Today is Labor Day, which often means the end of the summer holiday and the beginning of a new school year. While shopping for school supplies and preparing for the upcoming year, be sure that your student has the tools to learn more about the most important subject: their Faith.
The Word on Fire website offers a multitude of free materials to learn more about the Catholic faith, but one tool that is especially useful for students is Father Barron's
Faith Clips CD.
On this CD, Father Barron answers 50 frequently asked questions about the Catholic faith on a diverse range of topics from God, Jesus and the Trinity to the sacraments, prayer and the spiritual life.
Faith Clips is an interactive tool for anyone who seeks to learn or present basic theological and spiritual precepts.
This CD is easy to use with track lists that allow you to listen to an entire topic, such as “Jesus,” or listen to each individual question separately within the topic, such as “Why did Jesus have to die the way he did?"
As we begin this new year, prepare your student to face the theological questions that often accompany their day-to-day lives as young Catholics.
Click below to watch a
Faith Clips YouTube video answering the question, "What gifts does God give to the Catholic Church, " and get an idea of what is available on this CD.
It is a must-have for college students!
(Also available as an MP3 CD!)
Happy Labor Day, and have a blessed school year!
Father Barron weighs in on renown scientist Stephen Hawking's upcoming book release in which he offers his "scientific" view on the existence of a creator.
So another prominent British academic has weighed in on the God question. Stephen Hawking, probably the best-known scientist in the world, has said, in a book to be published a week before the Pope’s visit to Britain, that the universe required no Creator. (I’m sure, of course, that there was no “intelligent design” behind that choice of publication date!). I confess that something in me tightens whenever I hear a scientist pontificating on issues that belong to the arena of philosophy or metaphysics. I will gladly listen to Stephen Hawking when he holds forth on matters of theoretical physics, but he’s as qualified to talk about philosophical and religious issues as any college freshman. There is a qualitative difference between the sciences, which speak of objects, forces, and phenomena within the observable universe, and philosophy or religion which speak of ultimate origins and final purposes. Science, as such, simply cannot adjudicate questions that lie outside of its proper purview—and this is precisely why scientists tend to make lots of silly statements when they attempt to philosophize...
Today is the Feast of St. Gregory the Great. Here, Father Steve reflects on St. Gregory's humble submission to the will of God for his life and God's unexpected response to this obedience.
Saint Gregory the Great was born in Rome around the year 540 AD. He was the member of a privileged family and, as such, had many opportunities available to him. However, young Gregory eschewed all this and entered monastic life, accepting the spiritual way of poverty, chastity and obedience. Gregory might have intended to withdraw from the world, but Providence would have none of this. Gregory was named the Pope's legate to the imperial court of Constantinople. The Rome of Gregory's day was a mere vestige of its former glory so the intrigues and wonders of the New Rome, Constantinople, must have made quite an impression on this papal ambassador...
Jesus' public ministry began at the age of 30. Today, Rozann Carter comments on the significance of that milestone age, as well as the importance of spiritual preparation in the years leading up to it.
My brother turns 30 today.
As I thought about how to commemorate this great milestone in his life, I was reminded of the fact that Jesus began his public ministry around the time that he turned 30 (Luke 3:23). At age 30, he “officially” entered into the public sphere, preaching, teaching, healing, working miracles, and inadvertently making himself a target for opposition from the resistant culture to whom he ministered. It was the beginning of his road to Calvary and the fulfillment of his “mission” here on earth, the coming to fruition of the Incarnation. At 30, he took leave from his mother and father and did what needed to be done…to achieve the salvation of the world. But, as I thought about this in terms of my brother (and that quickly approaching birthday for myself and a good portion of my friends) I wondered about the significance of that year. Why 30? Perhaps more importantly, though, I wondered what Jesus was doing from age 1-29 and what that means for each of us...
Today, Father Steve takes a look at a recent CNN article about the religious phenomenon among young adults that author Kenda Creasy Dean calls "fake" Christianity. He offers his commentary on this therapeutic "gospel of niceness," describing how we got to this point and where we go from here.
A
story recently appeared on CNN which reported on the phenomena of “morally therapeutic deism” masquerading as Christian faith among teens and young adults. This “fake” form of Christianity is having a deleterious effect on the nation’s churches according to Kenda Creasy Dean, who has authored a study of this trend in a new book entitled
Almost Christian. Dean laments that in terms of three out of four American teens who call themselves Christian, fewer than half practice their faith, deem it important to their lives, and cannot talk coherently about their beliefs. The survey included Catholics and Protestants from both conservative and liberal congregations. Responding to critics who noted that teens and young adults cannot talk coherently about any deep subject, Dean retorted that this is simply not true. “They can talk about money, sex, their family relationships with nuance.” I would add to this from my own experience that teens and young adults can demonstrate at times rather sophisticated takes on everything from politics to entertainment to sports, but ask them about the content of the Christian Faith and its meaning, and there are usually two responses: blustery opinions about “religion” that parrot the mainstream media’s emphasis on whatever is trending at the moment and wide eyed silence...