Sunday, October 2, 2022
St. Edmund Arrowsmith, martyred for celebrating the Mass
| The enduring legacy of St. Edmund Arrowsmith, martyred for celebrating the Mass |
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| The hand of St. Edmund Arrowsmith has pride of place in the Church of St. Edmund and St. Oswald in Ashton-in-Makerfield, a former mining town midway between Liverpool and Manchester. |
| More than ‘the nuts and bolts’: World’s newest bishops talk synodality in Rome |
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| The world’s newest bishops gathered in Rome last month to learn more about what it means to be a Catholic bishop |
| 8 quotes from saints on guardian angels |
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| On Oct. 2, the Catholic Church celebrates the memorial of the guardian angels. |
Saturday, October 1, 2022
Making friends as an adult
I was recently chatting with a colleague whose son just started ninth grade at a new school. He had a tight group of pals in elementary and middle school. Now, at 14, he was starting over, the new kid trying to make new friends. |
My
colleague described how she’d been coaching her son through the
uncomfortable process of finding his people, telling him it takes time,
that it might be uncomfortable for a while. |
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As children, we have school and, if we’re lucky, some combination of parent-negotiated play dates, sports teams and after-school activities that create favorable conditions for making friends. The indignities of finding a new group with whom to eat lunch notwithstanding, your environment is tailored to the cultivation of new ties. |
But once we leave formal schooling, we don’t find ourselves in cohorts or situations like these as frequently. The advice for adults wishing to make friends is often to join a club, to find a group of people who are into what you’re into. We have to seek out the grown-up equivalent of a sandbox, a place where people are oriented toward making connections. |
Finding the running club or knitting circle is the administrative part of friendmaking. The greater challenge is moving through the awkwardness and fears of rejection that we may have thought we left in the high school cafeteria. Marisa Franco, a psychologist and the author of “Platonic: How the Science of Attachment Can Help You Make — and Keep — Friends,” recently spoke with The Times about strategies for getting over such anxieties. She mentioned a few theories about the dynamics of meeting new people that I found especially intriguing. |
The liking gap: We tend to underestimate others’ esteem. “When strangers interact, they’re usually more liked by the other person than they assume,” Dr. Franco said. |
The acceptance prophecy: “When people assume others like them, they tend to become warmer and friendlier,” she said. And that leads others to respond warmly in turn. |
The theory of inferred attraction: People tend to like people who they think like them. “So the more you can show people that you like and value them, the better,” Dr. Franco said. |
Have you found yourself in a situation where you were trying to make new friends as an adult? How did it go? Tell me about it. |
For more |
- Why is it hard to make friends when you’re over 30?
- “Even if our relationship-building muscles have atrophied, with a bit of work they’ll regain their strength.” Brad Stulberg on pandemic-era socializing.
- One potential benefit of returning to in-person work: office friends.
- On using a relationship app to make platonic friends.
Friday, September 30, 2022
Blessed Are Those Who Mourn Suicide
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Priests reject controversial synod poster: it’s ‘out of bounds and confusing’
| Priests reject controversial synod poster: it’s ‘out of bounds and confusing’ |
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| Two Spanish priests recently posted their analyses on social media of a controversial drawing posted to the Synod on Synodality Facebook page. |
| Pope Francis says that he tried to help Ukraine, Russia prisoner swap |
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| Pope Francis has said that he was involved in a prisoner swap between Russia and Ukraine. |
| Catholics in Poland and around the world pray Divine Mercy Chaplet to end war |
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| On Wednesday, Catholics recited the Divine Mercy Chaplet in the streets of 173 cities in Poland and 44 localities worldwide. |
| Cardinals Cupich, Dolan urge reconsideration of transgender mandate |
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| The Biden administration’s proposal to force hospitals and doctors to perform gender-transition surgeries is “misguided” and should be reconsidered, two cardinals wrote Monday in an article published in America Magazine. |
Church says clergywoman faces trumped-up charges
Associated Press: Though many congregations in the U.S. are relatively homogeneous, others are sharply divided. In some cases, divisions are becoming more pronounced as midterm election season heats up, leaving clergy to keep the peace while still meeting the spiritual needs of all of their members.
Christian Century: A new documentary positions the fiery iconoclast as a prophet ahead of her time.
Christianity Today: Founder of Open Doors said he wasn’t an “evangelical stuntman” but a faithful Christian following the leading of the Spirit.
United Methodist News Service: The former United Methodist district superintendent and deaconess has been charged with attempted murder, but she and her supporters say she is innocent and the charge is meant to silence her advocacy for indigenous people.
FiveThirtyEight: A whopping 72 percent of literate Iranians over age 19 disagreed with the government mandating that women wear the hijab in public, compared with only 15 percent who agreed with it.
Christian nationalism “a kind of Great Commission-in-reverse.”
Arab Christians remember Brother Andrew’s legacy and impact in the Middle East.
In places that have implemented abortion bans in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling, Christian-run pregnancy centers see women who get abortions outside of state return with medical and spiritual needs.
Russell Moore calls Christian nationalism “a kind of Great Commission-in-reverse.”
