By all rights, I didn’t deserve a Catholic education. Catholic education is a privilege and it requires commitment from school, parents and student to succeed. My parents and the school of my youth did their part, but it took years until I began to do mine. I’m a Catholic school …

Welcome to Christ and Culture, the newest online exclusive column for TheCatholicTelegraph.com. In this monthly piece, Father Thomas Wray will explore connections between Jesus Christ and his people through the lens of pop culture. Father Thomas Wray is a priest of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati and Director of the Office of …

Dear Father: : As we begin this Year of Mercy, I began to wonder about confession. How are priests trained to hear confessions? Dear Reader: The training of priests to hear confessions has changed over the centuries. Prior to the Council of Trent (1545-1563), priests were trained largely through an …

Let’s be honest. It’s easy to be cynical and jaded about the state of the world today. From the front page news it seems that all there is out there is a daily, ongoing, endless stream of violence. Depressingly, rather than be an antidote to it, religion seems to further …

Once I’ve heard “We wish you a merry Christmas” and “Jingle Bells” a few too many times each year, I turn to a an old secular hit to get a break. As we’ve begun the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy, I’ve been thinking about this “alternative Christmas carol” in a new …

The recording was soothing and stark at the same time but, almost 50 years ago, a particular recording of the Christmas classic “Silent Night/7 O’clock News,” captured the imaginations of many American teenagers. The recording was on the then-popular artists’ “Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme,” album. Simon and Garfunkel was …

As a young child, my older sister and I would battle for the right to blow out the Advent candles after our pre-dinner prayers. Mom and dad would handle the lighting, but the kids got to blow it out. If It wasn’t our turn, we’d fight until mom and dad …

Brian and Stacy and their three children went on a life-changing vacation on the Carolina shore last summer. One morning, an incident occurred that Brian still cannot shake. As he was walking the pier as the sun rose, he noticed a swimmer struggling in a riptide far from shore. In …

The commercial begins with a real nostalgic feel to it. Old photos in the background. Catchy tune in the air. It then proceeds to ask three generations the same question: When you were a kid what did you do for fun? The “grandparent” generation speaks of blueberry picking and growing …

Dear Father: I hate to sound cynical and tired, but do we really need a Year of Mercy after all the specially designated Years (Jubilee Year, Rosary, Eucharist, St. Paul, Faith, Consecrated Life, etc.) we have had? Dear Reader: Yes. We need such a year. Recently I attended a talk on Luke’s …