What do you get in this Crisis Magazine classic when you combine Peter Kreeft with a computer? A very entertaining meltdown. Make no mistake: I do not merely hate computers. I loathe, fear, despise, curse, and have constant torture and dismemberment fantasies about them. I know there are others out there like me, … Read more
“Whereto serves mercy, but to confront the visage of offence?” asks Portia in The Merchant of Venice. It’s a good question, and one that most of us don’t really think about these days. That’s because, increasingly, we are a culture that only has “mercy” on people who “couldn’t help it” or “didn’t know any better.” … Read more
In the last several years I’ve been invited to a few dozen colleges and churches around the country, usually to speak about Dante. It’s no surprise, I guess, that a translator of the Divine Comedy should receive such invitations. What is surprising, though, and what confounds the secularist who derives his news from Mother Times … Read more
The other night, I put a question to some friends: “Why isn’t David Letterman funny anymore?” No one disagreed with the premise, but we struggled to find an explanation while trying to recall what made him funny in the first place. The question was provoked by Letterman’s sleazy “joke” about Governor Sarah Palin’s 14-year-old … Read more
It had been one of those days. Or weeks. Or months, maybe. Ten years ago, I had a husband who was working extra hours at his second job. I had a cranky, teething baby with an aversion to naps and an impending eye infection. I had a potty training two-year-old who was solely responsible for … Read more
Argentina entered a period of deep reflection following the recent death in old age of Raúl Alfonsín, the country’s first democratically elected president after the military dictatorship of 1976-1982. In three days of official mourning, Argentines waited hours in lines that stretched many city blocks to view the former president’s body. The government and opposition … Read more
With a pro-abortion president in the White House, new sub-groups in the broader “culture of death” are coming into view. One of them is dark, indeed. Take two recent events: Dr. George Tiller is compared to Martin Luther King, Jr. The president of Catholics for Choice attacks a political appointee, Alexia Kelley, who … Read more
During the persecution of Christians during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, the Roman prefect Rusticus was frustrated by the serene equanimity of the Christian convert Justin, a Platonic philosopher. The Romans considered Christianity a supserstitio parva (perverse superstition) and classified its morality as immodica (immoderate) for, among other things, refusing to abort the unborn … Read more
As I’m writing this column at the tail end of my first trip to Vienna, some of you who’ve read me before might expect a bittersweet love note to the Habsburgs — a tear-stained column that splutters about Blessed Karl and “good Kaiser Franz Josef,” calls this a “pilgrimage” like my 2008 trip to the … Read more
Don’t tell me about the world. Not today. It’s springtime and they’re knocking baseballs around fields where the grass is damp and green in the morning and the kids are trying to hit the curve ball. — Pete Hamill I once knew a woman who, when preparing the first fruit salad of summer, would lop … Read more
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Mt 5:6). The goods of this world, though they remain good, can be deceptive when you are a member of a fallen race. In certain moods of rude good health and the flush of adolescent insolence, it is all too … Read more
Since writing The Thrill of the Chaste — a recovery manual for grown-ups who missed the memo on abstinence — I have addressed all kinds of people, from fishermen in Alaska to unwed moms in New York City, pornographers at “Sex Week at Yale” to hooting Catholic schoolboys in Drogheda, Ireland. But never have I … Read more
June 1 was a lovely day in Northern Virginia when the staff of InsideCatholic gathered with friends for our annual Lazarus Golf Tournament at Bull Run Golf Club, nestled against the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Before playing, however, we hosted a roundtable discussion entitled “The Future of the Christian Vote: Is It in … Read more
In this Crisis Magazine classic, Ronald J. Rychlak says that while Pius XII was no Nazi collaborator, Hitler did have a strong religious ally… the grand mufti of Jerusalem. The Jewish Holocaust of World War II is a story of human tragedy, with real victims, real villains, and real heroes. Important questions often … Read more
Not too long ago, I wrote an article for my parish newsletter about why we must offer encouragement — not sideways glances — to parents who bring their young children to Mass. Overall, the response was positive, but one reader sent me a letter suggesting I leave my kids at home so I could “more … Read more
The most startling thing about Florence King’s 1982 novel When Sisterhood Was in Flower might be how thoroughly it combines satire and fondness. Gentleness isn’t a characteristic often associated with satire; and it certainly isn’t often associated with Miss King, the acerbic virago of National Review. King on Sylvia Plath: “For all her insecurities, Plath was … Read more
Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord (1754-1838) was a scandalous bishop, adroit foreign minister, and quintessential survivor who served the French Revolution, Napoleon, and the restored Bourbon monarchy with equally cold-blooded skill. Slippery character though he was, however, Talleyrand also was a wit. In Earthly Powers, his valuable history of the interaction between religion and politics in … Read more
Flannery O’Connor couldn’t have written it better, although she would have found a way to make it funny: A wealthy abortionist, who specializes in the destruction of children exactly as old and fully developed as those you see doctors saving in the preemie ward, stays out of prison for his activities thanks to a … Read more
In this Crisis Magazine classic, Todd Aglialoro explains the controversy without resorting to scientific jargon. This is the perfect introduction to the debate. Embryonic stem-cell research (ESCR) has taken a place next to abortion and same-sex marriage as a preeminent polarizing moral issue. Celebrities marshaled by the late Christopher Reeve agitated in favor of … Read more
There are many ways to play the game of politics in America. Two of the most time-honored are the race/ethnic game and the ideological game. That is, you can play politics by making an appeal to certain ethnic/racial groups or by appealing to certain ideological groups. In 2008, the brilliant Obama campaign strategy combined both … Read more