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The Deacon's Bench

Just in time for the holidays, a group of priests in New York City (Staten Island, to be precise) is embarking on a mission to bring wandering Catholics back into the fold. Take a look: Since the summer, Monsignor Edmund Whalen has been encouraging his parishioners at St. Joseph-St. Thomas in Pleasant Plains to invite…

Barack Obama fared much better among religious voters than John Kerry did in 2004 — and this piece from the Wall Street Journal helps to explain why: The Obama campaign prevailed among Catholics despite sermons and letters from several conservative bishops across the country, who warned it would be a grave sin for Catholics to…

It was James Earl Jones. Anybody remember this? From 1972, “The Man,” a drama about the first black President of the United States.

Amy Welborn is thinking it may be a Kennedy. Or maybe Doug Kmiec? I’m thinking Obama may have bigger plans for Caroline Kennedy, who broke with Democratic orthodoxy when it was unfashionable, and who spearheaded Obama’s veep search. Seems to me, she could be more useful to him in a high profile spot in this…

This morning, as is my custom, I had some deep conversations with myself in the shower. And I was wondering: if our show were on the air right now (it doesn’t debut until the spring), how would we cover The Morning After? And, since I always win these arguments with myself, I decided it would…

The man elected yesterday to be the leader of the free world received a congratulatory message today from someone who’s above his pay grade: Pope Benedict XVI sent a personal message to President-elect Barack Obama Nov. 5, congratulating him and offering his prayers for Obama and for all the people of the United States. Jesuit…

“Tonight — tonight, more than any night, I hold in my heart nothing but love for this country and for all its citizens, whether they supported me or Senator Obama — whether they supported me or Senator Obama. I wish Godspeed to the man who was my former opponent and will be my president. And…

Rocco called it, aptly, a “repudiation,” and now others are weighing in with their thoughts about how Catholics voted yesterday. Here’s Thomas Reese, SJ, from the Washington Post: Catholic voters ignored the instructions of a group of vocal bishops and delivered 54% of their vote for Barack Obama as president of the United States. These…

The world heard two remarkable addresses Tuesday night: John McCain’s gracious concession speech and Barack Obama’s soaring victory speech. But I was struck by this: when McCain mentioned his opponent, the crowd booed. That didn’t happen when Obama mentioned McCain.

On CBS News tonight, Bob Schieffer spoke of how he attended segregated schools when he was growing up in Texas. “A black person had never attended any of my schools,” he said. Correspondent Byron Pitts told Katie Couric about how his mother grew up in a world where a black woman could not look a…
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