Welcome to Thursday. The U.S. Capitol was overtaken by insurrectionists seeking to disrupt the votes to formally declare Joe Biden the president-elect, leaving some U.S. bishops calling for prayer and peace.
As the U.S. Capitol was taken over by insurrectionists on Jan. 6 seeking to disrupt the certification of the Electoral College votes to formally declare Joe Biden the winner of the presidential election, a number of Catholic bishops took to Twitter to call for prayer and peace, with a few specifically condemning the siege of the Capitol by a violent mob.
"Today's events show the immensely perilous pathway of division and polarization that our country has embarked upon in these past four years," San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy told NCR.
"We need to begin immediately a moral and spiritual regeneration in the public and political realms that touches the hearts of Americans and helps us all to see through the prism of this terrible assault on our democracy," he added, saying that the country must embrace dialogue over division as it seeks to move forward.
You can read more of the story here.
This week, we began our series, Building a Common Future, in which we asked Catholic politicians, activists and scholars to offer advice to President-elect Joe Biden.
"Building our common future: It's what the United States, indeed, the entire world needs right now," we wrote in an editorial introducing the series.
Today's commentary comes from Social Service Sr. Simone Campbell and focuses on fair wages, just tax policies and support for labor organizations. "Catholic social teaching's call to solidarity challenges us to make decisions with the most vulnerable in mind," she writes. "We the people are called to advocate that the new administration shape its policies from a stance of solidarity with those who are too often exploited, as well as those who are wealthy."
You can read Monday's commentary from Sen. Tim Kaine on immigration here. Tuesday's commentary from Dwayne David Paul on community policing can be found here. Wednesday's commentary from Marie Dennis on U.S. foreign policy and national security can be read here.
Read the rest of Campbell's commentary here.
More headlines
- There has been pushback against a document from the U.S. bishops that lists six areas where the bishops see hymn lyrics falling short and provided examples from actual hymns currently in use.
- ICYMI: When the Rev. Raphael Warnock arrives in Washington to take his Senate seat, he is likely to be welcomed by a collaborator from his home state of Georgia: the city's archbishop, Cardinal Wilton Gregory.
- At Global Sisters Report, hundreds of women in Kenya are benefiting from a project of the Salesian Sisters of Don Bosco that provides microloans to help women start small businesses in order to provide for their children.
Final thoughts
Did you know that NCR publishes a book review each Saturday? Recent book reviews include Via Negativa, a novel about an aging priest's road trip; Waging Peace, a memoir of the author's tour in Iraq as a medic with the U.S. National Guard; and The Myth of the American Dream, a critique of the American dream and a call to radical neighborliness. You can sign up for the NCR Book Club email here.
Until Friday,
Stephanie Yeagle
NCR Production/Online Editor
[email protected]
Twitter: @ncrSLY
