McGrath Institute Blog

Looking for new ideas or resources to engage your faith or your ministry? Here are our weekly curated links, including offerings in each of the following categories: Prayer for the Home, Educational Opportunities, Resources (for ministers, educators, parents, etc.), and Flourishing and Fun.

We are living in a time of great mental, emotional, and physical stress. In turn, taking care of ourselves, or allowing God to take care of us, is more important than ever before. For many, the words peacefulness, joy, and goodness—all fruits of the Holy Spirit—elicit a sort of desirable calmness. Fortunately, experiencing these fruits through leisure is possible. However, not all opportunities are created equal. What you do for leisure may make all the difference in helping you find what you are seeking. 

Editorial Note: This post is part of our #FaithAndScience series exploring the relationship between science and religion, and is excerpted from the author's textbook Faith, Science, & Reason: Theology on the Cutting Edge, 2nd edition (Midwest Theological Forum, 2019).

Perhaps there is no better way to see the witness of Sacred Tradition regarding science than to observe how many great scientists the Church has had within her ranks throughout history. Stretching back to ancient times and forward to the present day, Catholic men and women have understood God’s call to include investigating the natural world, and have made major contributions to science. An impressive number could even be considered game changers, scientists who either founded whole branches of science or whose original discoveries advanced understanding for all ages to come. Here are just a few stories of some of the lesser-known heroes of Catholic science:

Looking for new ideas or resources to engage your faith or your ministry? Here are our weekly curated links, including offerings in each of the following categories: Prayer for the Home, Educational Opportunities, Resources (for ministers, educators, parents, etc.), and Flourishing and Fun.

Today, the Church honors St. Maximilian Kolbe, a Franciscan priest who volunteered to die in place of a fellow prisoner at Auschwitz, thus embodying the teaching of Jesus, “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13). Yet this last and greatest act of St. Maximilian did not emerge from a vacuum; it was the result of a lifetime of being conformed to Christ through prayer and sacrifice. Only by consistently practicing self-denial, by dying to himself and taking up his cross daily, could St. Maximilian have been conformed to Christ to such a degree that he was in that pivotal moment able to imitate Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross, laying down his life so that another might live.