For years, a tattered and taped copy of the Aug. 30, 1902, issue of The Catholic Mirror has jockeyed for attention on my sometimes-cluttered desk at the Catholic Review.

Father Dale Picarella had just finished greeting a mob of parishioners at the end of Mass when I approached him in the sacristy with a special request. Would he visit my mother at Bayview Medical Center in East Baltimore as she was recovering from cancer surgery?

The goodness and humility witnessed by the future Baltimore archbishop were on display for all the world Feb. 11 when Pope Benedict XVI quietly announced in Latin that he would step down due to his advanced age and lack of stamina.

My brother was in line at a local supermarket when he observed a young woman strike up a conversation with an apparent longtime friend. Showing off her slightly protruding belly, the younger woman announced that she was pregnant.

Mercy Sister Lois Mueller was a bundle of energy when I first met her at The Villa retirement home in Baltimore three years ago. I was visiting for a story I was writing about how retired nuns kept in shape by playing bowling and other Nintendo Wii video games donated by students of St. Joseph School in Cockeysville.

The Scala Sancta, “Holy Stairs,” are believed to be the passageway Jesus walked on his way to face Pontius Pilate before the crucifixion. St. Helena, mother of Constantine, brought the staircase to the Eternal City from the Holy Land in the middle of the 4th century.

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 […]

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 […]

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 the likeness of the Hall of Fame third baseman was a replica of Michelangelo’s David. Joseph Sheppard, the Baltimore sculptor who crafted the Robinson statue, […]

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.