STEPHEN COPELAND

AUTHOR & STORYTELLER

St. Anthony Messenger: A Diplomat’s Journey to Activism

Upward mobility is the name of the game in Washington, DC. Michele Dunne played the game, eventually reaching the peak of her career. From the State Department to the US Embassy in Cairo, then to the National Security Council as director for Egypt and North Africa, Dunne had become a premier voice and diplomat for policymaking in the Middle East. She sought to stay true to herself and her values, even in the cutthroat, power-hungry milieu of Washington... Read the remainder o

St. Anthony Messenger: The Imagination’s Pathway to Prayer

My 3-year-old son wakes up each day in a world of magic and potential. He’ll empty decks of cards and place them under his wooden train tracks, which he surrounds with cups and bowls. The point? I have no idea. But in his mind perhaps he’s constructed an intricate subway system through a bustling metropolis. He’ll grab his golf putter and drag stools, chairs, weights, books, toys, anything that stirs his imagination into the living room... This column was published in the Sep

Franciscan Media: Choosing Relationship Over Ideology, A Franciscan Approach

I often tell people that I feel like I have the best job, able to listen and learn from people who are way smarter than me as I interview them for Franciscan Media’s Off the Page Podcast . Editing the episode can be its own lectio divina (sacred reading) experience as I allow a guest’s words to sit even deeper in my heart. And in times of difficulty, I often find myself returning to past conversations, contemplating the words and wisdom of someone I’ve interviewed, hoping it

St. Anthony Messenger: Chloé Valdary, A Modern Mystic

St. Francis of Assisi unexpe ctedly found himself in some contentious situations charting a path toward peace. Whether mediating between a class conflict in Assisi, dialoguing with a sultan during the Fifth Crusade, or, even when he was weak and dying, seeking to reconcile the bishop and podestà (mayor) who were locked in a bitter dispute—there was Francis, in the middle of it all, seeking peac e. Chloé Valdary has ha d a similar trajectory in her life, somehow finding her

St. Anthony Messenger: A Loud Amen

“We’re going to have to be careful about this,” Elizabeth “Teeny” Horne said as she hugged fellow teacher Sandra Worsham in her empty classroom at Baldwin High School in Milledgeville, Georgia. Worsham was caught off guard. Not because the attraction wasn’t mutual, but because Horne was a devout Catholic. Worsham’s first marriage had crumbled as she confronted her sexuality, but not without guilt and shame as her deep desire for God collided with the reality that she was gay.

St. Anthony Messenger: St. Francis Builds

Mike Johnson had his own law firm. The house, the jacuzzi, the tennis court. He sat on 13 boards and committees. His dream? To become a judge. That was five years before. Now it was his first day inside El Abra—a maximum-security prison tucked into a valley in the Bolivian Andes. The journey of Brother Mike Johnson, OFM, from successful lawyer to Franciscan friar arose from a pattern in his life: his vocation expanding as he ventured outside his comfort zone. But nothing had

St. Anthony Messenger: Contemplating the Nature of the Universe

"If you want to know how science and religion are related, first come to know the deepest truth of yourself,” writes Sister Ilia Delio, OSF , in Birth of a Dancing Star . “This is what I realized when I looked into the nighttime sky: I saw myself in the stars and the stars within me.” 4:00 in the afternoon of April 8, 2024: That was when I interviewed Sister Ilia for St. Anthony Messenger . It’s a fitting thing to talk to someone like Sister Ilia in the middle of a solar ecli