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President Donald Trump issued a powerful message this week about the value of individuals with Down syndrome in America. October is Down Syndrome Awareness Month, and an estimate 250,000 Americans have the chromosomal abnormality. Some go to college, while others own businesses and work as models, actors and artists. Some get married, and many serve as advocates and spokespeople for people with disabilities.

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The United States and Japan are calling on their nation’s companies to leave China and return home, in the process proposing that China pays for the moving costs. This appears to suggest that the era of "Made in China" is officially over and a major reshuffle of the global supply chain is in the works. A shorter and more localized supply chain is expected in the new era of globalization – without China as the world's factory. This break with the past has not come from nowhere and was not simply triggered by the Wuhan virus outbreak. Actually, the U.S.-China...

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- People cannot call themselves Christians if they sow the seeds of war, Pope Francis said. Finding fault and condemning others is "the temptation of the devil for making war," the pope said in his homily during morning Mass in the Domus Sanctae Marthae Jan. 9, the same day he gave his annual address to the diplomats accredited to the Vatican. If people are "sowers of war" in their families, communities and workplace, then they cannot be Christians, he said, according to Vatican News.

Republican Whittney Williams, a President Trump supporter who used to live in the U.S. illegally, on Monday announced that she would be launching a campaign to challenge Michigan Rep. Haley Stevens (D) for the 11th District seat Stevens flipped blue during the 2018 midterms. Williams, 37, said in an announcement video that she was brought to the United States at the age of 10 from Taiwan “without knowing a word of English.” “My family overstayed their visas and, as a result, I spent the next 16 years living in the shadows as an illegal immigrant,” Williams said. Williams, the director...

August 27, 2018 Dear Friends, Earlier today, on behalf of His Eminence, Cardinal Donald Wuerl, I shared the following letter and materials with priests of the Archdiocese of Washington. I thought you would find it helpful, and share the letter and materials below. Over the past two weeks, I have shared several communications with you regarding the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report. As Cardinal Wuerl noted at yesterday’s Mass for Healing at the Cathedral of Saint Matthew, all must know the Church’s contrition and remorse for these grave sins. Survivors of this great betrayal by priests must know of the prayers...

My wife Jacqueline and I have four sons. Thanks be to God, they never fell victim to the calculating predations of a bishop or priest seeking to gratify his disordered passions. Many fathers’ sons and daughters did.

In his speech in Poland on Thursday, Donald Trump referred 10 times to “the West” and five times to “our civilization.” His white nationalist supporters will understand exactly what he means. It’s important that other Americans do, too. The West is not a geographic term. Poland is further east than Morocco. France is further east than Haiti. Australia is further east than Egypt. Yet Poland, France, and Australia are all considered part of “The West.” Morocco, Haiti, and Egypt are not. The West is not an ideological or economic term either. India is the world’s largest democracy. Japan is among...

The world's first commercial plant for capturing carbon dioxide directly from the air opened yesterday, refueling a debate about whether the technology can truly play a significant role in removing greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere.

This sermon will knock your socks off! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=881aDDE5qFY&feature=youtu.be

Please pray for my brother tonight as he checks himself into the hospital for alcohol abuse. He recently lost his job while at the same time celebrating the birth of his third child. He feels lost and inadequate.

A prominent Cuban dissident group has asked to meet Pope Francis during his upcoming visit to Cuba in September, its leader said on Thursday. Cuba’s dissidents caution against assumptions and complacency The Ladies in White, made up of the wives and relatives of former political prisoners, visited the Vatican’s mission in Cuba to submit their request. Group leader Berta Soler said she has passed along information about human rights in Cuba to Vatican officials, including “evidence of ladies and activists who have been victims of repression in recent weeks”. She has also expressed concern that the government will prevent dissidents...

Some humor my Catholic FRiends will enjoy in these challenging times. Modified slightly from the original which I heard recently. So, after the Synod on the Family in Rome, Cardinal Kasper crosses the river to get a little night cap. He wanders into a bar and sits down next to two gentlemen who are already there. They exchange pleasantries and intoduce themselves to each other. One of the men is a medical doctor and the other is an architect. They get into a long and passionate discussion about the value of their respective occupations and the question arises as to...

Cast in the deep hot lazy months of lame duck Democrat political infighting, a spurned and entitled Hillary Clinton will seek to take the shine off the reputation and legacy of "the one we've been waiting for." Should be fun.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid sounds like a man who intends to stay in his office into the next decade. “I don’t want to do it more than eight more years,” the Nevada Democrat said of serving as his party’s leader in the Senate during a Wednesday interview with CQ Roll Call. Reid is up for re-election in 2016 and has repeatedly said he intends to run again. He reiterated that intention again on Wednesday and indicated he’s looking at serving another full term running the Senate, if Democrats hold onto the majority the entire time. If he and Democrats...

You know that feeling of pleasure you get when you see someone stand up to a bullying, incompetent boss? It’s viscerally satisfying, isn’t it? That’s the way I felt this morning when I heard Postmaster General Patrick Donahue announce that the U.S. Postal Service intended to move forward with a plan to stop Saturday delivery of mail, effective sometime in August. In doing so, Donahue stuck his thumb in the eye of the U.S. Congress, the mail agency’s ultimate boss. Bravo, Mr. Donahue. You may think I have incorrectly identified the incompetent party here. After all, it’s a deeply ingrained...