A local attorney has made national news: Danny Lampley of Oxford, Mississippi, was found to be in criminal contempt of court because he refused to recite the Pledge of Allegiance at the beginning of a session of Chancery Court. Judge Talmadge D. Littlejohn wrote: “The court having ordered all present in the courtroom to stand … Read more
Over at OpenCulture, I stumbled across this amazing video, described as “Video mapping during the 600 year anniversary of the astrological tower clock situated at the Old Town Square in the center of Prague.” Not quite sure what all that means, but check it out: [video:http://vimeo.com/15749093 400×710] The post describes such “light shows” as being … Read more
The diocese of Green Bay is reporting some interesting results from its recent run of the “Catholics Come Home” series of ads: This month, the diocese released survey findings that show Mass attendance increased an average of 7.4 percent after the commercials began to air. In addition, more than 95 percent of parish leaders and … Read more
A group called “Before It’s News” recently provided a heavily hyperlinked article with the unwieldy title, “Is America in Decline? 24 Statistics About the United States Economy That Are Almost Too Embarrassing to Admit.” Here’s a sample from the middle: #6 One prominent economist now says that the Chinese economy will be three times larger than the … Read more
Many years ago, in 1948, a book was published that had an immediate dramatic effect on its readers. It was written by a young man, Thomas Merton, and told the story of his riotous youth, conversion to Catholicism, and entry into the Trappist monastery at Gethsemani, Kentucky, in 1941, when he was twenty-six years old. … Read more
There was a time, 150 years ago, when American law held that all human beings were created equal — except for black human beings. American law currently holds that all human beings are equal — except for the unborn child. The Supreme Court of the United States did legalize de facto abortion on demand in … Read more
(This one’s for Zoe!) The New York Times has a story today about Wal-Mart’s new push to source more of its produce from local (read: in-state) farmers: The program is intended to put more locally grown food in Wal-Mart stores in the United States, invest in training and infrastructure for small and medium-sized farmers particularly … Read more
Does Catholic Charities facilitate same-sex adoptions? Of course not, you might say. Well, one head of Catholic Charities has been asked to find out. Arne Nelson, CEO of Catholic Charities in Orlando, sent out the following question to the diocesan heads of all Catholic Charities in the US. Let’s hope the answer is a resounding … Read more
In the current issue of the Catholic Herald, Bishop Jaime Soto of Sacramento writes that most modern couples accept contraception as the “default” position in marriage, only giving up the practice when it’s ‘time to have kids.’ This isn’t merely a drag on our population’s replacement rate, but has itself confused the definition of marriage. … Read more
I’m sitting outside a downtown Starbucks with two George Washington University undergraduates, talking about sex, politics, and religion. Michele Walk and Conor Joseph Rogers fit my stereotype of contemporary American college students. They’re sincere, confident, and hyperaware of the ways in which they’re different from their parents. Michele and Conor also represent a growing demographic: … Read more
While wandering aimlessly through the fantastical Interweb landscape earlier this morning, I happened across The National Post’s (CA) Arthur Kaptainis and his account of last Saturday’s “Casual Concert” from the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. The opening lines, in particular, caught my attention – which is exactly what a writer would want, I suppose: Few composers are defined … Read more
Christopher Hitchens surveys the political landscape and wonders what sane person would choose to run for office today: I could introduce you to dozens of enthusiastic and intelligent people, highly aware of “the issues” and very well-informed on all questions from human rights to world trade to counterinsurgency, to none of whom it would occur … Read more
Faith draws on far more resources of head and heart than the formal reasoning that flashes through our frontal cortex can account for. Religious sentiment and habits of piety formed in early life can lay down trails we will endlessly retrace in future decades. Conversely, pieties denied us when we were young will be harder … Read more
Remember the man your man could smell like? Me, too. But if you prefer more of a dank and musty odor to Old Spice, you may enjoy this new video making it’s way around the internet: [video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kB4P_VMNGYQ 635×355]
The rescue of the 33 miners in Chile, trapped below ground for 68 days, continues today (as of right now, ten miners have reached the surface), and the stories of each one are incredibly moving. Here, the video of the first miner, Florencio Avalos, reaching the surface and greeting his wife and son: [video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JAyr0NPvqo 635×355] … Read more
The center of our Faith is Eucharist. Eucharist means “thanksgiving.” That means that the center of our Faith is thanksgiving. It is in the form of a thanksgiving meal that our Lord chose to make Himself present to us. And He did so, shockingly, “on the night He was betrayed.” In other words, He defiantly … Read more
The Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274) holds a central place in the tradition of Roman Catholic intellectual and spiritual life. The matrix of Aquinas’s own mystical experiences was the thirty-some years of Dominican ministry and community life that this Neapolitan nobleman began in 1244. We see Aquinas’s spiritual self-understanding reveal his deep personal love … Read more
Many Catholics were justly upset when the University of Notre Dame awarded an honorary doctorate to President Barack Obama last year. But there are some good things happening at the school as well, and they should be recognized and encouraged. Most recently, the Notre Dame Fund created the Notre Dame Evangelium Vitae Medal, established “to … Read more
Watching the trailer for the recent documentary Waiting for Superman, about our floundering public school system, is enough to make a school-choice activist out of anyone: [video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKTfaro96dg 635×355] Ross Douthat, writing in the New York Times, says the movie is right to highlight the benefits of school choice, but that choice alone won’t fix the … Read more
Columbus Day has been an official holiday in the United States since 1937, except in three states — Nevada, South Dakota, and Hawaii. The day was never much on my own radar screen since the second Monday of October was always Thanksgiving in my home country. Christopher Columbus has been vilified as well as defended … Read more