By Michael Patrick O’Brien– Salve is a versatile word. In Latin (pronounced “sal-vay”), it is a greeting and a welcoming phrase, derived from the verb for wishing someone health and…
Posts published by “Mike O'Brien”
By Gary Topping– Any memories I had of my first autumn in Utah—1972—are submerged in my recollection of the horrendous winter that ensued, when temperatures sank to minus fifteen degrees. …
By Michael Patrick O’Brien– If my dearly departed Irish Catholic mother was to haunt a place, she’d choose the old Sisters of Mercy convent and boarding school in her hometown…
By Michael Patrick O’Brien– During the last few months, I fell up the stairs four different times. I now am working at the office almost full-time again, post-pandemic (hopefully). As…
By Michael Patrick O’Brien– Mother Teresa of Calcutta and Dorothy Day, perhaps the greatest Catholic women of the twentieth century, came to Utah fifty years ago. Both went to the…
By Michael Patrick O’Brien– Catholic monasteries are known for many interesting and wonderful things, but probably not for their pumpkins. That all may be about to change, thanks to some…
By Gary Topping– I admit it: I was a pretty weird kid. I knew it at the time and was unrepentant. Still am. I rarely listened to popular music. I…
By Michael Patrick O’Brien– Near the end of my first decade of life, singer Neil Young penned and recorded a song called “After the Gold Rush.” The haunting lyrics of…
By Michael Patrick O’Brien- When I gave my 24-year-old son Danny a recent tour of my new office at my new law firm, he sat in my chair, put his…
By Michael Patrick O’Brien– As I watched my friends—the monks from the old Trappist monastery in Northern Utah—cope for the last five years with the closure of their beloved Huntsville…