Vatican experts have declined to consider the case of the apparent healing of an Annapolis woman as the miracle needed for the canonization of Blessed Francis X. Seelos, a 19th century Redemptorist priest who was pastor of St. Alphonsus in Baltimore, St. Mary in Annapolis and Ss. Peter and Paul in Cumberland.Read More

Redemptorist Father John Murray is convinced he’s a walking miracle. After suffering a fall that left him paralyzed from the chest down, the former pastor of St. Mary in Annapolis and St. Wenceslaus in Baltimore began praying for Blessed Francis X. Seelos – a former St. Mary’s pastor – to intercede on his behalf. As noted in this...Read More

Pope Benedict XVI minces no words when he describes the medieval judges who interrogated and sentenced St. Joan of Arc to death 580 years ago. The French clergymen were aligned with St. Joan’s political opponents, the pope said in a Jan. 26 general audience, and they “lacked charity and the humility to see God’s action in...Read More

A statue of Brooks Robinson is unveiled Oct. 22 outside Oriole Park at Camden Yards in Baltimore. (CR/George P. Matysek Jr.) Before the new statue of Baltimore’s beloved Brooks Robinson was unveiled last weekend beneath a blast of black, orange and white confetti outside Oriole Park, the bronze behemoth rested in a foundry in Pietrasanta, Italy. Standing right next to...Read More

A song from the “Manual of Select Catholic Hymns and Devotions.” (CR Staff/George P. Matysek Jr.) They just don’t write hymns like the ones I recently stumbled across in an old Catholic songbook at the recently closed St. Michael Church, Fells Point. Published in 1925, the yellowed and crumbling “Manual of Select Catholic Hymns and...Read More

Despite Deacon Richard Novak’s familiar injunction to “go in peace to love and serve the Lord,” few parishioners seemed eager to leave following the July 31 morning Mass at St. Michael in Fells Point.Read More

Father Milton Hipsley holds his rosary at his Mercy Ridge residence in Timonium last year. (CR/Owen Sweeney III) Father Milton Hipsley's letters started arriving on my desk in the summer of 2009. Very neatly written in all capital letters, the notes always seemed focused on the importance of kindness and of taking time forRead More

Jim and Pat McDonnell spent less than a minute in the presence of Pope John Paul II, but it was enough to change their lives.Read More