February 9, 2024 | A Word to Enkindle, Fr. John Bayer
My impression is that many people today think we live in unprecedented and negative times. They feel afraid as they watch ideologies make bold moves for economic and political power.
In a certain basic sense, it is hard for me to agree that our times are unprecedented. The Church must struggle in every age, and we just don’t have that divine vision which would allow us to compare, definitively or apocalyptically, our own age with any other. On the other hand, I can easily understand the feeling that things are urgent; after all, these are our times, and so we are, quite rightly, sensitive to their dramatic character.
January 12, 2024 | A Word to Enkindle, Fr. John Bayer
“Learning from ‘Las Posadas'” by Fr. John for The Texas Catholic. This Christmas I had the very edifying experience of attending for the first time a celebration of Las Posadas. The celebration was organized by Puede Network, a youth empowerment...
November 17, 2023 | A Word to Enkindle, Fr. Thomas Esposito
St. Paul seems to have defined the triad we know today as the theological virtues: faith, hope, and love.
November 2, 2023 | A Word to Enkindle, Fr. John Bayer
“Lay engagement in the synod and beyond” by Fr. John for The Texas Catholic. As a member of the synod preparatory commission, one of the exciting things I have seen is the synergy between clergy and laity in our diocese. Of course, we are still a pilgrim...
October 19, 2023 | A Word to Enkindle, Fr. Thomas Esposito
Profane and profanity are English words commonly used in reference to swearing, cursing, and hurling abusive language at someone. That’s an intriguing development from their Latin roots! A fanum is a temple or a sanctuary; attach the preposition pro to it, and you get “before/in front of/ outside the temple.”
Language that is not fitting to be heard in the presence of the divine, therefore, is unholy, not sacred: literally, profane.
October 17, 2023 | A Word to Enkindle, Fr. John Bayer
This is my third column in a series on the premature death of children.
