The Narthex

Mary gets her crown in Emmitsburg

The gleaming gold-leafed statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary that soars over Emmitsburg finally has her May crown.For the first time since the statue was erected a half century ago, the much-loved figure was adorned with a gigantic wreath of silk flowers hoisted 120 feet by a crane during a
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Living like Father Hipsley

When Father Milton A. Hipsley Jr. was pastor of St. Thomas Aquinas in Hampden in the 1980s, a visiting priest took note of stacks of unopened correspondence from the Catholic Center that seemed to be accumulating in the rectory. He asked Father Hipsley if he was worried about the unread letters.“I
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Remembering a friend

Christopher Gaul died Oct. 18, 2012. (CR file photo)Kneeling in the small parking garage at Catholic Review headquarters about a decade ago, Christopher Gaul and I went to work changing a flat tire on his small sports utility vehicle. Gaul, my former managing editor, confidently wielded an iron wrench to unloosen lug
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Community life inspires ‘miracle man’

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...
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A rare birthday present for St. Joan of Arc

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...
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Baltimore sculptor honors Brooksie

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...
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A glimpse into Archbishop O’Brien’s playful side

The archbishop has a well-earned reputation as a serious-minded and devoted leader who gives everything he has in service of a Church he loves. Yet, there's another side to him - a playful side that endears him those who know him.
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All together now: ‘I love my cross, I love my beads’

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...
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Our Lady of the Butterflies

An image of the Blessed Virgin Mary holding the Christ Child is made out of African butterfly wings. (CR Staff/George P. Matysek Jr.) One of the great joys of my recent pilgrimage to the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland was meeting Father Anastasio Roggero. The Carmelite priest, who shepherds the Church of Our Lady Victorious...
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Letters that made a difference

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 for
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‘The greatest temptation of my life’

Dominican Father Carleton Parker Jones (CR/Owen Sweeney III) Dominican Father Carleton Parker Jones calls it the “greatest temptation” of his life. It happened 21 years ago in the library of the Anglican Centre in Rome, where Father Jones was completing research for his doctoral dissertation on Blessed John Henry Newman. Blessed Newman, an Anglican priest...
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Calling St. Polycarp

When Marilyn Szewczyk was about to launch a network of pro-life pregnancy centers in Maryland, she turned to St. Polycarp for help. Reasoning that the obscure early Christian martyr didn’t have many people asking for his intercession, Szewczyk figured she’d have easy access to his ear. Lynn Anne Sukeena, one of Szewczyk’s daughters, told me...
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