If confession is good for the soul – as all good Catholics avow – what about the Pope and his “staff”? Journalist and peace advocate Colman McCarthy always demonstrates a wise and clear-headed way of looking at issues. McCarthy is a latter-day Socrates always questioning the status quo to get at the truth. “The greatest way to live with honor...

Hold on folks, we’re about to enter The Corporate Zone – that bizzaro world where upholding the law and common sense go to die. Thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United, corporations are not only people entitled to as much free speech as money can buy, but may soon be able to claim that their religious beliefs can determine what...

“I think this case will be remembered because it is the first case of this sort since we stopped trying people in America for witchcraft, because here we have done our best to turn back the tide that has sought to force itself upon this modern world, of testing every fact in science by a religious dictum.” That’s Clarence Darrow...

On Valentine’s Day, in front of 25,000 people, Pope Francis declared that the key to a lasting marriage lies in just three words: “Please, thanks and sorry.” The Associated Press reported (Feb. 14) that “Francis told fiancés gathered in St. Peter’s Square for a special papal date that expressions of courtesy, gratitude and contrition go a long way toward conserving and enhancing...

Everyone’s entitled to their opinion, right; says so in the First Amendment. So what’s all this fuss about A&E’s Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson sharing his opinions with a few million Americans? Well, if you’re A&E, the cable network jointly owned by the Hearst Corporation and Disney/ABC, you might want to step back and consider the impact Phil’s “opinions” have...

I’ve written about the significance of faith before. Although it is not an ethical value, its importance in driving ethical conduct should not be underestimated. In fact, the word faith comes from the Latin fidere meaning ‘to trust.’ Trusting can sometimes be difficult, but it can uplift and strengthen our resolve to reach beyond ourselves and become considerate and compassionate of others....

“I fired him because he wouldn’t respect the authority of the President. I didn’t fire him because he was a dumb son of a bitch, although he was, but that’s not against the law for generals. If it was, half to three-quarters of them would be in jail.” Harry Truman was well known for telling it like it was regardless...

In his 1986 memoir, Confessions of a Parish Priest, Father Andrew M. Greeley wrote, “I’m a priest. Not a priest-sociologist or a priest-journalist, or a priest-novelist, or any multiple variation of those hyphenates. I’m a priest, a parish priest. The other things I do in life: sociological research, journalistic writing, storytelling, are merely my way of being a priest.” But no...

Friend and colleague Colman McCarthy, a former Post columnist, directs the Center for Teaching Peace in Washington DC, and teaches courses on nonviolence at six area colleges and high schools. (He’s also a recovering Catholic.) A critic of Roman Catholicism, calling it “200 years out of date” and in need of a “radical transformation,” scolded a few months ago that...

A recent e-mail from friend and colleague Jamie O’Boyle directed me to a news story from The Catholic Sun, an online newspaper from the Dioceses of Phoenix, Arizona. Father Thomas Williams, dean of moral theology at the Rome’s Pontifical Regina Apostolorum University in Rome, “who has appeared over the years as a church analyst for CNN, CBS, ABC and Fox...