DAILY DEVOTIONS, LIFELONG FAITH

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16 Feb, 2001

Helping the Whole Person

(For breaking Political coverage click here.) The president is particularly concerned with removing the premise that there is something wrong with admitting the motivations of religious faith into the noble American ambition of doing for our neighbor what we would have him do for us. Despite the great care that the administration has taken to

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15 Feb, 2001

Hams and Martyrs

In honesty, the truly “fixed point” was my consternation, especially when the children were six-under-seven. Was there a kitchen-martyr, anywhere, I'd wonder? I'd get exasperated that the chore of setting table by little children always produced an interesting configuration of spoons and forks. Lake Milk, with its spreading shore, seemed ever present, somewhere. Many bowls

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15 Feb, 2001

When the Moral Stakes Are Too Low The Problem with Today’s Hollywood Movies

(This article appears in the February 2001 issue of CRISIS, America's fastest growing Catholic magazine.) (For a review of a newly released Oscar nominated film click here.) It is not for us to strike the final balance, tempting though it may be. Hell could be empty (though I wouldn't bet on it). For these reasons,

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14 Feb, 2001

A Valentine’s Promise

These pledges create the woven fabric of human intimacy that fortify our lives, giant robes we wrap around ourselves to keep our bare bodies from solitude’s cold night. The vows husbands make to wives and wives to husbands; of lover to beloved; the promises of parents to children and vice versa; our obligation to see

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13 Feb, 2001

What is Family?

As a society, we've forgotten how family was made, what kept it together, and Who created it in the first place. Most families today don't follow the model God intended when He created marriage and families. Nowadays, Heather has two mommies, and most of the children in my children's classes have two dads, or a

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13 Feb, 2001

Righteous Cannibals

Anthony Hopkins is not the movie's villain. Far from it. He is its hero, performing a stunning act of gallantry at the conclusion of the film to leave us all to meditate on his genius and hidden virtues. The movie's villains are the conservative creeps over at the FBI and Justice Department, and avaricious Italian

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12 Feb, 2001

Showtime No More What the Decline of the L.A. Lakers Tells Us About America

The soap opera began earlier this season when Shaquille O'Neal, the Lakers' All-Star center, and Kobe Bryant, the team's astonishingly polished young (22 years old) scoring guard, began to criticize each other in the press. The argument was over which player was responsible for the team's less-than-spectacular start this season — the squad that had

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12 Feb, 2001

Real Racial Unity

(For more of today's breaking Political News click here.) Behind the euphemisms of national unity, of course, lies the problem actually on the mind of the Washington politicians – how to handle the social collapse of the black urban community. Yet, while it is true that most prominent kinds of suffering are concentrated disproportionately in

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11 Feb, 2001

Ang Lee’s Little Masterpiece Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Shines

Critical praise hailed the films as being “poignant,” “charming,” and “playful.” Then Lee came West, making two films that seemed worlds apart from his earlier work: Sense and Sensibility and Ride With the Devil. The leap — from sweet family dramas to Jane Austen and pop singer Jewel as a Civil War-era love interest, all

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02 Feb, 2001

When Life Hands You Literature

Word weaving is, first of all, fun. It happens naturally and can't be forced, like most fun things. We discover a phrase or idea from our reading has woven itself right into the fabric of our life. We now have a more apt, more dramatic, or less stinging way of saying something. When we use

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01 Feb, 2001

Media Violence Packs a Punch

For those of us on the other side of the debate, significant support for our position arrived recently in the form of a joint statement by the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Psychological Association, and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry stating that “viewing entertainment violence can lead