“Jesus didn’t need many men. He needed the right men. The priesthood doesn’t need many men. It needs the right men.”

For the past 43 years we’ve been living the consequences of Roe v Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that effectively legalized abortion on demand. And the abortion struggle of the past four decades teaches us a very useful lesson.

I want to thank Dr. Muñoz and Father Jenkins for inviting me to speak this afternoon. It’s a privilege and a pleasure to be here. A lecture named after Alexis de Tocqueville will naturally involve politics. That’s a good thing, and we’ll have plenty to talk about. But I don’t want to begin there today.

AWAKENINGS:  Living as a believer in the nation we have now+Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.Forum AddressBrigham Young University, 3.22.16 I’m here today because I believe that the friendship of the LDS and Catholic communities is important. And I hope we have a chance for questions and discussion at the end of my remarks. Being a […]

Joseph Greaton, an English convert and Jesuit, was Philadelphia’s first resident priest. In 1732, eleven persons attended his first Mass at old St. Joseph’s. In September 2015, 300 years later, another Jesuit will celebrate Mass for us in Philadelphia at the World Meeting of Families. The congregation will be more than one million people.

Vatican II ended in December 1965 with an outpouring of enthusiasm and hope. The Council’s hope was grounded in two things: a renewed Catholic faith; and confidence in the skill and goodness of human reason. Half a century has passed since then. A lot has happened. The world today is a very different place from […]

THE GREAT CHARTER AT 800: WHY IT STILL MATTERS+Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.Brigham Young University, 1.23.15 Henry Ford is often quoted as saying, “History is bunk.” That’s not quite accurate. What he actually told the Chicago Tribune in 1916 is this: “I wouldn’t give a nickel for all the history in the world. It means […]

Address at USCCB Fall General AssemblyNovember 10, 2014+Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap. Brothers, I’m grateful to Archbishop Kurtz for a few minutes to update you on the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia next September 22-27. Each of you received on your chair a packet of information. It outlines the content of the four-day general […]

I’ve always had an affection for French Canada. My father’s family began there. When I was growing up in Kansas in the 1950s, Quebec was deeply Catholic; one of the most profoundly Catholic cultures in the world. The province had 90 percent church attendance. Catholic education, health care and social services pervaded daily life. I […]

ST. FRANCIS, POPE FRANCIS AND TODAY’S SPIRITUAL REVOLUTION +Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.Catholic Association of Latino Leaders Conference remarksHouston, 8.16.14 Before we start, we should remember for a moment the drama taking place on our southern border, where so many undocumented immigrants — many of them very young – are stuck in an ugly kind […]