Jean-Baptiste Lamy, the Apostle of Santa Fe
The man chosen by Blessed Pius IX to restore the Faith to the troubled American Southwest was the Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Lamy, who died on the 13th of February in the year of Grace 1888.
Year: 2012
The Redeemed Surrealists
In Norse mythology, the earth was formed from the body of Ymir, the father of the frost giants. His blood became the ocean, and his skull the sky. It’s a grim vision of life, and yet a strikingly anthropomorphic one: The world is shaped like a man and the man is dead.
Hagia Sophia is No Lady
The primary use of sexual metaphors in Christianity is to convey the balance of activity and passivity, initiative and response, between the Lord and a human soul. We call the Church the “bride” of Christ, and Jesus the “bridegroom” of the soul precisely because of what these terms convey to psychologically normal people…
Obama vs. Our “Obsolete” Constitution
What a fitting capstone to the Obama presidency. And imagine that a majority of professing Roman Catholics elected this man in November 2008.
White Collar Mitt vs. Blue Collar Rick
Rick Santorum won big victories in three small contests in the Republican presidential race last Tuesday. In doing so, he reshaped the oft-reshaped nomination battle once again. But he has not installed himself as the favorite, and neither he nor Mitt Romney has established himself as the candidate who can do best in the general … Read more
A Son of Saint Louis
Samuel de Champlain vindicates the ideal of the Christian explorer who brings the light of faith and the benefits of civilization to the heathen savage.
Another Fleeting Failure For NBC
Super Bowl XLVI was a good football game, marred once again by the bohemian elite at NBC. NBC could have prevented, but failed to stop, the broadcast of a female rapper “flipping the bird” at 114 million viewers during Madonna’s halftime show. It was another “fleeting expletive” of the hand-gesture variety, and somehow, despite elaborate … Read more
The Republicans: The Party of Civil Rights?
Ann Coulter, the lawyer and best selling author, has a blog which used be headed with the book-advertisement/slogan “If Democrats had any brains, they would be Republicans.” This “in your face” approach characterizes her recent book, Demonic: How the Liberal Mob is Endangering America. True to her partisanship, in this book she psychoanalyzes Democrats in … Read more
Thirteen Worthwhile New Movies
You can never get complete agreement on lists of movies. In this annual feature, the editors of Mercatornet.com try to select films which are worthwhile, entertaining and reasonably family-friendly. If you would like to nominate others, please make a comment. The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn Directed by Steven Spielberg … Read more
Do Catholics Have Too Many Babies?
When we were colonists and fought a war against the king and Parliament so that we could secede from the British Empire and be independent of it, we also fought for the value of personal freedom. That is the idea that in matters of personal choice, the government should play no role. The king only … Read more
Appease This!
On April 1, 2001, a U.S. spy plane and a Chinese fighter collided over the South China Sea, forcing the Americans to make an emergency landing on Chinese soil. But the Chinese government said it would not release the crew until it got an apology. The Bush administration tried to find other ways to satisfy … Read more
Obama’s Trampling on God’s Turf Now
Yes, Virginia, there is a religious war going on. It is for the soul of America. And traditional Christianity is besieged. In a January visit to the Vatican, American bishops were warned by Benedict XVI that “radical secularism” posed “grave threats” to their Catholic faith. Your religious freedom is being circumscribed, said the pope. The … Read more
GOP Must Convince Young People It’s the Party of Options
The Republican presidential candidates, except for Ron Paul, haven’t been paying much attention to young voters in the primaries and caucuses so far. But any Republican nominee — which is to say probably Mitt Romney, or maybe Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum — had better be paying attention to them in the summer and fall. … Read more
Economics: The Cheerful Science
Chances are, you’ve heard economics referred to as “the dismal science.” That unflattering description is glib and catchy; it is also 100 percent wrong. Let me set the record straight and explain why economics—far from being dismal—is cause for hope, joy, cheer, and optimism. Thomas Carlyle, a 19th-century Scottish essayist, coined the phrase “the dismal … Read more
The Spirit of Metroplex II
There are many good arguments against quickly convening a Third Vatican Council—a notion beloved of Catholics who occupy the portside cabins on the Barque of Peter. The most obvious is that Catholicism has barely begun to digest the teaching of Vatican II on the nature of the Church, the universal call to holiness, and the … Read more
The Population Bomb, Still Fizzling
A new report was released on Monday by the UN’s high level panel on global sustainability. Unsurprising its conclusion is that the world’s current economic , environmental and demographic trajectory is wildly unsustainable. According to the UN estimates, as reported by Reuters: As the world’s population looks set to grow to nearly 9 billion by … Read more
The 2012 Republican Primary and the Seeds of 1966
The Republican primary contest has come down to a choice between Mitt Romney and the anti-Romney. It is another in a series of battles between the non-conservative and conservative wings of the GOP. Arguably, the political seeds of today’s Republican schism were planted in 1966 when Ronald Reagan became governor of California and George Herbert … Read more
Should Our Kids Be Happy?
A British media personality has pricked the country’s happiness bubble by declaring that she does not want her kids to be “happy”. Kirsty Young, a Scot with two young daughters and two teenage step-children (and a husband who is a millionaire), said in an interview that it was impossible to be happy all the time … Read more
Was Romneycare Unconstitutional?
You can now divide Americans into two groups: Those who believe government rightfully has the power to force people to purchase goods and services they do not want and those who don’t. Among the former are two subgroups: Those who believe only state governments have this coercive power and those who believe the federal government … Read more
Economic Chaos Ahead
Let’s think about the kind of mess that we’re in. Federal 2010 Medicare and Medicaid expenditures totaled $800 billion. The projected annual growth of both programs is about 7 percent. Social Security expenditures are more than $700 billion a year. According to the 2009 Social Security and Medicare trustees reports, by 2030, 49 percent of … Read more