Catholic Dads

Stairway to Heaven is a weekly feature exploring how to live our Catholic faith in our culture.

Our ways aren’t always God’s ways and we shouldn’t short-circuit him.

Today is my birthday. The older I get, the more I want to downplay this day.

But, this day has to be something more to me, because it is also the anniversary of the day my birth mother placed me for adoption. And, through no other explanation than divine providence, the anniversary of the day I found my adoptive parents 8 years later.

Here in the UK, we have an annual Red Nose Day, instigated by comedians to raise funds for charity. The funds are channeled through an organisation called Comic Relief, and distributed to numerous charities, doing fantastic work around the world. This year, the day was last Friday, and a record £74.3 million (about $119 million). [...]

Stairway to Heaven is a weekly feature exploring how to live our Catholic faith in our culture.

40 Days for Life is a national prayer campaign to end abortion. It works and is an excellent way for pro-lifers to do something.

Are you pro-life?

Do you want to DO something?

You knew it was coming. You hoped it wasn’t, but in a society as debauched as ours, it is hardly surprising. [ABCNews] Angie Jackson says nothing is off-limits on Twitter, not even the details of her abortion [to] chronicle her experience taking RU-486, commonly known as the abortion pill, in an attempt to “demystify” abortion [...]

These events originally happened to me on April 21, 2009. —————————- It was a day like today. It was neither especially warm nor cold. It was slightly overcast, but nothing to speak of. The work day had been especially average, with nothing particular to recommend it. Things were quiet, no dramas unfolded. It was a [...]

Before you go off, I just wanted to share something that just happened to me on Twitter. I received a tweet from @americanpapist asking us to: Urgent: #Defund Planned Parenthood *today* –>http://tinyurl.com/lcqjcb (please RT this!!) (RT is “retweet” or the equivalent of “forward” to the uninitiated.) So, I did–but I used my predominantly Scouting (Boy [...]

Dear Fr Jenkins I read your eulogy of President Obama with interest, particularly your justification for inviting and honouring a man so at odds with Catholic thinking. You are reported* as saying, inter alia: “As the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council wrote in their pastoral constitution Gaudium et Spes: “Respect and love ought to [...]

It may be time to stop buying Judy Blume books.  Here is something that surprised me, and made so clear that Judy Blume, whatever her past insights, clearly does not get it now. Posted at The Catholic Key Blog from a Planned Parenthood Action Fund email: My “Friend”, Cecile Richards at Planned Parenthood Action Fund [...]

We have four new children in our family. We spiritually adopted four children conceived on the feast of the Annunciation, and due to be born on Christmas day, but who are at risk of being aborted. We do not know who or where these unborn children are, but we will pray for them every day [...]

During a march for life, I came across a group of women holding up black signs that read “I regret my abortion.” They looked at us gratefully, as though to say, “Thanks for caring.” I saw the sadness in their eyes and in my heart I grieved for their loss and pain. This morning, it [...]