Catholic New York

A Family-Focused New Year

As the calendar turns to a New Year, we’re all looking ahead to better days. How can it be otherwise? The year 2020 was an annus horribilis, a horrible year, in so many ways—the sickness and … more

12/31/20

Hope Comes at Christmas

As we await the joyous celebration of the coming of our Lord at Christmas, we’re experiencing these weeks of Advent with a rising sense of hope that the light at the end of the pandemic tunnel is … more

12/17/20

Rulings Back Religious Freedom

Religious freedom came out a winner last week in two important pandemic-related court rulings in favor of New York’s Catholic parishes and schools. It’s about time. The constitutionally … more

12/2/20

Worthy of Elevation

First, we want to offer our heartiest congratulations to Cardinal-elect Wilton D. Gregory, the Archbishop of Washington who will become the first African-American cardinal at a Nov 28 consistory at … more

11/5/20

Their Brief Lives Were Blessed

They lived in different centuries and in different parts of the world, but in many ways Father Michael J. McGivney, founder of the Knights of Columbus, and Italian teenager Carlo Acutis exemplify the … more

10/21/20

McCarrick Report a Disturbing Recounting

Two years in the making, the Vatican’s exhaustive report on Theodore E. McCarrick’s rise in the Church hierarchy despite allegations of sexual misconduct is disturbing reading. The 90-year-old … more

10/18/20

Encyclical’s Message Is Timely

The new encyclical, signed Oct. 3 by Pope Francis, is a welcome document indeed during these tumultuous months of pandemic, civil unrest and political turbulence. Fratelli Tutti, translated as … more

10/7/20

New Seminary Rector a Familiar Presence

The storied history of St. Joseph’s Seminary, Dunwoodie, begins a new chapter this semester, welcoming a new rector, Bishop James Massa, as it enters its 125th anniversary year. We congratulate … more

9/24/20

Lebanon Is Not Alone

The response of the Church and individual Catholics to the devastating explosion in the Port of Beirut, Lebanon, one month ago has been impressive and heartwarming. The prayers, the expressions of … more

9/9/20

Turning Toward Reopening

As we approach the end of summer 2020, we in New York are in a situation that was unimaginable when we rang in the New Year eight months ago. Stay-at-home orders, mandatory masks in public, social … more

8/26/20

Walking With Others, In Sorrowful Remembrance

We’ve had a lot to cope with since we ushered in the new decade on January 1, 2020. The worldwide coronavirus pandemic and its social distancing restrictions, the resulting economic … more

8/12/20

Unemployed and Their Families Can’t Be Cast Aside

The bitterly contested extension of federal emergency unemployment benefits was playing out among Democrats and Republicans in Congress as we were closing this issue. We hope it’s been resolved … more

7/29/20

Story on Church Loans Way Off the Mark

A widely circulated Associated Press article on Catholic parishes’ and agencies’ participation in a federal coronavirus aid program is one of the most scurrilous pieces of mainstream journalism … more

7/15/20

Sunday Mass a Big Part of Return to Normalcy

Last Sunday, for the first time since religious gatherings were suspended due to the coronavirus pandemic, Sunday Masses were offered in churches of the northern counties of the archdiocese. True, … more

6/17/20

Will Cries for Justice and Healing Be Heard?

What’s happening to us, America? The outrageous killing of George Floyd, a black man, at the knee of a white Minneapolis police officer, and the resulting violent protests that swept cities … more

6/3/20

‘Sto Lat’ for a Spiritual Giant

There are many reasons that the long pontificate of St. John Paul II—from his election in 1978 to his death in 2005—was an exceptional period for the Church. He was, of course, a pope of many … more

5/20/20

Coming Out the Other Side

For at least the last two months, the coronavirus pandemic has been an all-consuming preoccupation around the world. And nowhere more so than in New York state, where the virus and the disease … more

5/6/20

Hailing Heroes in Our Midst

Each evening at 7 p.m., locked-down New Yorkers have been opening their windows and bursting into cheers and applause in honor of the nurses, doctors and other frontline heroes laboring through the … more

4/23/20

Easter’s Promise in Troubled Times

Our world and nation have struggled mightily in the battle against the deadly novel coronavirus. Nowhere have the effects been more devastating than our home state of New York, especially New York … more

4/9/20

‘Let’s Stay United’

In less than two weeks New York has gone from a state concerned with rising levels of coronavirus cases to the epicenter of the pandemic in this country. Part of the reason is that greatly … more

3/25/20