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Where Peter Is

Jesus Wants to Live His Life in Us

A reflection on the readings for Sunday, September 12, 2021 — The Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time There is a story from a little over fifty years ago, during the US civil rights era, in which one person told another how much he admired Martin Luther King Jr. The second person responded that there was...

Which Pope said this?

In place of the usual “guess the pope” feature that typically runs on Saturdays, we are sharing the words of the last three popes in commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States: Yesterday was a dark day in the history of humanity, a terrible affront to...

September 11 As a Childhood Memory

I’m a little hesitant to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks for Where Peter Is. But I volunteered to do so, and so here I am. As a member of one of the youngest cohorts that actually remembers it, I have a personal 9/11 story but I’m not sure...

The Anniversary of 9/11: I Remember

People are often surprised at my long history at CBS News. CBS, after all, isn’t exactly a farm team for Catholic clergy. I am probably the only man in history who went from working for Katie Couric to working for the pope. But my story, I hope, helps to tell our story. The...

Confessions of a former Pope Francis opponent

I am a convert to the Catholic faith, having been raised in a non-denominational Christian home and subsequently drifting between various stages of belief and doubt, though always claiming to believe in Jesus even if I didn’t live for Him. In my last couple months of RCIA—as I enthusiastically looked forward to entering...

What being Catholic Means

During my time working at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in the early 2000s, people—friends and colleagues as well as strangers—would ask why I stay Catholic. Mind you that my first few years there included 9/11 and the clergy sexual abuse crisis, events that would challenge anyone’s faith in a loving...

Blame Yourself

On Sunday, August 29th, Pope Francis provided a brief exegesis of the day’s Gospel passage from Mark, in which Jesus berated the hypocrites who “honor God with their lips” but whose hearts are far from him. For those who have read Francis’s writings and listened to him speak, one could immediately see the...

Be thou opened

A reflection on the readings for Sunday, September 5, 2021 — The Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time The Jesus of Mark’s Gospel doesn’t come to play. His mission is urgent and told at a breakneck speed. By Chapter 2, he can’t go anywhere without the crowds pressing in on him. The hunger and the need...

Which Pope said this?

This throwaway culture has marked us. And it marks the young and the old. It has a strong influence on one of the dramas of today’s European culture. In Italy, the average age is 47 years old. In Spain, I think it is older. That is to say, the pyramid has been inverted....