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The Scriptural recounting in the Gospel of Saint Matthew of the mysterious wise men who visited the baby Jesus bearing gifts is one of the most enduring and compelling scenes in Sacred Scripture. The rudimentary nature of St. Matthew’s description of the Magi’s arrival has encouraged a flowering of apocryphal literature across the centuries which has added depth and detail to the occasion of the Epiphany. There are numerous references to the Magi in early post-Scriptural literature. Saint Justin Martyr mentions them prominently in his debate with Trypho (Chapter 78) in the mid-second century AD. Magi were of the priestly...

All is Calm, All is Bright…Really? Maybe This Video Will Help By: Msgr. Charles PopeThe video below was produced by the Archdiocese of Washington for our “Find the Perfect Gift” Christmas outreach. It is an attempt to refocus Catholics and non-Catholics on the truest and most perfect gift of Christmas, Jesus Christ. It also invites each of us to give the perfect gift, the gift of our very self to God and to one another.The video illustrates well a problem that we can all have at Christmas: hectic, hurried lives, made even busier by “holiday” requirements and traditions. These traditions,...

We're about to enter the "holiday season," and rather than the old-fashioned joy of it, we are surely going to enter into another litigious time of year. I'm a little confused over this "separation of church and state" issue that keeps popping up every “holiday season.” The word "holiday" is derived from the words “holy day,” so it's clear there is something religious lurking around in there. I'm also hearing a lot about a semi-public area, New York City’s Zuccotti Park, which a mob is being encouraged by public officials to take over and use as a live-in campground to...

Christmas is a wonderful time to celebrate with family, friends and supper at Grandma's house.

It was the week before Christmas and all through the house the pundits were hanging each other with flair. It had to happen. The universal holiday of Clement Clarke Moore's "Night Before Christmas" has been displaced this year by the "war on Christmas." On one snow-blown hilltop stand the Sons and Daughters of Christmas Past, who believe the phrase "Have a happy holiday" is quashing Christmas. Across this pond of frozen opinions one finds gentlefolk who believe the word "Christmas" offends non-Christian sensibilities. The Boston Globe's liberal columnist Ellen Goodman threw soot on much of the pro-"Christmas" brigade: "Fox News's...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 5 - It is the time of year when bedtime stories and television specials often recall the plucky reindeer and the little girl of Whoville who managed to save Christmas. This year, some conservative groups are hoping to add a new name to that pantheon of heroes: Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr., the Supreme Court nominee. "Liberal groups like People for the American Way and the A.C.L.U. have opposed public Christmas and Hanukkah displays and even fought to keep Christmas carols out of school," declares a radio commercial paid for by the conservative Committee for Justice beginning Monday...

THERE IS LITTLE in the spate of economic statistics that was published this week to upset economy-watchers here in America. The economy is growing at an annual rate of 4 percent. The Institute of Supply Management reports that both the manufacturing and service sectors are expanding at an increasing rate. Share prices are showing strength, and the housing market remains buoyant. Incomes are rising. Even usually glum farmers are finding reason to cheer: their incomes are up 25 percent on last year's levels. Oil prices are falling as high inventories and warm weather relieve supply worries, and as Iraq slowly...

<p>Ulises Lizarraga (left), a 31-year-old native of Caborca, Sonora, says the lower prices of goods make shopping in the United States a bargain.</p> <p>NOGALES, Ariz. - As Ulises Lizarraga loads his new stereo, computer printer and other Christmas gifts into the back of his car, he knows he got some great deals.</p>