark change in church decor and a complete absence of flowers.

BARRY’S BAY, Ont. – Man’s need for beauty springs from his profound hunger for God, artist and best-selling author Michael D. O’Brien told a conference at Our Lady Seat of Wisdom College.

Stephanie Photopoulos always taught her students at school and at the dance studio that their bodies should be loved and cherished. Now, the young Catholic hopes to prove it to them on stage.

For many years I have enjoyed a group of Catholic writers who hit their stride roughly in the middle of the 20th century.

VATICAN CITY – Ugly churches with bad acoustics don't do justice to the richness and beauty of the liturgy – and it's this connection between art and faith that's vital for priests to understand today, a Vatican official insists.

The French novelist and essayist Léon Bloy once made this comment about God’s power in our world: “God seems to have condemned himself until the end of time not to exercise any immediate right of a master over a servant or a king over a subject. We can do what we want. He will defend Himself only by His patience and His beauty.”

VATICAN CITY - When Catholics see couples who are patient, kind, never jealous or rude, they "behold the beauty and simplicity and strength of married love," but the Church also must learn to help and to heal those whose dreams for lifelong love have been shattered, said Scottish Archbishop Philip Tartaglia.

My first year of university is finally over. Academically, I held my head above water, but socially, I found myself unable to fit in. I am enrolled in a Life Sciences program, where there isn’t much racial diversity. As one of the few black people, I found myself struggling with my self-identity.