These are the six US states with one remaining abortion clinic

Pope Francis participates in an interreligious meeting at the site of Ur, outside Nasiriyah, Iraq, March 6, 2021. / Vatican Media

Denver, Colo., Sep 14, 2021 / 10:53 am (CNA).
Real-life relationships and a “holy curiosity” must be the basis for … […]

South Bend, Ind., Sep 1, 2017 / 03:19 am (CNA).- With hopes of leading Catholics to a deeper search for Christ, a new puzzle book from Ave Maria Press challenges readers to expand their interaction with God’s mysteries.

“I open the book with a quote from Proverbs 25:2, ‘It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out’,” said Matt Swaim, author of Catholic Puzzles, Word Games, and Brainteasers: Volume 1.

“Properly understood, the idea of God as a mystery shouldn’t cause us to throw up our hands and stop searching him out; it should draw us to engage with him and get a window into his magnificence,” he told CNA.

Catholic Puzzles, which will go on sale Sept. 22, contains interactive word problems such as anagrams, code scrambles and crypto quizzes. The puzzles empower readers to learn more about saints, the mysteries of the rosary, Holy Scripture, and Church doctrine.

Swaim started developing fun interactive puzzles to aid his 8th grade CCD students with understanding Church teachings. After connecting with Ave Maria Press, a suggestion was made to put together a similar project for a broader adult audience.

“I think adults see their kids doing worksheets for religious ed classes and wish there were more of that kind of thing for their skill level out there.”

He said the puzzles are meant to be a challenge for older Catholics, but not so difficult as to deter anyone from giving it a try.

So far, he said, the response has been positive: “Most people are just excited to discover that something like this exists, and that it’s not at the elementary school level.”

Watching people wrestle with thought-provoking questions is one of his favorite things about the new book, Swaim said, noting that the struggle to solve a problem can help bring us to a deeper knowledge of it.

“Think about it – if you’re working on solving a particular encrypted saint quote for a half an hour, that’s 30 minutes for your brain to mull it over, let it sink in, and have it stay with you.”

He clarified that searching for truth and for Christ does not mean that we treat God like he is a Sherlock Holmes murder mystery. Rather, delving into the mystery of God’s creation gives us “a greater insight into just how wonderful and big and mind-blowing it is to be in relationship with him.”

Seeing God as a mystery doesn’t stop us from pursuing him, Swaim said, adding that growing in our relationship to God’s mystery is similar to the experience of getting to know another human person through friendship, marriage or parenting.

“If every person in this world is a unique, unrepeatable mystery to learn about and learn from, then how much more the God who created all of them?”

“God has hidden himself in his creation, in the faces of our neighbors, in the most minuscule aspects of our days. He’s constantly searching after us, but he also wants us to be searching after him.”

But we do not always search for God, he said. Instead, “we devote hours to studying the intricacies of the NFL” or memorizing quotes of “our favorite television shows.”

Swaim challenged Catholics: “What if we applied a fraction of that inquisitive fervor toward exploring our faith?”

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CNA Staff, Jun 16, 2020 / 04:28 pm (CNA).- Sen. Josh Hawley called Tuesday for religious conservatives to “stand up and speak out” for religious liberty in light of the recent Supreme Court decision in Bostock v. Clayton County.

The decision redefined discrimination in federal civil rights employment law to include gender identity and sexuality. 

In a June 16 floor speech, Hawley referred to the decision as “historic,” and “seismic,” adding that the decision marked the end of the “legal conservative project.”

The senator said religious conservatives have long voted for certain candidates under the presumption that they would appoint judges who would protect religious liberty. The Missouri senator classified himself as one of these “religious conservatives.”

“If this case makes anything clear, it is that the bargain that has been offered to religious conservatives for years now is a bad one,” said Hawley.

This unspoken bargain, he claimed, is that religious conservatives “go along with the (Republican) party establishment,” including supporting policies that, in his view, do not benefit lower- and middle-class workers, in exchange for “some judges on the bench who supposedly will protect your Constitutional rights to freedom of worship to freedom of exercise.”

Hawley was particularly critical of policies he said cut taxes on the rich and help out “multinational corporations,” while doing nothing to prevent jobs from going overseas.

“We are supposed to stay quiet about all of that and more because there would be pro-Constitution religious liberty judges. Except for they aren’t,” he said. “These judges don’t follow the Constitution.

“What (religious conservatives) sought together was protection for their right to worship, for their right to freely exercise their faith as the First Amendment guarantees, for the right to gather in their communities, for their right to pursue the way of life that their scriptures variously command and that the Constitution absolutely protects. That’s what they have asked for, that’s what they have sought all these years,” said Hawley.

The Supreme Court did not rule on the fate of churches and other religious institutions in its decision on Monday, writing that these topics were “questions for future cases.”

“No doubt they are,” said Hawley, saying these are “huge questions.” He added that he will “eagerly await” what the “super legislators across the street in the Supreme Court building” will have to say on this topic.

Hawley criticized his fellow legislators for failing to pass legislation on issues of critical importance.

“There’s only one problem with this piece of legislation,” Hawley said, referring to the Supreme Court’s decision.

“It was issued by a court, not by a legislature. It was written by judges, not by the elected representatives of the people. And it did what this Congress has pointededly declined to do for years now, which is to change the text and the meaning and the application and the scope of a historic piece of legislation.”

Hawley said that the other members of the legislature are “terrified” to put a vote on a potentially contentious issue on the record. He said that the legislature is now no longer accountable to the people who elected them, that in their refusal to pass legislation, “courts rush in.”

Now, said Hawley, is the time for religious conservatives “to bring forward the best of our ideas on every policy affecting this nation” and stop remaining silent on issues such as economics, trade, race, class, and “every subject that matters for what our founders called the general welfare.”

“The bargain which religious conservatives have been offered is not tenable,” said the Senator. “So I would just say it’s not time for religious conservatives to shut up. We’ve done that for too long. No, it’s time for religious conservatives to stand up and to speak out.”

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