Find within these pages a clearinghouse of articles, news, links, events, collaboration tools and other resources shared with fellow priests. New pages every week — look forward to an expanding toolbox of practical resources at your fingertips!
News Bytes for Your Parish Bulletin
- Greek Bishops Defend Crucifix
- Chilean Priest Recovering From Stabbing at Mass
- Corruption in Latin America Seen to Be Multiplying
Internet: Pastoral Tool
Internet has become a common tool in homily preparation, evangelization and pastoral support, says a study about the use of digital technology by priests worldwide. The study, presented in a press conference at Vatican Radio, reflects the "new cultural world" of digital technologies, observed Cardinal Cláudio Hummes, prefect of the Congregation for Clergy. The study, carried out by a research center in Switzerland with the support of the Vatican congregation, found that 94.7% of priests access the Internet on a daily basis for a variety of activities.
Priestly Identity
The archbishop of New York is urging priests to remember that their vocation is an identity, not simply a career. Archbishop Timothy Dolan affirmed this in a lecture he gave in Ireland, marking the Year for Priests. In his address, the prelate said: "If the very value of my priestly vocation depends on what I do, where I'm assigned, how the people affirm me […]; if, in a word, my value depends on what I do, sooner or later we'll get frustrated, cynical, exhausted, crabby, bored and tempted." He added: "Our value must come from who we are."
News Bytes for Your Parish Bulletin
- Priesthood Seen as Gift in Fragile Vessel
- Cardinal Rode Visits Peru's Movements, Religious
- 300,000 Given to Aid Oil Spill Victims
- Economic Think Tank Compares Policy With Church
Nature vs. The Pill
The contraceptive Pill received wide praise in the media on the occasion of its 50th anniversary. But moral theologian William E. May notes that many women today (and their gynecologists) reject "artificial" methods of contraception and rejoice over the natural method of Fertility Awareness Method, or FAM. Also known as natural family planning, May says the morally-permissible NFP is just as reliable, "indeed more reliable," than any artificial method of birth control in enabling wives and husbands to avoid causing a pregnancy for good reasons.