Browsing News Entries
Martyrs of Damascus
Posted on 07/10/2025 16:00 PM (CNA - Saint of the Day)

Feast date: Jul 10
Beatified by Pope Pius XI in 1926, these eight Franciscan friars and three Maronite laymen were offered the choice of converting to Islam or suffering death in Damascus on July 9, 1860.
Thousands of Maronite Christians had already been killed by the Druz in Southern Lebanon in that year and the Druz, an offshoot sect of Shiite Islam, had turned their attention to Damascus where they killed nearly two thousand more.
When they had reached the Franciscan convent there, the superior, a spaniard named Fr. Emmanuel Ruiz, who had sheltered the Christians that lived around the convent inside the chapel, was threatened with death if he did not convert immediately.
He refused and they cut him to pieces and killed the rest of his community and the three Maronites who, refusing to flee with the other Christians, chose to die rather than deny their faith.
St. Amalberga
Posted on 07/10/2025 16:00 PM (CNA - Saint of the Day)

Feast date: Jul 10
St. Amalberga, otherwise Amelia, was born at Brabantrelated, and was in some way related to Pepin of Landen. Whether she was a sister or niece, the Bollandists are not sure. She was married to Witger and became the mother of three saints: Gudila, Reinelda, and Emembertus.
The Norman chroniclers speak of her as having been married twice, which seems to be erroneous. Nor are Pharailda and Ermelende admitted by the Bollandists to have been her children. She and her husband ultimately withdrew from the world; he becoming a monk, and she a nun. There is very great confusion in the records of this saint, and of a virgin who came a century after. To add to the difficulty a third St. Amalberga, also a virgin, appears in the twelfth century. The first two are celebrated simultaneously on July 10.
She died in 690 and is buried beside her husband at the Lobbes monastery. Her relics have been in Saint Peter's abbey church in Ghent, Belgium since 1073. She is known to protect people against arm pain, bruises, and fever.
In art she is represented holding a palm and open book with a crown at her feet, standing on a giant sturgeon or other fish.
Now is time to build new world without inequality, injustice, pope says
Posted on 04/19/2020 07:58 AM (CNS Blog)
Pope Francis’ ‘journalism for peace’ starts with you
Posted on 08/2/2018 17:54 PM (Blog)
Is it just me or is the truth getting harder to find? It seems there is an increasing disagreement in our country over how to interpret both the news and the Good News. For example, let me make my biases clear: The Bible tells me to welcome immigrants. Here’s where I’m getting that from: “When […]
The post Pope Francis’ ‘journalism for peace’ starts with you appeared first on U.S. Catholic.
Flint’s holy water
Posted on 04/30/2018 16:46 PM (Blog)
In the spring of 2016, as a graduate student at Michigan State University, I spent some time in Flint interviewing residents and business owners on how they were dealing with the lead crisis. I attended Ash Wednesday Mass at St. Michael Catholic Church in Flint and was heartbroken to see the drinking fountains and faucets […]
The post Flint’s holy water appeared first on U.S. Catholic.
How to talk to your children about Jesus’ death
Posted on 03/27/2018 19:01 PM (Blog)
“Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” blares from the Echo Dot sitting on our kitchen counter. We listen to it so much, my 3-year-old daughter Dahlia perfectly mimics the announcement of it in that sing-songy computer voice of Alexa’s. “‘Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer’ by Gene Autry,” they report in unison, with the first syllable in […]
The post How to talk to your children about Jesus’ death appeared first on U.S. Catholic.
A Catholic celebrates Persian new year
Posted on 03/22/2018 13:12 PM (Blog)
I observe two new year celebrations in three months. First, I celebrate New Year’s Day on January 1. Every year, I watch the ball drop at midnight on television, sing “Auld Lang Syne” with family and friends, and sleep in late the next day after celebrating the night before. But the big new year celebration […]
The post A Catholic celebrates Persian new year appeared first on U.S. Catholic.
Keeping faith despite the worst kind of sins
Posted on 02/23/2018 13:07 PM (Blog)
I felt welcome at Michigan State University right away. My journalism professors gave me the tools I needed to succeed in my profession, and I made some great friends. I even found a nice Catholic church within walking distance from campus—St. John Church and Student Center, part of St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in the Lansing […]
The post Keeping faith despite the worst kind of sins appeared first on U.S. Catholic.
Puerto Rico: ‘An unprecedented level of need’
Posted on 11/6/2017 11:35 AM (CNS Blog)
Historic Tomb of Michelangelo and altarpiece in dire need of repairs
Posted on 10/11/2017 06:19 AM (CNS Blog)