In a Hospital Room
 "As I write these words, uncertain of the outcome of tests I will be undergoing early tomorrow morning, I find myself in unutterable peace, a peace born of the grace of God and of the goodness of God's people. Life is such a gift, and after almost 80 years of living it, I have no sentiment so strong as gratitude."  - Sept. 2, 1999 

That Research on Abortion and Crime 
"The Washington Post report describes conjectures that 'As women gained the right to terminate pregnancies, they gave birth less often to unwanted, economically deprived children who grow up into the kind of young adults most prone to commit crimes.' In other words, it is suggested that abortion has lowered the crime rate by assuring that fewer poor people are born to break the law."  - Aug. 26, 1999  

Ten Good Men for a Power-Mad World 
"Ten good men and true as they are, they will lie face down on the floor of the sanctuary of St. Patrick's Cathedral on Saturday, the 15th of May, 1999, as a sign of their becoming servants of God's People, as priests. Should the day come that any one of them should believe himself to be, if only for a fraction of a moment, more than a servant, for that fraction of a moment he would demean his priesthood." 
 - May 13, 1999 

Gentle Woman, Quiet Light 
"My mother was not a woman for all seasons after the fashion of a Thomas More. Nor would Henry VIII have cared what she thought, said or did. She never could have threatened his royal power or even his royal ego. He would have looked at her as a nobody, if he looked at her at all. And with that she would have been quite content. But she was a woman for my seasons and for the seasons of the rest of the kids in our family." - May 6, 1999 

A Priority: Efforts for Justice for All 
"Many others have come to see me since I issued an invitation to do so, after the death of Mr. Diallo. With each group, each individual, I have discussed my fundamental and passionate conviction: that constructive and lasting change will come in direct proportion to the recognition by each of the sacredness of every human person as made in the image of God." - April 1, 1999 

Will I Be Holier? 
"Holy Week has a wonderful way of reminding us of how little we have accomplished if we have not begun to be holy. At the same time, the words of Cardinal Newman offer hope to the least of us in the struggle: 'To obtain the gift of holiness is the work of a life.' "
 - March 25, 1999 

The Drug That Gets Away With Murder 
"There can be no question, drugs as we commonly think of them are fearsome, pernicious, horrifyingly destructive. But a mind-altering, mood-altering addictive drug too rarely thought of as a drug at all receives far too little notice and literally gets away with murder: alcohol." - January 7, 1999

 Pastoral Reflections on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass 
"May I suggest that young people today secretly hunger to be lifted out of themselves, long to be divinized, are the first to recognize that if the Mass is nothing more than they can watch on video shows on television, it is not worth their time?" - December 3, 1998

Pastoral Reflections on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass 
"I would hate to see a surge toward moral rigidity, but are there some today who either see nothing as sinful--indeed, have lost the very notion of sin--or believe that by receiving the Eucharistic Christ their sins are 'automatically' forgiven?" - November 12, 1998

Pastoral Reflections on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass 
"The reality is that everything the Church teaches rises or falls on the basis of both who Jesus is and who he said he is. If he is not the Son of the Living God; if he is not the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, equal to the Father and to the Holy Spirit; if he did not become man; if he did not suffer and die for us; if he did not rise from the dead, then everything the Church teaches, everything we believe, is vain and empty, 'a tale told by an idiot,' as Shakespeare's Macbeth calls life itself, 'filled with sound and fury, signifying nothing.' " 
- September 17, 1998 

Pastoral Reflections on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass 
"In my own judgment, this 'crisis of worship,' as it has been called, is the most serious crisis confronting the Church today. Some may consider that judgment excessive. I do not." - September 10, 1998

What a Way to Spend a Lifetime 
"For the priest, of course, and the religious, this is at the heart of their vocation: to encourage, inspire, shout from the housetops the wonder and the glory of knowing and loving and serving God, to proclaim to the whole world the priceless value of souls. What a way to spend a lifetime." - April 30, 1998 

After Good Friday...Easter 
"The most poignant moment during Holy Week for me every year comes when I enter the cathedral on Good Friday to begin the three-hour commemoration of the hours that our Divine Lord spent on the cross." - April 9, 1998 

Holy Week: A Meditation 
"Holy Week is the great summation, Easter the great culmination of everything that Catholics and many other Christians live for, sacrifice for, and, through the centuries and still today, die for." - April 2, 1998 

A March and a Pilgrimage 
"We march in Washington each year on the 22nd of January, the anniversary of the infamous decision of the Supreme Court called Roe vs. Wade, legalizing abortion on demand, because we believe that our marches and our prayers and our letters and God's grace will one day end the horror of abortion in our land." - January 22, 1998 

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