With 18 days to go before his plane touches down on U.S. soil, the U.S. media is focusing on the places the pope will visit in their country, how to get tickets and where to buy pope memorabilia. At the same time a much different church is quietly preparing to welcome Pope Francis to Cuba. ...read more

Last week’s Gospel was from John 6:63-68 (the end of the Bread of Life Discourse, which is why we looked at what marriage has to do with the Eucharist) and the second reading was from Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians. This passage from Ephesians 5:22-32 is always a cause for discontent. That is because no one ...read more

I recently heard a radio program where they were exploring the idea that the Summer of 2015 was the Summer that love died. They argued this because of the number of celebrity break-ups: Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner; Britney Spears and Charlie Ebersol; Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas and Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale. Not ...read more

Husbands and wives are called to love each other as God loves us. Last week I asked if this is even possible. We spoke about the story of the Wedding at Cana (John 2:1-12) and the story of Tobias and Sarah from the Book of Tobit, both popular Wedding readings. Both these stories teach us a ...read more

Last week, we saw that because God loves us freely, faithfully, fruitfully and totally, Married Love, has to be free, faithful, fruitful and total. This is why we can say that in Marriage we come closest to loving another person the way God loves us. But can we do that? Can I love my wife the ...read more

Last week we learned that God not only created Marriage, but He has a design for Marriage. This was the plan from the beginning. When the Book of Genesis says that God created humans male and female in his likeness and image and then he blessed them and told them to be fruitful and multiply ...read more

Thanks to Colleen Dulle who reached out to me via Twitter and shared this video that was made by the Archdiocese of St. Louis, Missouri. Great idea to celebrate marriage! (Maybe Noel in his Weekly Round-up could dig up some other videos people have made about Marriage.) My weekly round-up has been that in the ...read more

With one papal trip barely over, attention is already turning to the next papal trip: Cuba and the U.S. The official schedule was released at the end of June. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops released the theme and logo of that portion of the trip some time ago. The motto is “Love is our ...read more

(Pope Francis listens attentively to speakers at the World Meeting of Popular Movements in Bolivia on July 9.  Photo courtesy of CNS) In two years Pope Francis has said enough about the global economic system to spark both enormous enthusiasm and heavy criticism.  The story is still developing, but after his recent trip to Latin ...read more

Last week we looked again at something I wrote in 2009 about the nature and design of Marriage. I am curious to know your thoughts on this and whether you think it makes sense. If there are any moral theologians out there, please comment as you would know better than I whether my argument that all Church ...read more