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The Deacon's Bench

Last year, I had my first experience scaling the Everest of liturgical chant, the Exultet. (I blogged about that, and my first Triduum, here, and that account was recently reprinted in Deacon Digest.) I know a few guys who now find themselves in the same position I was in last year: staring at the calendar,…

From Zenit‘s Hollywood desk: An Academy Award-winning director is planning a movie on Japanese Christians martyred in the 17th century. Martin Scorsese will film the movie in New Zealand and release it in 2010, according to the Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun. Names of actors linked to the project include Daniel Day-Lewis (pictured on the left),…

After making headlines last fall, Bishop Joseph Martino of Scranton is doing it again, and upping the ante in the pro-life battle. From the local press: In a letter to the heads of three local Irish organizations, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Scranton has threatened to close St. Peter’s Cathedral in Scranton during St. Patrick’s…

I can’t believe it, but I’m the same age as Barbie. Needless to say, she’s holding up a lot better than I am. To mark this milestone — hers, not mine — there’s an exhibit now underway in Baltimore. And it’s giving people an opportunity to assess the moral and social impact of this shapely…

… the more they stay the same. Why does this feel like Groundhog Day? (Which remains, to my way of thinking, one of the smartest and subtlest and sweetest conversion stories ever captured on film.)

At the “calling of the candidates,” Miguel Echevarría of St. Catherine of Siena Church, Kennesaw, joins his fellow deacon candidates in the center aisle of the Cathedral of Christ the King, Atlanta, during the Feb. 7 diaconate ordination as his wife, Maria, left, looks on. (Photo by Michael Alexander) Just in time for Lent, the…

Well, who’d a thunk? McNamara’s Blog has this fascinating tidbit about the leader of the confederacy, who loved nuns and reputedly wore a Miraculous Medal: When he was a child, future Confederate President Jefferson Davis attended Catholic school for a short while, the College of St. Thomas near Springfield, Kentucky. (In those days, “college” was…

We’ve known for a long time that men and women often seem to be from different planets. Now, it turns out, that idea may also apply to how we sin: Women are prouder than men, but men are more lustful, according to a Vatican report which states that the two sexes sin differently. A Catholic…

If you’re wondering what the Holy Father had to say to the Speaker of the House, Whispers has a glimpse: Following the General Audience the Holy Father briefly greeted Mrs Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, together with her entourage. His Holiness took the opportunity to speak of the requirements of…

One of the passengers on that miracle flight that landed in the Hudson thinks that miracle may be due to something more than just divine intervention — perhaps, Divine Mercy. From Florida Catholic: Frederick Berretta humbly admits to being away from the church, to his “half-hearted approach to living the faith and not trusting in…
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