by John Clark | I went to school for the first five years of my academic life. During that time, if memory serves (and it decreasingly serves), I received many stickers on my papers. Somehow—and no one really knows why—stickers have become part of the primary academic life in America; they somehow signify achievement.

by Marc Postiglione | How would you define the word irony? Might I propose a good working definition as: a situation that is strange or funny because things happen in a way that seems to be the opposite of what you expected. The same Peter, who out of fear for his own life three times denied that he ever knew Jesus, is now standing in front of the Christian community in Jerusalem boldly declaring the truth about Jesus Christ for the entire world to hear.

by Mitchell Kalpakgian | It is common to hear students dismiss certain fields of knowledge as useless to their profession and career. Why should students majoring in information technology, accounting, music, or biology study philosophy, literature, or Latin? Surely they will not need this knowledge in their specialized, technical fields of study.

by Dave Armstrong | I've often used what I call the “nutshell” argument for Purgatory: we must be without sin to enter into God's presence (Eph 5:5; Heb 12:14; Rev 21:27; 22:3, 14-15). Therefore, God must purge or wash away our sin to make us fit to be in heaven with Him. All agree so far.

by John Clark | Years ago, I inquired of a wise, old friend as to what her favorite religious movie was. Her answered surprised me. She said: “I don’t watch religious movies. The images in them can effect your reading of Scripture for the rest of your life.” Her point was that, after seeing a film, your meditations are influenced by what you have seen. The more I thought about it, the more I realized she had point.

by Mitchell Kalpakgian | According to the worldly wise, the end justifies the means. If one achieves his ambitions, he need not be scrupulous or squeamish for doing what most people do—even if they are dishonest.

by Gene McGuirk | For many years, the U.S. military has made it difficult for home-schooled high school students to enlist. They were often considered to be “non-graduates.” Seton has had many calls from families over the years about our graduates whom some branch would not permit to enlist. In recent years, the Department of Defense (DOD) has been running an ongoing test of new homeschooled recruits to see if they could fit in.

by Dave Armstrong | My specialty as an apologist is “biblical arguments for Catholicism.” I enjoy that aspect of my work a lot because the Bible is the great “common ground” that all Christians share (and I strive to be ecumenical). We all reverence Sacred Scripture and believe it is inspired revelation.

by John Clark | We’ve all probably been in conversations in which a parent will comment that his child spends too much time on the computer or iPad, as though the parent had no control at all over his children. That’s pretty sad for a number of reasons, beginning with the fact that it alludes to a relationship breakdown.

by Dave Armstrong | We can learn a lot from words: especially if we go back to the Latin roots of many of our English words. All Christians are familiar with the notion of God being the Creator. He made all things from nothing (theologians describe this with the wonderful Latin phrase, creatio ex nihilo).

by Mitchell Kalpakgian | The custom of visiting on Sundays and holidays, once a natural part of a human life, has waned in the last fifty years. Visitors feel the obligation to call in advance and ask permission lest they impose or inconvenience their hosts. Hosts who receive visitors sense the need to have ample provisions...

by Bob Wiesner | The Te Deum is an ancient prayer of praise, dating to the 4th Century. Traditionally ascribed to Saints Ambrose and Augustine, composed to commemorate Augustine’s baptism, scholars now also argue for the authorship of Saint Hilary or Bishop Nicetas of Remesiana. Whoever wrote it, it has a long history in the Church.

John Clark shares ideas for when you've got no time to be in the kitchen, and how to cook meals in less than thirty minutes.

by Mitchell Kalpakgian | The French phrase “déjà vu” (already seen) carries a negative connotation. If something is déjà vu, it means that one has done something, been someplace, or had an experience that he does not want to repeat, revisit, or undergo again.

by Dave Armstrong | Some things are so obvious that we take them for granted. We don't feel that we need to “argue” them because we casually assume that everyone “knows they are true.” The old Frank Sinatra song comes to my mind: “Love and marriage: go together like a horse and carriage . . .”

by John Clark | Does social networking fulfill man’s need to partake of society, thus removing his binary reduction to man or beast? Is the internet a society at all? These are philosophical questions best left to sociologists. I don’t have the answers. I merely ask them in an everyday, pedestrian sense.

by Mitchell Kalpakgian | In the “Preface” to The Great Divorce C. S. Lewis explains the nature of moral error in the modern world as an endless progression on the wrong road-- the assumption that all roads sooner or later lead to the same destination.

Marc Postiglione unpacks Pope St. John Paul II's encyclical, 'Redemptor Hominis' - 'Redeemer of Man', a message of personal dignity, freedom and truth.

by Kevin Clark | When you first graduate from college, you attend many weddings. For the five years or so after college, several weddings seem to come every year—some weddings where you know the betrothed well and you are actually in the wedding party, and some where you merely witness the proceedings.

by Dr Kalpakgian | By giving Curdie “some” of the truth Irene led him to “all” of it. By giving Curdie time and being content to be misunderstood for a short period, Irene led her friend to the fullness of the truth. To be a messenger like Irene is to speak the simple truth and let God do the rest.