“Marketing” is a bad word in church circles. It implies manipulation, impure intentions and other chicanery. This is not without reason; corporate marketing has become a science, with companies spending millions of dollars to understand the psychological and sociological impact of advertising. Many Christians, understandably, believe it would be unseemly — if not sinful — [...]

I recently finished reading psychologist Dan Gilbert’s book Stumbling on Happiness, an examination of how the human brain attempts to make decisions about what will make us happy — decisions that, if studies are to be believed, we don’t make very well. Gilbert’s book is summarized in this 2008 TED talk (the whole talk is [...]

I’ve said before that one of the gifts post-Boomer Catholics are bringing to the Church is a reappropriation of faith traditions that were largely abandoned following the Second Vatican Council. While many of us never experienced the rosary, novenas or Eucharistic adoration as children, we are finding them invaluable practices as we grow into faith-filled [...]

From Slave to Priest: A Biography of the Reverend Augustine Tolton (1854-1897) is the story of Fr. Augustine Tolton, the first black priest in the United States (a number of mixed-race priests preceded him, but they self-identified as white). Written by Sister Caroline Hemesath in 1973, a new addition was released by Ignatius Press in [...]

Comparing the United States to the Roman Empire seems to be a fashionable thing to do lately. And the argument is certainly not without merit. As the only superpower left its natural to make judgments based on the worlds great empires and to ask if we are making the same mistakes that caused their downfalls. [...]