Elizabeth Scalia

We enter 2025 after a careening, mad season of confusion, hate, deceit and instability. The sense that things are vastly off-kilter and that centers are not holding is almost palpable.

Thoughtfulness is slow-going, though, and other parts of my “wish list” seem stuck in a stifling inertia of bureaucracy, material reluctance or perhaps (to be charitable) indecision.

Muscular evangelization is not helped by a plethora of crumbling church buildings and sacraments going unbestowed amid dying congregations; evangelization requires energy, and bringing young, enthusiastic believers into community together begets exactly the happy vigor needed to effectively share the faith.

I passionately advocate for acknowledging the profound supernaturalism of the Catholic Church, where bread and wine, consecrated through prayer and ritual, bring into our space the very presence of the incarnate Lord, who feeds us, entering into our very veins and sinews, so we might become his vessels, bringing the light, the concern, the Body of Christ into the world.

We are left to ponder the notion of “diabolical disorientation” while being forced to remind church leaders that art — even the greatest works of artistic expression — can never be more important than people.

For many the idea of “finding time for real prayer” seems daunting as they imagine adding an hour to their already crammed schedules and then begin to consider all the things they will “need” to really get going: a prayer corner, with icons and statues and Bibles and breviaries.