The Catholic Heart Hidden in the Christmas Classic ‘Home Alone’...
More than 30 years after its release, ‘Home Alone’ remains cherished as pure Christmas fun: slapstick booby traps, a wisecracking 8-year-old, and two burglars who refuse to quit despite the bodily harm they sustain along the way. Yet woven into the movie’s charm are quieter religious undertones that give the film its emotional depth — and that depth is no accident.
How can your parish attract more capable volunteers? Here are some challenges, and some solutions...
In this episode of the Upstream Podcast, Father John Riccardo and I explore a fundamental shift in how church leaders can view and use volunteers, emphasizing that the church is the Body of Christ and not a corporation. The biggest challenges are rooted in low expectations, treating volunteers generically, and creating...
Apostolic Letter on the Importance of Archaeology (December 11, 2025)...
In this centenary year of the establishment of the Pontifical Institute of Christian Archaeology, it is both my responsibility and my pleasure to share some reflections that I consider important for the Church in our present time. I do so with a grateful heart, knowing that when our memory of the past is illuminated by faith and purified by charity, it nourishes hope...
Is There a Priesthood Crisis in America?
I work with priests and bishops from all around the country, so I am blessed to have conversations that the average lay person doesn’t get. In fact, since I am no longer an institutional insider (since I work for our apostolate now), I am considered “safe” to talk to and therefore, I get to hear what is really happening with them. They ask for advice...
Today in Papal History: Martin Luther Burns a Bull...
Today in Papal History, exactly 505 years ago, Martin Luther burned his copy of the papal bull Exsurges Domine – or “Condemning the Errors of Martin Luther” – written by Pope Leo X in response to the former’s infamous 95 Theses. The document itself addressed 41 of Luther’s 95 points specifically, and was the product of a commission convened by the pope that brought theologians...
Memo to the White House: God Became Man 9 Months Before He Was Born...
Boston-Area Pastor Refuses to Remove Anti-ICE Nativity Scene, Seeks Meeting With Archbishop...
The pastor of a Catholic parish near Boston says an anti-immigration-enforcement display in its Nativity scene will stay up at least for the time being, and he is asking for a meeting with the archbishop. The announcement Monday night — more than three days after the Archdiocese of Boston said the display should be removed — leaves the parish and Archbishop Richard Henning of Boston at an impasse.
Advent, Salvation, and the Gift of Silence...
In his letter to the Romans, Paul exhorts both Jew and Gentile about the necessity of belief in Jesus Christ as the path to salvation. And it is not only belief but in practice, as established by Christ through the Apostles, specifically through the celebration of the Mass commemorating Christ, culminating in the Eucharistic celebration of the Mass. St. Paul places great emphasis on the relationship between a confession, assent, and belief of faith.
Lose the Distractions This Advent...
Why I am not (quite, yet) a Traditionalist...
‘Peace Is Possible,’ Pope Leo XIV Says After Visits to Turkey and Lebanon...
Pope Leo Asks: What Has Arius to Do With Jesus?
‘Miraculous’ Summer Wildfire Reveals Dramatic Discovery in Biblical Bethsaida...
Advent, St. Newman, and the Forgiveness of Sins...
Here’s the easiest way to de-banalize your liturgy...
Pope Leo XIV Returns to Rome, Discusses Peace Efforts, Ukraine, and His Election...
Humility Is the Devil’s Achilles’ Heel...
If We Must Thank God for Good Things, Why Can’t We Blame Him for Bad Things?
In the Beginning: The Catholic Answers I Knew...
Advent and the Deliverance from Evil...
A Meal of Toads and Other Gruesome Punishments...
Pope Leo XIV Visits Nicene Basilica on 1,700th Anniversary of Council of Nicaea...
Pope Leo: Repent Sins, Bear Witness, Foster Christian Unity...
Vatican Reports First Budget Surplus After Years of Deficits...
Pope Leo XIV Arrives in Ankara to Begin First Apostolic Journey to Turkey and Lebanon...
In a Dark Hour: A Reflection on the First Sunday in Advent...
Vatican ends routine use of Latin in sweeping overhaul of Curia governance...
Why Does Jesus Heal Some People and Not Others?
How Close Can East and West Get in Nicaea?
This Sunday, Christ the King Moves You From Satan’s Tyrannical Rule to the Kingdom of God...
Abortion Is a Preeminent Priority...
Joy, Venezuela’s Vatican-China Deal, and Numb for the Holidays...
I am back in Washington after our first-ever Pillar Pilgrimage to Rome. It was, honestly, a time of great consolation for me. The first weeks of Advent are meant, as we all know, to lift our eyes a little higher to the horizon of the end of time and the coming of the Lord in glory. As someone perpetually preoccupied with the immediate, it was an immense gift to be “forced,” in a way, to set the quotidian concerns of the day’s news aside — at least a bit — and be reminded that there is a Good News much more important for me to both give and receive.
The Tilma, False Gods, and the Fate of our Age [Catholic Herald Paywall]...
When Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared to the peasant Juan Diego in 1531, Mesoamerica stood at a crossroads. The Aztec Empire had fallen, yet the religious imagination it shaped remained formidable. Centuries of human sacrifice soaked the land and the collective memory. Atop their temples, Aztec priests tore the still-beating hearts from countless victims, lifting them to feed the sun...
I Hate When Eastern Orthodox Apologists Do This...
A look at popular Eastern Orthodox objections to Catholicism—and why many of the same critiques, from papal authority to ecclesial scandals, apply across both apostolic traditions. The video urges viewers to move beyond online polemics and toward serious theological dialogue aimed at eventual unity...
We All Live in a Perfect House...
Imagine living in the conviction that every aspect of our every day is perfectly arranged for our good. The life-giving power of such a conviction would come from the simple fact that it is true. The heart of our daily challenge is to remember this truth. Having the right images in our mind goes a long way in helping us really to remember...
The Return of the Queen...
There was a time, for a very long time and a long time ago, when the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham was one of the major places of pilgrimage in the whole of Christendom. By the sixteenth-century, the holy shrine at Walsingham, in the English shire of Norfolk, had welcomed pilgrims for more than 450 years...
XIV, XIII, and Buon Natale...
Today’s the feast of St. Juan Diego (and my daughter Pia’s birthday) and you’re reading The Tuesday Pillar Post. Today also marks seven months since the newly elected Pope Leo XIV offered his first Mass as pontiff, in the Sistine Chapel, where I will have the privilege and gift to stand today.
Here is Your God: A Reflection on the Upcoming Third Sunday of Advent...
John questions Jesus from prison in today’s Gospel—for his disciples’ sake and for ours. He knows that Jesus is doing “the works of the Messiah,” foretold in today’s First Reading and Psalm. But John wants his disciples—and us—to know that the Judge is at the gate, that in Jesus our God has come to save us. The Liturgy of Advent takes us out into the desert to see and hear the marvelous works and words...
This Sunday, We Each Have a John the Baptist in Our Heart...
What the Vatican’s New Curia Rules Change — and Why They Matter...
Catholic Dioceses and Schools Confront $800 Million Pension Fund Shortfall...
Leo XIV Shuts Down Vatican Donations Commission 10 Months After Its Creation by Pope Francis...
Dolton, Illinois, Designates Pope Leo XIV’s Childhood Home as Historic Landmark...
Society’s New ‘Sins’: Smoking, Spanking — and Having Too Many Kids...
A YouTube Priest Says You Shouldn’t Pray After Communion. Here’s Why He’s Wrong...
Pope Leo XIV Finishes Third Day in Turkey With Mass at Soccer Stadium...
For 300 years, the early Church learned from ‘The Shepherd of Hermas’...
The Fragility and Stability of the Liturgical Benedict Option...
How Plato Turned Socrates’ Death Into a Blueprint for True Learning...
On the surprising sanity of Bill Gates on climate change...
How to Keep Politics From Colonizing Your Soul...
The Vatican’s Unhappy Return of Canadian Indian Gifts...
No Duty Is More Urgent Than That of Returning Thanks...
Angels are the REAL Guardians of the Galaxies...
‘The Sinner,’ Vatican Terms, and Stretching Curds...
Rian Johnson Turns to Denver Priests for Catholic Accuracy in New ‘Knives Out’ Film...
Greenville, South Carolina, Traditional Catholic Haven in the Bible Belt...
Pope Leo XIV Prepares to Depart Thursday for ‘Demanding Journey’ to Turkey and Lebanon...
Pope Leo XIV Issues Apostolic Letter 'In Unitate Fidei' on 1,700th Anniversary of Nicene Council...
Pope Leo XIV Warns Against ‘False Mercy’ in Marriage Annulment Proceedings...
I Can’t Do the Push-Ups for You...
Presenting Yourself, Zuppi and Me, and High Rollers...
‘The Carpenter’s Son’ Reimagines the Boyhood of Christ — Badly...
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The Complete List of Popes
- St. Peter (32-67)
- St. Linus (67-76)
- St. Anacletus (Cletus) (76-88)
- St. Clement I (88-97)
- St. Evaristus (97-105)
- St. Alexander I (105-115)
- St. Sixtus I (115-125)
- St. Telesphorus (125-136)
- St. Hyginus (136-140)
- St. Pius I (140-155)
- St. Anicetus (155-166)
- St. Soter (166-175)
- St. Eleutherius (175-189)
- St. Victor I (189-199)
- St. Zephyrinus (199-217)
- St. Callistus I (217-22)
- St. Urban I (222-30)
- St. Pontian (230-35)
- St. Anterus (235-36)
- St. Fabian (236-50)
- St. Cornelius (251-53)
- St. Lucius I (253-54)
- St. Stephen I (254-257)
- St. Sixtus II (257-258)
- St. Dionysius (260-268)
- St. Felix I (269-274)
- St. Eutychian (275-283)
- St. Caius (283-296)
- St. Marcellinus (296-304)
- St. Marcellus I (308-309)
- St. Eusebius (309 or 310)
- St. Miltiades (311-14)
- St. Sylvester I (314-35)
- St. Marcus (336)
- St. Julius I (337-52)
- Liberius (352-66)
- St. Damasus I (366-84)
- St. Siricius (384-99)
- St. Anastasius I (399-401)
- St. Innocent I (401-17)
- St. Zosimus (417-18)
- St. Boniface I (418-22)
- St. Celestine I (422-32)
- St. Sixtus III (432-40)
- St. Leo I (the Great) (440-61)
- St. Hilarius (461-68)
- St. Simplicius (468-83)
- St. Felix III (II) (483-92)
- St. Gelasius I (492-96)
- Anastasius II (496-98)
- St. Symmachus (498-514)
- St. Hormisdas (514-23)
- St. John I (523-26)
- St. Felix IV (III) (526-30)
- Boniface II (530-32)
- John II (533-35)
- St. Agapetus I (535-36)
- St. Silverius (536-37)
- Vigilius (537-55)
- Pelagius I (556-61)
- John III (561-74)
- Benedict I (575-79)
- Pelagius II (579-90)
- St. Gregory I (the Great) (590-604)
- Sabinian (604-606)
- Boniface III (607)
- St. Boniface IV (608-15)
- St. Deusdedit (Adeodatus I) (615-18)
- Boniface V (619-25)
- Honorius I (625-38)
- Severinus (640)
- John IV (640-42)
- Theodore I (642-49)
- St. Martin I (649-55)
- St. Eugene I (655-57)
- St. Vitalian (657-72)
- Adeodatus (II) (672-76)
- Donus (676-78)
- St. Agatho (678-81)
- St. Leo II (682-83)
- St. Benedict II (684-85)
- John V (685-86)
- Conon (686-87)
- St. Sergius I (687-701)
- John VI (701-05)
- John VII (705-07)
- Sisinnius (708)
- Constantine (708-15)
- St. Gregory II (715-31)
- St. Gregory III (731-41)
- St. Zachary (741-52)
- Stephen II (III) (752-57)
- St. Paul I (757-67)
- Stephen III (IV) (767-72)
- Adrian I (772-95)
- St. Leo III (795-816)
- Stephen IV (V) (816-17)
- St. Paschal I (817-24)
- Eugene II (824-27)
- Valentine (827)
- Gregory IV (827-44)
- Sergius II (844-47)
- St. Leo IV (847-55)
- Benedict III (855-58)
- St. Nicholas I (the Great) (858-67)
- Adrian II (867-72)
- John VIII (872-82)
- Marinus I (882-84)
- St. Adrian III (884-85)
- Stephen V (VI) (885-91)
- Formosus (891-96)
- Boniface VI (896)
- Stephen VI (VII) (896-97)
- Romanus (897)
- Theodore II (897)
- John IX (898-900)
- Benedict IV (900-03)
- Leo V (903)
- Sergius III (904-11)
- Anastasius III (911-13)
- Lando (913-14)
- John X (914-28)
- Leo VI (928)
- Stephen VIII (929-31)
- John XI (931-35)
- Leo VII (936-39)
- Stephen IX (939-42)
- Marinus II (942-46)
- Agapetus II (946-55)
- John XII (955-63)
- Leo VIII (963-64)
- Benedict V (964)
- John XIII (965-72)
- Benedict VI (973-74)
- Benedict VII (974-83)
- John XIV (983-84)
- John XV (985-96)
- Gregory V (996-99)
- Sylvester II (999-1003)
- John XVII (1003)
- John XVIII (1003-09)
- Sergius IV (1009-12)
- Benedict VIII (1012-24)
- John XIX (1024-32)
- Benedict IX (1032-45)
- Sylvester III (1045)
- Benedict IX (1045)
- Gregory VI (1045-46)
- Clement II (1046-47)
- Benedict IX (1047-48)
- Damasus II (1048)
- St. Leo IX (1049-54)
- Victor II (1055-57)
- Stephen X (1057-58)
- Nicholas II (1058-61)
- Alexander II (1061-73)
- St. Gregory VII (1073-85)
- Blessed Victor III (1086-87)
- Blessed Urban II (1088-99)
- Paschal II (1099-1118)
- Gelasius II (1118-19)
- Callistus II (1119-24)
- Honorius II (1124-30)
- Innocent II (1130-43)
- Celestine II (1143-44)
- Lucius II (1144-45)
- Blessed Eugene III (1145-53)
- Anastasius IV (1153-54)
- Adrian IV (1154-59)
- Alexander III (1159-81)
- Lucius III (1181-85)
- Urban III (1185-87)
- Gregory VIII (1187)
- Clement III (1187-91)
- Celestine III (1191-98)
- Innocent III (1198-1216)
- Honorius III (1216-27)
- Gregory IX (1227-41)
- Celestine IV (1241)
- Innocent IV (1243-54)
- Alexander IV (1254-61)
- Urban IV (1261-64)
- Clement IV (1265-68)
- Blessed Gregory X (1271-76)
- Blessed Innocent V (1276)
- Adrian V (1276)
- John XXI (1276-77)
- Nicholas III (1277-80)
- Martin IV (1281-85)
- Honorius IV (1285-87)
- Nicholas IV (1288-92)
- St. Celestine V (1294)
- Boniface VIII (1294-1303)
- Blessed Benedict XI (1303-04)
- Clement V (1305-14)
- John XXII (1316-34)
- Benedict XII (1334-42)
- Clement VI (1342-52)
- Innocent VI (1352-62)
- Blessed Urban V (1362-70)
- Gregory XI (1370-78)
- Urban VI (1378-89)
- Boniface IX (1389-1404)
- Innocent VII (1404-06)
- Gregory XII (1406-15)
- Martin V (1417-31)
- Eugene IV (1431-47)
- Nicholas V (1447-55)
- Callistus III (1455-58)
- Pius II (1458-64)
- Paul II (1464-71)
- Sixtus IV (1471-84)
- Innocent VIII (1484-92)
- Alexander VI (1492-1503)
- Pius III (1503)
- Julius II (1503-13)
- Leo X (1513-21)
- Adrian VI (1522-23)
- Clement VII (1523-34)
- Paul III (1534-49)
- Julius III (1550-55)
- Marcellus II (1555)
- Paul IV (1555-59)
- Pius IV (1559-65)
- St. Pius V (1566-72)
- Gregory XIII (1572-85)
- Sixtus V (1585-90)
- Urban VII (1590)
- Gregory XIV (1590-91)
- Innocent IX (1591)
- Clement VIII (1592-1605)
- Leo XI (1605)
- Paul V (1605-21)
- Gregory XV (1621-23)
- Urban VIII (1623-44)
- Innocent X (1644-55)
- Alexander VII (1655-67)
- Clement IX (1667-69)
- Clement X (1670-76)
- Blessed Innocent XI (1676-89)
- Alexander VIII (1689-91)
- Innocent XII (1691-1700)
- Clement XI (1700-21)
- Innocent XIII (1721-24)
- Benedict XIII (1724-30)
- Clement XII (1730-40)
- Benedict XIV (1740-58)
- Clement XIII (1758-69)
- Clement XIV (1769-74)
- Pius VI (1775-99)
- Pius VII (1800-23)
- Leo XII (1823-29)
- Pius VIII (1829-30)
- Gregory XVI (1831-46)
- Blessed Pius IX (1846-78)
- Leo XIII (1878-1903)
- St. Pius X (1903-14)
- Benedict XV (1914-22)
- Pius XI (1922-39)
- Pius XII (1939-58)
- St. John XXIII (1958-63)
- St. Paul VI (1963-78)
- John Paul I (1978)
- St. John Paul II (1978-2005)
- Benedict XVI (2005-2013)
- Francis (2013-2025)
- Leo XIV (2025—)
