Pope John Paul II

Isabelle Anne Romero, of Filipino decent, standing 5’3 inches was born October 10th, 2001, in Fresno California. Isabelle lives with both her parents and her younger sister Natalie most of the year. However half of the year her grandparents who are from the Philippines come and stay with her family. When they are in town it’s an absolute treat to everyone because of the homemade egg rolls that they generously share with the entire community. Isabelle playing both comp and varsity volleyball,…

everything, that’s how the light gets in,” Peter McLaren engaged in an historical debate of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’ legacy after his death and established a parallel between Chavez’ death and the election of Pope Francis. The author expressed that the election of the new pope, who is a Jesuit, could cause a potential revolution in the Catholic Church much like Chavez caused in the political arena. Peter McLaren is a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and works in…

When Pope Francis decided to canonize the Franciscan friar named Junipero Serra in September on the pope’s first to the United States, he knew that there would be controversy surrounding his decision. Father Serra was a friar who helped the Spanish mission in California settle and helped to convert the native population to Catholicism. However, the controversy comes from the way in which the friars and the missions went about converting the natives and the way in which they treated them is…

“Whenever our interior life becomes caught up its own interests and concerns, there is no longer room for others, no place for the poor. God’s voice is no longer heard, the quiet joy of his love is no longer felt, and the desire to do good fades”. –Pope Francis, Evangelli Gaudium Part A: 9 Principles of Catholic Social Thought (CST): Dignity of the Human Person: In society, every human being is created with love within the eyes of God in which our ethnicity, gender, religion and physical…

The Catholic community in Vietnam is a part of the Roman Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the Pope and the Roman Curia. Vietnam is a country with the proportion of Catholics ranked fifth in Asia. The Catholicism has been spread into Vietnam since the sixteenth century preaching from European missionaries. In the first half of the twentieth century…

The extremely creative writer Mark Noll of Wheaton College (Illinois) on his inspiring survey of the history of Christianity designed for the general reader. Dr. Noll graduated from Wheaton as an English major and from Vanderbilt with his PhD in the History of Christianity in 1975. After four years of Trinity College (IL), Noll joined the Wheaton College in 1979. Author of several other books. Unlike the usual this book is one fact after another church history "turning points" Dr Noll end…

Fasting is a Christian discipline for one who wants “to let go of an appetite in order to seek God on matters of deep concern for others, myself and the world” It is a discipline that is to be done for God and seen only by God. At the commencement of Bible College I understood fasting to be a practice that people in the church did in order to get God to hear their prayers and move on their behalf and answer the prayers that they had placed before Him during the time of fasting. It was…

On the issue of contraception, the three major branches of Christianity hold varying opinions rooted within their respective interpretations of sexual expression, marriage, and the commandment, “Thou Shalt Not Murder”. In order to understand each branch’s stance on the utilization of contraceptives as a moral issue, I will explore all three branch’s stance on the purpose of sex. The nuanced differences within their interpretations will reveal unique implications within each branch’s position on…

Thesis: Through inculturation and different interpretations of Christianity, the church is catholic or universal. In order for the church to be catholic, it must be able to spread the Gospel with respect to cultural diversities. Culture is the beliefs, customs, and arts of a particular society. The Catholic faith is central to many of the world’s cultures. Yet, through inculturation, the Catholic faith is lived differently in each culture (classroom notes 10-13). In Shusaku Endo’s book,…

There are many people and religious sects that resemble the Scribes and Pharisees from when Jesus was walking the earth. Even though there is plenty of evidence of the events that took place some two thousand years ago, people and religious groups do not believe they had taken place. Some groups that could resemble the Pharisees and Scribes of today lack some of the attributes of the teachers of the past. When Jesus was dealing with the questions of the different religious sects of the day, He…