Last Thursday evening I was privileged to spend some time with Bishop Robert Vasa of Baker, OR at InsideCatholic’s annual partnership dinner here in Washington, DC. In his talk, Bishop Vasa examined the role of the USCCB, and was frank about its limitations. One of the main points I took away from his talk was that American Catholics have forgotten that the USCCB has no power on its own. ... More

Yesterday, I linked to Bishop Vasa’s funny (and hopefully accurate) predictions for the new year.  He follows it up today with a great column in the Catholic Sentinel, the official newspaper of the Archdiocese of Portland and the Diocese of Baker. We’ve all heard the debate on how to handle pro-abortion Catholic politicians in regard to the reception of Holy Communion.  And I’... More

A post below about Bishop Vasa of Baker, Oregon reminded me of the good bishop’s innovative work on health care while he was the Vicar General of the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska. Bishop Vasa’s idea is exactly the kind of thing Catholics should be working towards. Check out this article from 2000, it may be an old article, but we need creative alternatives like this in light of the cu... More

You’ve got to love it when Bishops make sweet predictions about the coming year. Let us pray that His Excellency is 100% accurate! The following hoaxes/myths will be exposed in 2010: Manmade global warming Atheistic evolution Relativism is the only absolute Abortion is “health care” Nobody can do health care better than the government A Catholic can be pro-choice The government w... More