People with Down syndrome are valuable because they are people, members of the human family, cherished by God their creator.

This March, as we celebrate Women’s History Month, let us pledge to rediscover and remember the lives and labors of the Black women, like Mother Tolton, who in the face of unyielding discrimination fought to make the church in the United States truly Catholic.

When we act to protect our immigrant neighbors through trust policies, we are also benefiting the common good.

The moment is arriving when parish and diocesan staff must use all the tools available to them to create a welcoming community, giving people a reason to come back as soon as they feel safe to do so.

Theologians and liturgists praise the power of rituals at the core of our faith. Rhythms of prayer and traditions of worship orient our lives toward God and set a solid foundation in an ever-shifting world.

Don’t underestimate yourself. God has need of the talents you have been given. Prayer shows us how to use and multiply our gifts.

Perhaps it’s a blessing, then, that the church gives us Lent in midwinter. It’s a season of soul-searching; the gray skies give us no other choice but to turn inward and examine the dark spaces we’d rather not explore.

This Lent, I call on St. Clare of Assisi to show me the way. I need a sister in Christ to lead me through Lent radically different than in Lents past — to embrace penance, conversion and self-sacrifice as Jesus refines me.

On March 2, 1955, Claudette was a 15-year-old frightened Black girl who refused to give up her seat to a white woman on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama. She was jailed nine months before Rosa Parks was arrested for the same civil disobedience, but not in the same way.

In a time when we feel deeply divided and we’ve lost so much, what could we add or multiply to help those who need it most?