We are called to care for those sickened by pollution, house those displaced by environmental calamities, and heal the spirits of those - especially our youth - who are disheartened by a world where human survival is now in question.
Blase J. Cupich
Let's face it: grandparents are very important to family systems. You're babysitters, but you also instill values in children that sometimes skip a generation.
Clericalism is a form of elitism in which some are viewed as having special rights and privileges.
We are a democracy, and we get the leaders we deserve because we elect them.
We have to believe in the mercy and grace of God to trigger conversion rather than the other way around: that you're only going to get the mercy if you have a conversion. The economy of salvation doesn't work that way.
For generations, our political life was distorted by the influence of public officials whose foremost goal was to preserve the essence, if not the form, of slavery in a segregated and discriminatory social system.
I think that education is a pathway out of poverty for many people. It was for our family.
Collaborative governance needs to be more than calling on the advice and competence of others to make up for our episcopal shortcomings. Rather, governance involves seeking how God is revealing his work through others in the community.
We don't need military weapons in our society. We're not supposed to be at war with one another.
Pope Francis tells us who he is by pointing to Caravaggio's St. Matthew: 'Here, this is me, a sinner on whom the Lord has turned his gaze.' He is telling us that he has experienced the same rush of speechless wonder and graced love Caravaggio depicts in his painting.
My folks were very practical. They were also kind of able to think outside of the box. They were not going to let circumstance paralyze them. They knew sometimes you just had to take some new initiative. I think they passed that on to all of us... If you don't find a way, you make one.
The nation's children, families, poor, workers, and senior citizens deserve more than lip service. They deserve more than outrage. They deserve real support, protection, and solid action.
The church can challenge society, but society also challenges the church. That's good. We should be humble enough to be able to accept that.
Schooling people in the ways of ongoing discernment produces a greater receptivity to the tradition of the church and at the same time creates the freedom that will make them more responsive to the will of God throughout their lives.
I grew up in a family of nine children, and I know there has to be a back and forth and a listening.
It's important for people to give every leader the chance to step forward and look for ways to have dialogue.
Listen, talk, be respectful of people - and make sure that you have openness to where people are coming from. And you don't do anything that is unnecessarily antagonistic, that is only going to make you feel good because you've done it.
There is a synergy between the way Croatians approach life and the way Jesuits do. Croatians are very real about situations. We don't gloss over things. If there are issues to deal with, you deal with them.
I am never bored in my ministry because I continually see the impact of God in people's lives.
Science can and should inform debate about abortion and the law. But science does not resolve questions of moral value and moral choice.
We are a people unafraid to welcome 'your tired, your poor, your huddled masses,' because we measure others by the quality of their hopes for the future, not by the circumstances of their birth.
Some of the greatest Christians I know are people who don't actually have a kind of faith system that they believe in. But, in their activity, the way they conduct themselves, there's a goodness there.
We help immigrants because we are an immigrant nation, and we are an immigrant church. We've always done that; this is nothing new to us. This is not a new venture for us. It's who we are and have been from the very beginning of the history of the Catholic Church in this country.
There should be reluctance to make a national policy so inflexible that it fails to take into account the country's diversity.
Society cannot escape what is essentially a moral question: When does human life deserve legal protection from the state? And society certainly cannot escape this dilemma by denying that it is fundamentally a moral issue, no matter what position one chooses.
In the 40 years that I've been a priest and the 17 as a bishop, I have experienced people coming at things in a different way. That's the way adults are, that's the way the world is, and that's OK.
The long arc of history that recounts the Catholic Church's embrace of people of all faiths and none in providing health, education, and welfare in society is as incontestable as it is impressive.
Christ receives people; because of that mercy, conversion happens.
The open and generous nature of the American people has the capacity to astonish and push boundaries. We crowdfund, sign petitions, dump buckets of ice on ourselves, and embrace new ways of relating to our environment.
Once we begin to make our churches safety zones in a military-style approach, we're going to lose something of the character of our places of worship.
Once a bishop is appointed, in terms of governance, we are semi-autonomous. It's not like we are branch managers of a bank or something.
I think that the Pope has trust in every bishop that is appointed.
Here are the ingredients of a tragedy: untreated mental illness, a society where life is cheap and crime is glamorized, and a ready supply of firearms.
Our schools must be places where all are respected and the values of tolerance and peacemaking are taught and nurtured.
I commend the parents who are sending their children to a Catholic school, because they're making a sacrifice, and they're paying twice for their child's education: They're paying the tuition, and they're paying taxes.
This business of demonizing or pre-defining people by the way they look, the religion that they practice, or where they came from is not only un-American but it's going to hurt America.
I would say that every pope has had people within his administration who have had difficulties one way or another with his administration.
We have always wanted to make sure that we start the conversation by saying that all people are of value and their lives should be respected and that we should respect them.
People should be called the way that they want to be called rather than us coming up with terms that maybe we're more comfortable with.
If we create a framework for decision-making that is biased toward life, supportive of families, and fair to people of all circumstances, our policies, legislation, and commercial decisions will be vastly different.
We are an immigrant nation.
Once kids begin to realize that they are connected to a greater good and greater whole, then that will lessen the possibility that they will act out violently because it creates empathy.
We budget quite a bit of money every year in order to assist people who are migrating here, people who are trying to enter into our society and be a part of the American dream.
We have to be sure we don't pigeonhole one group as though they're not part of the human family, as though there's a different set of rules for them. That would be a big mistake.
I did my doctoral dissertation on the lectionary readings that we use at mass and how you have biblical texts that have been taken out of their original Bible context and put together for mass, and now they form a new text. Out of that new text, there is an interplay of new meaning.
I try to be sensitive to the power of language, to the power of language that God uses to reveal something about what Christ is doing in our time. That is why I'm always excited about preaching, because there is always something new.
I was really grateful to have a chance to have some really in-depth study about the power of language using a philosopher who taught at the University of Chicago by the name of Paul Ricoeur. I'm really happy to be in Chicago because a lot of what I do is rooted in his approach to language.
Those who do not think religious organizations should have an opinion on climate change misunderstand the former and the moral dimension of the latter.
Racism is a sin and has no place in the church, including the Archdiocese of Chicago.
We Catholics have been in the forefront in defending the dignity of the human person. Clericalism is a direct violation of human dignity.
