Check out these recent articles from around the web:

A Complicated Grief by Kerry Weber: “Painful suffering, monumental moments, can divide life into a before and an after. Yet we must persevere; we continue on, if differently. It takes time to process suffering. Hope and joy look different.”

Listening Inward: Recognizing Our Sacredness by Claire McGrath: “At our very core, each of us is good, beautiful, and sacred. It is here, in the most authentic part of ourselves, where God dwells, constantly reminding us that we are Beloved. Self-rejection rips us away from ourselves; we hide and push away and berate ourselves until we can no longer hear God at the core of our existence telling us that we are valuable and important and lovable.”

The Body and the Spirit by David Brooks: “The human head and body don’t just live and pass along genes. They paint, make ethical judgments, savor the beauty of a sunset and experience the transcendent. The body is material but surpasses the material. It’s spiritualized matter.”

Surprise! One of the Church’s family issues is polygamy by John Allen: “Say ‘family issues’ to most Americans or Europeans, and they’re likely to flash on divorce, or the challenges of single-parent households, or perhaps same-sex relationships and the push for gay marriage. What probably wouldn’t come naturally to mind is polygamy. Yet in many parts of the non-Western world, polygamy is a major feature of family life, and thus a major pastoral challenge for the Catholic Church.”

Paul Ryan still doesn’t understand poverty by Sr. Simone Campbell: “He still doesn’t get that we have many families struggling because their wages are far too low—unjust, in fact—and there are not enough jobs. Because his op-ed targeted Wall Street Journal readers, many of whom are powerful business leaders, he missed a golden opportunity to call them to do their part in addressing these twin causes.”

Is the Pope’s ‘new balance’ message getting through? by Michael O’Loughlin: “Both Clark and Carr said that the church does a great deal to fight poverty, even if it doesn’t appear to some to be the top priority. Carr pointed to the bishops’ conference lobbying lawmakers in Washington and the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, the bishops’ anti-poverty initiative that awarded more than $14 million in grants to community organizers this year. But Clark believes poverty must become more central in the church’s public dialogue, which she hopes can spur a wider discussion around the issue.”

This Is Your Child’s Brain on Alcohol by Mary Jane Rotheram-Borus and Mark Tomlinson: “Given that alcohol permeates our lives—and every individual responds differently to alcohol—we have a responsibility to support one another and create a culture where “yes” is not the expected answer to, ‘Do you want a drink?’ Genetic influence when it comes to alcohol abuse is real and scary. Some people are able to drink and never develop an addiction, while for others alcohol is a daily craving that is difficult to control.”

Standing With Pope Francis for Human Life and Dignity by Thomas Worcester: “In making economic justice and a more equal distribution of the world resources second to none in his priorities, Pope Francis points the way forward to a broader use of the term pro-life.”

The Way to Beat Poverty by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn: “If there’s one overarching lesson from the past few decades of research about how to break the cycles of poverty in the United States, it’s the power of parenting — and of intervening early, ideally in the first year or two of life or even before a child is born.”

ISIS Video Shows Execution of David Cawthorne Haines by NY Times: “The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria released a video Saturday of the third beheading of a foreign hostage, a British aid worker.”

A Church with verve is at risk in Ukraine by John Allen: “No one should need persuading that what’s happening in Ukraine right now is alarming. A fragile cease-fire between Russian-backed separatists and Ukrainian forces could unravel at any moment, and even more lives may be at risk this winter as the country scrambles to make up for lost Russian gas. Most basically, if one nation can slice off a piece of another with impunity, it’s hard to know what international law means. Yet if Catholics require an additional reason for concern, it’s this: What’s at stake in Ukraine isn’t just geopolitics or the military balance of power, but also one of the most remarkable Catholic communities anywhere in the world.”