Blog - October 2011 RSS Feed

Recently specific aspects of the New York City sexual education curriculum have come to light. The guidelines laid out for our most precious gifts–our children–are deeply disturbing. I’d like to share with you an op-ed on the topic in the New York Times by Professor Robert George and Melissa Moschella at Princeton University: “Imagine you have a 10- or 11-year-old child, just entering a public middle school.

Father Walter Birkle used this example recently during his excellent sermon for the funeral Mass of Father Michael Peluso. Seems as if a funeral home in California embarked upon an aggressive marketing campaign to sell caskets:  they would “custom design” caskets!

I am grateful to the New York Daily News for their editorial in today’s paper that chastises Susan Sarandon, because she “defamed” our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, with her “grotesque characterization” that he is a Nazi.

Yesterday’s Gospel has one of the most familiar refrains in all of scripture — “Then repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” (The whole Gospel can be found here .) I thought you might be interested in my homily from yesterday’s Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Reflecting on the words of today’s gospel, “Give to Ceasar what belongs to Ceasar, but give to God what is God’s,”  Cardinal Dolan challenges us to look at the moral questions this raises. How does a person of faith balance these duties?

It took a Jewish woman to remind me of the irreplaceable significance of prayer and penance in the life of a believer. This is my third autumn with you here in New York, and each year I have been inspired by how seriously our Jewish neighbors take their high holy days.

Cardinal Dolan reflects on the experience of receiving invitations — we like to receive them and God loves to send them to us!

Richard Riordan, the founding president of the Los Angeles Catholic Education Foundation, announced a new campaign to raise $100 million for Catholic schools in the Los Angeles area. Riordan wrote an insightful article in the Wall Street Journal last week about  the importance of funding for  Catholic education.

Today my co-host, Father Dave Dwyer, and I had the pleasure of interviewing Martin Sheen for our radio program, A Conversation with the Archbishop for The Catholic Channel on Sirius XM Satellite Radio .

Senator Ruben Diaz had a immigration rally this past Sunday. Msgr. Kevin Sullivan, Executive Director of New York Catholic Charities represented Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio and me. We wrote the following letter in support of Senator Diaz’s rally: October 2, 2011 Dear Friends: Although we are not able to be present with you this afternoon because of parish Masses, we express our solidarity with you who have come together in the Bronx to stand with our immigrant sisters and brothers.

Cardinal Dolan reminds us that the month of October is the month of the Holy Rosary and encourages us to pray the Rosary.