We are pleased to present below all posts archived in 'January 1998'. If you still can't find what you are looking for, try using the search box.
Some years ago, counselling a young nun who was trying to make sense of her struggle with religious life, I learned something about religious ambivalence. Her life embodied it.
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Today it is fashionable to criticize the church and blame it for virtually every kind of problem; war, prejudice, injustice and lack of equality. People point to the church's worst moments – the Crusades, religious wars, the Inquisition, its former sanctioning of racism and sexism, its historical resistance to various social and scientific advances, some of its present struggles with fidelity to its own ideals – and they conclude that the world would be better off without it.
For a great number of people the date, Jan. 1, 2000, is of immense significance. They conceive of this date as, literally, something that comes along only once every thousand years.