As we conclude our celebration of Independence Day, I would like to reflect on the enduring and, indeed, increasingly crucial role that Catholic education plays in our society. While often viewed through a narrow lens, a deeper examination reveals its profound impact — an impact rooted in both faith and civic responsibility, and not dissimilar in spirit to the transformative vision that underpinned Abraham Lincoln’s land-grant colleges such as Colorado State University.

NEW YORK. A decade and a half after its popular animated namesake was released comes the live-action remake “How to Train Your Dragon” (Universal). While the basic story and some of the personnel remain the same, the new arrival, although appropriate for a wide audience, falls short of the heights to which its predecessor soared.

Who or what is Jesus? 

According to author Martin Mosebach, “The early Christians knew that the Christian message was Jesus himself. The essence of the Gospels’ new, more profound, and more compelling picture of God was that God had become flesh, present among us.” (“The Heresy of Formlessness: The Roman Liturgy and Its Enemy” (Ignatius Press). There was much confusion about Jesus’ precise relationship to God.

To this day, I can recall watching “Predators of the Mara,” a rerun of “Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom,” on a quiet Sunday afternoon in the early 1980s. In that episode, a cheetah chases down and kills a young wildebeest. It is a remarkably brutal scene of struggle for the wildebeest to get free from the cat’s jaws locked on its neck. The horror I felt as I watched one animal kill another was tempered only by the calming voice of Marlin Perkins, who explained that the herd was ultimately stronger because predators in the Maasai Mara National Reserve helped to cull the sick and the weak. This was natural selection — survival of the fittest.

COLORADO SPRINGS. The Catholic Daughters of the Americas Court Holy Family No. 1794 in Security hosted the organization’s 50th Biennial State Convention from June 6-8 at the Radisson Hotel in Colorado Springs.  We celebrated the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the Catholic Daughters’ Colorado State Board.