Cover Stories
U.S. Catholic May 08

Is torture losing its shock value?
With our government softening us up on "enhanced interrogation techniques," now is not the time for Catholics to give in, says William Cavanaugh in this Expert Witness interview. Our Savior, after all, was also tortured by the state.

The torture show
For six seasons Jack Bauer has been "saving" America one atrocity at a time, writes U.S. Catholic media columnist Patrick McCormick. Time to change the channel.

Greener pastures:
How family farmers are planting for a sustainable future

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View "5 questions with E.J. Dionne" below and look for the complete interview with Dionne in an upcoming issue of U.S. Catholic. Subscribe now!


Reviews:

Movies
There Will Be Blood
Paul Anderson's adaptation of Upton Sinclair's 1927 novel Oil! joins an impressive list of Hollywood classics lancing the boil of ambition and greed in the underbelly of the American dream. Like Citizen Kane, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, The Godfather, Chinatown, and Wall Street, Anderson's brooding and violent epic takes aim at a ruthless and savage winner-take-all ethic buried deep in the American psyche.

Atonement
Older Catholics may recall a story about the standard penance for gossip. "On a blustery day shake out the contents of a feather pillow from a high window. The next day collect every feather scattered across the landscape."


Music
marry me st vincentMarry Me
St. Vincent (Beggars Banquet, 2007)
Marry Me, the first album from St. Vincent, takes the listener from one extreme to the other. Most of the music is light and jazzy, but the lyrics are laden with images of violence, war, revenge, and uncertainties.


Books
before dallasBefore Dallas
Anyone who has been confounded by the church's mishandling of the child sex abuse crisis will benefit from Nicholas Cafardi's detailed account of the church's response prior to the 2002 approval in Dallas of the U.S. bishops' Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People.

As Cafardi, both a civil and canon lawyer, points out, concern about sexual abuse was not born of the 20th century. Collections of canon law have long had provisions on how to handle such offenses by clerics. Why these were not followed, and why other roads were taken instead, serve as the core of the book.


More selections from the April issue of U.S. Catholic

Margin Notes
Home sweet biohazard
good newsThere's no place like home, as long as parents prevent it from becoming toxic.


The Examined Life
Make it personal
Millions have headed for the exits without getting the best of what we have to offer.


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Selections from the April issue of U.S. Catholic

good news The Examined Life
Lab partners
Instead of shooting rhetorical spitballs in the other's general direction,
boosters of both science and religion should start sharing a desk.

Margin Notes
I think I can, I think I can
A 19th-century mode of transport may be the answer to our current environmental woes.


Selections from the March issue of U.S. Catholic

Margin Notes
Womb for rent
Have infertile couples taken a maternity leave of their senses?

good news The Examined Life
Start spreading the Good News
The first (and most ignored) rule of preaching the gospel: "Know your audience."


Selections from the February issue of U.S. Catholic

Margin Notes
global warming Hot enough for you?
The world's poor face an even bleaker future than polar bears, thanks to global warming.

The Examined Life
Here comes everybody else
Our color in the Crayola box of "flesh tones" shouldn't determine our place in the church.


Selections from the January issue of U.S. Catholic

Margin Notes
death takes a holiday Death takes a holiday
But the question is whether executions will take a permanent vacation in the United States.

The Examined Life
His-steria
Despite terror that women are staging a coup de church, the numbers just don't add up.


Selections from the December issue of U.S. Catholic

Margin Notes
Bank robbery
Forgive us our bad debts—many of which were made fraudulently to developing countries.

not all roads lead to rome The Examined Life
Not all roads lead to Rome
The diverse challenges of a struggling world need local solutions from a flexible church.


Selections from the November issue of U.S. Catholic

Care package Margin Notes
No more CARE packages
Instead of dumping grain in poverty-stricken regions, we should be investing cash.

The Examined Life
More than words
Rather than threaten our Christian faith, exploring the language and spiritual practices of other religious traditions may instead make us better Catholics.


Selections from the October issue of U.S. Catholic

Margin Notes—Kevin Clarke
Cracks in the system
Deferring infrastructure maintenance for war spending builds a bridge to nowhere.

The Examined Life—Bryan Cones
How green is your faith?
We should honor God the Father by caring for our Mother Earth.


Promise of the Promised Land:
Elias ChacourArchbishop Elias Chacour of Galilee is working to create his own biblical vision of the Holy Land, in which people of all faiths live together in peace.

Read the interview or view excerpts in Quicktime.


The Busy Christian's Guide to Catholic Social Teaching
Visit our popular online guide to 100 years of Catholic tradition.

Multimedia:
Images from Chicago's march for immigration reform

Quicktime 7 is recommended for best viewing.