The Bible is the best-selling book of all time and a fundamental part of our faith, but it can be intimidating. Brian Strassburger, SJ, addresses some questions about the Bible to help you feel more comfortable picking it up.
Posts in Spirituality
Year after Year, The Gospels Wear Us Like a Pair of Leather Boots
The liturgical calendar invites us to order our lives around a cycle of stories. The same words return to collide with us in new ways. Like returning to a childhood bedroom in adulthood, memories pile up and dialogue.
As a Jesuit Political Scientist, Religion Doesn’t Often Play a Direct Role in My Work. Am I Still Serving the Church?
My work as a political scientist focused on the Middle East, may not always involve directly talking about God, but it is deeply enmeshed with how we see God and God’s people, and it involves being acutely aware of their needs and their dignity.
What St. Alberto Hurtado Said about His 1946 Visit to America
The great Chilean Jesuit saint reminds us that we are called to be more than what we produce and consume.
And The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round: On Death and Resurrection
The velorio, a gathering in the home of the deceased, is a Mexican tradition that allows loved ones to gather to share meals, memories and to mourn. And, even still, life around us is a reminder that not even death can conquer our hope.
Cancel Culture: Walking the Line Between Mercy and Justice
I’m living in the time of cancel culture. I notice that the news about cancel culture often triggers my temper because of how outrageous it can be. Although anger can be righteous whenever the news about cancel culture triggers my temper, I immediately want to react with everything I have. I want to ostracise the thing that causes harm to me and society. Those things do not deserve to exist, and, by wiping them out, society will be better, at least that’s what I think.
I Am a Jesuit and I Am an Alcoholic
I stopped drinking during the last semester of my regency, a stage of Jesuit formation where we work in a Jesuit institution. My last binge led me to see how my story with alcohol was going to end. If I kept on drinking, I would have left the Jesuits and continued deteriorating. In this “moment of clarity,” I decided that I needed to stop drinking in order to live. Though I am writing this anonymously, my story is a truth I carry with me. I am a Jesuit, and I am an alcoholic.
Sometimes I Sit Inside the Fog of My Prayer
The morning is gentle. I’ve come at the perfect time to sit and pray near the old living room windows. The sign of the cross, coffee on the window sill, closed eyes. I’m opaque inside today. I pray about yesterday. And sometimes my prayer isn’t always clear.
The Potter and the Bowl: In Whose Hands Do We Find Ourselves?
I’ve been throwing pottery for over a year now. For a while, I had the technique down, or at least down enough to center the clay and build from there. But lately, I have had the worst time centering the clay. As I sit with my struggles to center the clay, my mind wanders to the world around me: does anything feel centered these days?
Inauguration Day: A Prayer for Transition
Today is Inauguration Day. So much has happened leading up to this day that we offer this moment to God, to bless, to protect, and to guide this day into the way of peace. Pray with us today as our country takes time to transition and change.