The psalmist this Sunday says the Lord is the shepherd who "guides me in right paths." In the wake of the election, House and Senate lawmakers are gathered in Washington for a lively lame duck session. . . .

As the security situation in Iraq has improved, some Iraqi leaders feel it is time to send U.S. coalition troops packing with a message similar to that which the Lord spoke to Ezekiel in this Sunday's first reading: "I myself will look after and tend my sheep." . . .

In the Sunday gospel Jesus describes the measure that will be used at the time of judgment: What we do for the least ones among us, we do for the Lord. Some major media companies seem to be in synch with the idea . . .

Jesus makes it clear in Sunday's gospel that failure to help the poorest and most marginalized members of society is failure to fulfill his mission: "What you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me." . . .

"The last enemy to be destroyed is death," we learn in this Sunday's reading from the First Letter to the Corinthians. While achieving that lofty goal remains well outside earthly human potential, the town of Burlington, Vermont appears to be at least a little closer than Huntington, West Virginia. . . .

"There is no one more surprised than I--except my husband. And you know what they say: Behind every successful woman is an astonished man."

Netflix rentals of the film version of John Steinbeck's Depression-era novel The Grapes of Wrath rose 10 percent from September to October of this year.