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The Deacon's Bench

This shot tells a beautiful story of a father’s love for his son. It comes from Texas Catholic — and an alert reader sent it my way. It’s Shreveport’s new Bishop Michael Duca being embraced by his father Lewis during the sign of peace at his episcopal ordination last Monday. Photo by: Jenna Teter

“We prostrate ourselves before a God who, like a Good Samaritan, was first to bow to mankind as a way to rescue and give him new life, who knelt before us to wash our dirty feet. Worshiping the Body of Christ means believing that in that piece of bread there really is Christ, who gives…

Last weekend — the weekend when I celebrated the anniversary of my own ordination just one year ago — our neighbors to the east welcomed some new deacons, as the Diocese of Rockville Centre (on Long Island) ordained 13. Visit the Long Island Catholic link for more pictures, and details. Congratulations and blessings! Welcome, neighbors!Photos…

Tragic news this morning about Steven Curtis Chapman, the popular Christian recording artist. His young adopted daughter was struck and killed by a car, apparently driven by Chapman’s son. Below is a song he wrote about his daughter a few years back, and the story behind it. He and his family will be in many…

Because we all could use a laugh right about now (and the feast of that saintly cut-up Philip Neri is just a few days away: here’s Adolph Hitler, as you’ve never seen him before. Trust me: you will howl. God bless The Anchoress for sending this my way.

Hot on the heels of yesterday’s dispiriting news about the way Cardinal Egan is reassigning priests in his archdiocese, we have this word that someone is coughing up money — a LOT of money — to save a church: An anonymous donor has come to the rescue of St. Brigid’s Roman Catholic Church in the…

Back on Ash Wednesday, I preached a little homily about penance, and suggested some things we might do during that penitential season of Lent besides simply giving up chocolate. I mentioned praying for strangers, praying for those we don’t even like, even praying for our enemies. And in an off-handed way, I asked, “When was…

How are vocations in your diocese? The St. Louis Post-Dispatch is reporting on the very good news coming out of that archdiocese these days — a surge in priestly vocations, thanks in large part to the efforts of the archbishop: Once or twice a year, each student at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary will drop by Archbishop Raymond…

Rocco got the first scoop on this story yesterday, and now the New York Times is running with it. Seems the Cardinal Archbishop of New York is in a personnel-shuffling mood: Cardinal Edward M. Egan has reassigned almost 10 percent of the active priests in the Archdiocese of New York without adequately consulting the personnel…

I’m not entirely sure what to make of this story, out of Minnesota. I’m sure the priest must have very good reasons for choosing this course of action. But if I had to ask myself WWJD … well, I don’t think it would be this: The mother of a 13-year-old autistic boy who was banned…
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