Michael Sean Winters

Three U.S. cardinals who met with Pope Francis aren't saying what was on the agenda. A likely topic, writes NCR's Michael Sean Winters, is the need to fill the many vacancies in U.S. metropolitan archdioceses.

The panel on "The Role and Authority of the Bishop in a Synodal Church" focused on moving away from monarchical episcopal authority. It was not Management 101. It was mission-oriented, grace-filled Ecclesiology 101.

Is today's Republican Party capable of exercising any check on Donald Trump? Which senator would have the courage to say no to a reelected Trump?

The protests, from the very start, have been directed at Israel. Michael Sean Winters asks: When obvious moral facts are ignored, can these anti-Israel protests be explained as anything but evidence of antisemitism?

It's time for another installment of Michael Sean Winters' long-running feature, Catholics Behaving Badly. This time, the regrettable examples come from the Denver Archdiocese and Raymond Arroyo's show on EWTN.

If you were grading this debate against that by the two presidential candidates, this one was more substantive to be sure.

As Pope Francis likes to say, reality is more important than ideas, so examining legitimate diversity among the churches will require a discussion of controversies that divide local churches.

Vice President Kamala Harris understands, and is getting better at communicating, the core Catholic teaching about economics: The economy is made for man, not man for the economy.

How do you respect the bounds of normalcy and decency when your opponent not only fails to recognize such boundaries, but has actually made his ability to blow through such boundaries part of his essential schtick?

A report from the group More in Common aims to debunk myths about religion and division in U.S. society. For Catholics, the study shows we have a lot of work to do in helping our people understand what we believe.

The outrageousness of Donald Trump's comments about Springfield, Ohio, did not prevent a refocusing of his supporters' attention on the issue of migration, writes NCR columnist Michael Sean Winters.

The pope is known for his spicy way of saying things. And he speaks his mind. There are times, however, when it is better to say nothing than to throw out statements that sound designed to make headlines. 

Archbishop J. Augustine Di Noia communicates to the reader not just his thoughts about theology, but his love for the church, which shines through precisely because of its role in the divine plan.

The pope's words, said at a mosque in the most populous Muslim nation on earth, invite all of us Catholics to think about how we encounter persons of other religions.

The feel-good vibes coming out of the Democratic convention are running into the strong headwinds of culturally conservative working-class voters. 

Undecided voters are difficult to figure out: In this highly polarized political environment, who could be undecided?

Laborem exercens, published by Pope John Paul II in 1981, broke new ground in the church's reflection on labor. "It remains a fruitful guide," Michael Sean Winters writes.

Political interviews, like the one CNN's Dana Bash conducted with Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz last night, are not usually the stuff of high drama in a campaign, but these are not usual times. 

It is an interesting question why The New York Times tends to mostly highlight conservative Catholics in its opinion pages, like the recent op-ed about the influence of conservative converts to Catholicism.

Democracies are not empires, modernity is not antiquity, class structures have changed entirely, but the human heart remains the human heart.