My colleague, Josh McElwee, reports on Pope Francis's sermon in Ecuador yesterday. One section of the homily really jumped out at me:
"Families have to risk to give love, to share love," he said, adding briefly to his prepared text. "We must risk to give love out to others."
The best "will come in spite of all the variables and statistics which say the opposite," the pope continued. "The best wine is yet to come for those who see everything crumbling down."
"Mumble it until you believe it," he told the crowd. "The best wine is yet to come, and whisper it to the desperate or unloved. Open your heart for the best of wines that will come."
Those words - "mumble it until you believe it" - speak to something deep about our faith in the Word made flesh.
The USCCB's bulletin insert on same sex marriage is appalling. No mention of the Catechism's call for respect. Dire prognostications about religious liberty. They are circling the wagons over at the USCCB but as the fons says, "Those who are circling the wagons often realize, alas too late, that they are really circling the drain."
Video of John Carr's event on the environment last week, featuring, among others, Fordham's Christiana Peppard and EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy. Anne Thompson on NBC was her usual incisive, smart self and I was very intrigued by the comments of Ralph Izzo who works for an energy company but who was also not the least defensive about the encyclical and its challenges. Another home run for Carr's Initiative on Catholic Social Thought in Public Life.
