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Tagged: conversion

A Pope for All People

Pope Francis welcomed actress and activist Whoopi Goldberg to a private audience recently, and he told her she was “really important.” I used to have a really hard time with news stories like this one. The pre-COVID, self-righteous version of...

I No Longer Call You Servant

I work with homeless and at-risk youth.  I’ve been doing it for 42 years, the first few decades in or around New York City but for the last 20 years in Vermont.  I’m an executive director, a role which entails...

My Lenten Call

Lent invites us to conversion, and the call to conversation can be painful. Worse, it can be embarrassing, especially when it comes from an unlikely source. I’ve recently experienced this myself, regarding a vice I barely even knew I had,...

On Metanoia and Grace 

In 1989, a youth minister named Janie Tinklenberg read a book authored by Topeka minister Charles M. Sheldon entitled In His Steps: What Would Jesus Do? In the book, Sheldon challenged his readers to consider how Jesus would respond when...

Let’s Not Canonize Shia Just Yet

Much has been made in recent weeks of actor Shia LaBeouf’s reported conversion to Roman Catholicism. To label Mr. LeBeouf, who was reared in a household he has characterized as “hippie Jewish,” a true convert to the ways of the...

The challenges of celebrity conversions

In our increasingly secular world, one would not expect a religious conversion to necessarily be breaking news. Yet when actor Shia LaBeouf shared in an interview with Bishop Robert Barron that he had decided to enter the Catholic Church after...