Modern cultural influences, including technology and shifting views on identity, risk weakening human relationships and spiritual development, said Cardinal Arthur Roche, the prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments.

After his death on the cross, Jesus descended into the “hell” that was simply the netherworld in order to free the dead who had sought to love and honor God despite the original sin that bound them, in order that Jesus might bring them into the fullness of life

St. Francis of Assisi was declared a saint nearly 800 years ago, just two years after his death. Not until much more recently — about 50 years ago — was the beloved 13th-century Italian friar called the patron of ecology.

The Way of the Cross — and the third, seventh, and ninth stations in particular — has been an especially appropriate Lenten devotion this year. Every day, it seems, some new craziness erupts in the world, the country, or the Church. Every time we think we see rays of hope and possibility, we take another fall.

In the early Church, the feast day of the Resurrection of the Lord was simply called Passover, or some translation of that word, as it still is to this day in most languages of the world. This is where we get the word “paschal” in the Paschal Mystery. That just means, “the Passover Mystery.”