Singing in a choir, I feel a little sorry for the Easter season. Yes, it has its music, same as any other part of the church year. But once Pentecost arrives, we forget the hymns of Easter and don’t really miss them. Few people enjoy Easter music in their homes or play it on their iPods. The songs of Advent and Christmas, however, are different.

Waiting in joyful hope. It’s what we’re doing: waiting for the coming of our rescuer, Jesus. Advent stories define so many arrivals: babies conceived by a woman too old, and another too inexperienced, to enjoy such privileges.

One step into Advent, and we’re suffused with memories. It’s nearly impossible to separate the run-up to Christmas 2016 with holiday seasons of long ago.

Back when she was Norma Jean Baker, not a lot of the smart money was bet on the woman who would become Marilyn Monroe. And who imagined that Bob Dylan, standing on a soda crate singing with his strange alternative voice at local music festivals, would one day be a phenomenon?

If you’re like most U.S. citizens, you have at least one daily interface with a news report. If you use a cell phone or computer, headlines about breaking events are leaping out at you by the hour. Whether you get your news from television and magazines or electronically delivered services, one common feature of news outlets is that the news is generally bad.

How close to the Apocalypse are we this week? Considering that our national presidential election is mere days away, it may feel like we’re poised on the brink of a volcano.

What sort of experiences lead to life-transforming changes? When has an event or relationship opened a door to new possibilities that you couldn’t imagine before?

Does anybody know what we celebrate this week? By “we” I mean Americans of every faith tradition, not just Catholics. It’s Pastoral Care Week!

When former Vice President Al Gore starred in the documentary An Inconvenient Truth in 2006, experts crawled out of the woodwork to debate the arguments Gore presented about the gravity of climate change and our role in it.

My new best friend in commentary Martin Lang (author of Luke: My Spirit Rejoices!) calls supplication half the circle described by faith. The other half, he posits, is gratitude.