Catholicism

PATRICK Buchanan's strong showing in the New Hampshire primary was in sharp contrast to the outcome of the feeble write-in effort on behalf of New York Gov. Mario Cuomo.Personally and politically, Mr. Buchanan and Mr. Cuomo are miles apart. One is an abrasive and ideological right-wing Republican, given to blunt, bellicose pronouncements; the other a careful and pragmatic liberal Democrat, given to art fully structured and delicately balanced prose.But the two do have something in common.

As the birthplace of U.S. Catholicism -- site of its first seminary, seat of its first bishop, home for a while of its first native-born saint -- Baltimore has a stake in St. Mary's Seminary. Its 200th anniversary is cause for ecumenical celebration.The shortage of St. Mary's students with priestly vocation is typical within the church. Nevertheless, St. Mary's is doing fine. Particularly notable for outreach is its night school, the Ecumenical Institute, offering theological knowledge and spiritual insight to students of all denominations, professions and genders.

The arts give children tools of imagination Mayor Martin O'Malley is definitely not overstating the power of the arts in school or of self-expression and creativity in the development of healthy, productive human beings and communities ("Mayor's not overstating the power of art," Opinion I was surprised and saddened to read the column by Cardinal William H. Keeler ("Catholicism under siege," Opinion Commentary, Nov. 28). If he believes he is living in a society that condones anti-Catholicism, I respect his belief.

Stephen Haynes, 71, Redemptorist priest The Rev. Stephen Haynes, a Redemptorist priest who had earlier been a cashier at the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, died of a heart attack Friday at Our Lady of Fatima Church in East Baltimore, where he had served for nearly a decade. He was 71. Born in Philadelphia, he was a graduate of Pennsylvania State University and worked for 29 years at the Evening Bulletin, his last year as the newspaper's head cashier. Father Haynes' parents were Baptists, but he was baptized as an adult in the Lutheran faith and later became involved in healing services at an Episcopal church.

FREEDOM of religion in the United States is not protected by the Constitution alone. In practice, it is also policed by the religions themselves in their plurality and vigor."

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright will be at the Enoch Pratt library's main branch on Thursday to discuss her new memoir, "Prague Winter," which delves into a family background that had been shielded from her for decades. As The Baltimore Sun's Mary Carole McCauley reports, in 1997, at age 59, just days after being confirmed as U.S. secretary of state, Albright learned about a family secret. "I had no idea that my family heritage was Jewish," said Albright, a native of Czechoslovakia.

"Black Robe" is "Dances With Wolves" through a glass darkly.It's a wonderful movie, as was "Dances" -- but it's 'N wonderful in a different way."Dances" was indeed a dance -- a minuet with a romantic vision of a Native American people who were eco-correct and oh-so-wonderfully noble and altruistic. It may have been dreadful anthropology, but it was a platform from which to critique the hallowed myth of manifest destiny and white superiority. And, like any fairy tale, it childishly cleaved the world into moral opposites: good (red)

WASHINGTON - Ever since the Know Nothing Party of the 1850s sought power with a message of virulent anti-Catholicism, religious prejudice has been a factor in presidential politics. Anti-Catholic bias was a major element in the defeat of New York's Democratic Gov. Alfred E. Smith, a Catholic, by Republican Herbert Hoover in 1928. In 1960, the prejudice was overcome by Sen. John F. Kennedy in his narrow victory over Vice President Richard M. Nixon. Since then, Catholicism has not been a bar to election at any political level.

EAST PALO ALTO, Calif. -- It's a weekday night in the Silicon Valley. Within a tiny Protestant church, the language of prayer is Spanish with a Mexican accent; the sounds of joy, bird-like warblings, belong to evangelical Protestantism. The church is the northern edge of a new Protestant reformation.Outside the doors of the Apostolic Assembly is the Bayshore Freeway, connecting San Francisco to San Jose. Across the freeway is wealthy Palo Alto, home of Stanford University. All along this stretch of freeway are exits to cyberspace, the greatest concentration of high-tech industry in the world.

Four months after a visit by Pope John Paul II focused international attention on Baltimore and its religious history, local Catholics are exploring plans to create a national museum that would tell the story of American Catholicism and the key role Marylanders played in it.The museum would be in or near the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the first Roman Catholic cathedral built in the United States and one...