News - December 2022 RSS Feed

Happy New Year! I pray that 2023 will be a year of blessings for all of us. Next week I will resume the series on the Doctors of the Church. Today I want to draw your attention to an interview that Wilton Cardinal Gregory gave to Michael J. O’Loughlin, national correspondent at America magazine. The interview was conducted on December 8, 2022—the day after Cardinal Gregory’s seventy-fifth birthday. It was posted online on December 12, 2022.

In my column today I want to print what is probably the most reprinted editorial in any newspaper in the English language. This has become a Christmas custom for me. I am happy to do it again this year. Enjoy!

I am going to interrupt my series of columns on the Doctors of the Church to speak about a topic that is very timely. Several years ago, I published in my column before Christmas some thoughts on hospitality as we were expecting large crowds of people to come to our Christmas Masses. We are seeing more people returning to Mass and will likely see some people we have not seen in a while. What I wrote then seems very relevant. So here are some thoughts as we prepare for our Christmas Masses next week.

I am writing this column on Sunday, December 4, which is usually the liturgical commemoration of St. John Damascene. Pope Benedict spoke about St. John Damascene (John of Damascus) in his General Audience on May 6, 2009. Let’s read what the Holy Father said about St. John Damascene on that occasion:

Today we continue our series on the Doctors of the Church. Today we are looking at St. Bede the Venerable (672? -735), who was named a Doctor of the Church by Pope Leo XIII in 1899.