“Here’s something you might want to do,” said my husband, as we left church one Sunday. He pointed to an item in the parish bulletin: Has your life ever been touched by the Sisters of St. Joseph? Would you like to return the kindness? It went on to ask for volunteers to help out at the local nursing home for the retired nuns from the order. More »

How did the son of a wealthy merchant become the town beggar? What would prompt a popular young bachelor to start talking dreamily about “Lady Poverty”? What would cause him to abandon the party scene and spend his time rebuilding a ramshackle old chapel stone by stone? More »

Padre Pio (May 25, 1887–September 23, 1968) is a good role model for any of us who are dealing with physical suffering. This Capuchin priest is a contemporary saint and one of the most popular of modern times. St. Pio of Pietrelcina, as he is more formally known, is famous for bearing the stigmata, the marks of Christ’s passion, for more than fifty years. The pain he experienced from the open wounds was intense and unending. More »

We’ve all heard about the typical “renaissance man”—someone who is talented in a wide variety of areas and who puts those talents to good use. More »

By any account, 590 was a disastrous year in Rome. Plague had struck, sweeping through the homes of poor and wealthy alike. Even the pope was carried away by the fearsome disease. The spring floods were the worst in memory; the Tiber broke through its retaining walls, causing enormous damage. More »

It was an adolescent prank—pears stolen from a neighbor’s tree. But as Augustine looked back on the incident many years later, it seemed reprehensible to him. More »

Most people are familiar with the eight hundred-year-old Dominican Order, one of the ten largest religious communities in the world. But how many know much about its founder, St. Dominic? More »

In third grade Sr. Cordelia gave out free tickets to the movies for every student in the class. In fact, Catholic school kids throughout Chicago were offered the tickets to see a movie about a Catholic saint. More »