Works of Mercy – Page 5 – Perpetual Adoration

September 10, 2016

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An Icon of the Good Samaritan

The number one Catholic in the world, Pope John Paul II, called her “an icon of the Good Samaritan.” The number one atheist in the United States, Christopher Hitchens, called her “a religious fundamentalist, a political operative, [and] a primitive sermonizer.” Planned Parenthood called her a “very successful old and withered person, who doesn’t look in the least like a woman.”

August 13, 2016

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Often a bridesmaid . . .

Did you know that 100 years ago, very few people were concerned about body odor or bad breath? Back then, people weren’t focused on covering up the odors that were produced by their bodies. Their primary aim was to just get through the day. Simple things, like taking a bath, were difficult and time-consuming.

June 11, 2016

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The Simple Things In Life

I attended Saint Louis University School of Law from 1979 to 1982. There was a McDonald’s restaurant that was located about six blocks from the school. The area where the McDonald’s was located was run-down, and it was not uncommon to run into a homeless person when I stopped at McDonald’s for a bite to eat.

April 16, 2016

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A Decision Not To Be A Victim

Two weeks ago, I wrote about some of the abusive teachers that I had at the Catholic grade school that I attended during the 1960s. Last week, I wrote about how the behavior of those teachers wasn’t much different than the behavior of other teachers in the 1960s. I wrote that at that time, there were some parents and teachers who believed that abusing and humiliating boys was a necessary part of transforming them into real men.

December 12, 2015

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Star Wars and The Age of Entertainment

On Saturday, December 5, 2015, people started lining up at the TCL Chinese Theater IMAX (“TCL”) in Hollywood, California. Their plan was to camp out until the evening of December 17, when they would be allowed to enter the theater to watch the newest Star Wars movie, Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

July 25, 2015

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The Key to the Side Door

Last week, I wrote about an experience I had during the summer of 1974. At that time, I was 17 years old. I had a part-time job at the Ramada Inn in downtown Peoria, and one Saturday night after work, I drove to the Shrine Mosque in downtown Peoria to see if I could catch the second half of a show that featured a professional barbershop quartet. The quartet had won the previous year’s international competition of barbershop quartets.

July 18, 2015

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Backstage at a Professional Performance

During the spring semester of my junior year in high school (1974), I organized a barbershop quartet. I recruited three of my friends who were in the music program with me at the high school. We started out by practicing at the house of one of the guys in the quartet. We continued practicing throughout the summer and started performing in the fall.

November 1, 2014

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An End-of-Life Experience

You may have heard about the incident a couple of weeks ago (October 22) in Ottawa, Canada, when a Canadian soldier was gunned down by a homegrown terrorist, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau. The soldier’s name was Corporal Nathan Cirillo, and at the time of the incident he was on duty as a ceremonial guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Canadian National War Memorial.

August 30, 2014

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A Catholic Town Jester

Recently my daughter Maria purchased a write-it-yourself children’s book for her four-year-old daughter, Grace. The book came with some stickers of characters you would see in an animated movie about a castle and a royal family. The characters included a king, queen, princess, wizard, town jester, and prince in shining armor.