Who is a saint?
Pope John Paul and President Bill Clinton The recent fast-track beatification of Pope John Paul II has got me thinking about saints. Throughout its 2,000-year history, the Catholic Church [...]
Meditation: Independence Day and Freedom
There’s a strong element of loss and disaffectedness in Aimee Mann’s song “4th of July” which begins: Today’s the fourth of July. Another June has gone by. And when they [...]
Book review: “Meet Me at Pere Lachaise” by Anna Eriksson and Mason Bendewald
This is an unfair review. I’ve been to Paris twice, and, both times, I’ve made a trip out to the Pere Lachaise cemetery. I’m a fan of cemeteries, and, for [...]
Book review: “Steel Barrio: The Great Mexican Migration to South Chicago, 1915-1940” by Michael Innis-Jimenez
On July 7, 1931, Thomas A. Green, a municipal judge in Chicago, caused an international incident when he tossed the acting Mexican consul into jail for six months. Adolfo Dominguez [...]
Book review: “A Delicate Truth” by John Le Carre
Spy novels are about adventure, tension and plot. Think Robert Ludlum and the various Bourne books. Since the 1963 publication of John Le Carre’s The Spy Who Came in from [...]
Book review: “Francis of Assisi: A New Biography” by Augustine Thompson, O.P.
Perhaps the best way to begin a discussion of Francis of Assisi: A New Biography by Augustine Thompson, O.P. — a rich, austere and complex portrait of one of the [...]
Book review: “Chicago: Growth of a Metropolis” by Harold M. Mayer and Richard C. Wade
During my long career as a Chicago Tribune reporter, much of my time was spent covering urban affairs, and often, when working on deadline and in need of a quick [...]
Book review: “Every Third Thought” by John Barth
Two-thirds of the way through Every Third Thought, John Barth has his central characters, the married couple of George Irving Newett and Amanda Jean Todd, allude to some lines in [...]
Book review: “How We Die: Reflections on Life’s Final Chapter” by Sherwin B. Nuland
I originally read Sherwin B. Nuland’s book How We Die: Reflections on Life’s Final Chapter in 1995 when I was in my mid-forties and my mother was dying of congestive [...]
Book review: “The Development” by John Barth
Gerry Frank has made an estimate of the number of beats his heart has pumped over his 68 years — 3,771,800, give or take a few thousand. Dick Felton is [...]
