Jan Campbell Pierce 🇺🇸

I want to express my strong support for the statement that Bishop Kevin Rhoades made this morning concerning a controversial appointment at the University of Notre Dame. Please read his communication in full, for he makes the case more completely and eloquently than I could. Suffice it to say that the woman proposed for a key leadership position at Our Lady’s University is not simply “pro-choice” on the question of abortion; she is a sharp critic of the pro-life position and those who advocate it. She has gone so far as to characterize the anti-abortion stance as rooted in white supremacy and racism, and she has insinuated that the Catholic commitment to integral human development implies the support of abortion rights. Like Bishop Rhoades, I speak as someone with strong connections to and deep affection for the University of Notre Dame. I believe that going ahead with this appointment is repugnant to the identity and mission of that great center of Catholic learning.   diocesefwsb.org/statement-of…

There was a line from Zohran Mamdani’s inaugural address yesterday that took my breath away. He said he intended to replace “the frigidity of rugged individualism with the warmth of collectivism.” Collectivism in its various forms is responsible for the deaths of at least one hundred million people in the last century. Socialist and Communist forms of government around the world today—Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea, etc.—are disastrous. Catholic social teaching has consistently condemned socialism and has embraced the market economy, which people like Mayor Mamdani caricature as “rugged individualism.” In fact, it is the economic system that is based upon the rights, freedom, and dignity of the human person. For God’s sake, spare me the “warmth of collectivism.”

Friends, our readings for the fourth and final Sunday of Advent are all about maybe the central motif of the spiritual life. Our culture today is so self-oriented: It’s all about me and my choice. But that attitude is directly repugnant to the Bible; in fact, the Bible is constantly trying to move us out of that space and into a different space—namely, one of surrender to the higher purpose of God.

Friends, this evening, join me in praying Night Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours at 7:30 p.m. CT: youtu.be/pw3Rhatj7mU

Friends, our new Holy Father is Pope Leo XIV! Born and raised in Chicago, Robert Francis Cardinal Prevost entered the novitiate of the Order of Saint Augustine in 1977 and was ordained to the priesthood in 1981. The first-ever American pope, Prevost served most recently as the head of the Church’s Dicastery for Bishops and president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. Please join me in praying for Pope Leo!

Friends, let us all pray for the health and recovery of our Holy Father.