As you’ve probably already noticed, Crisis Magazine has gotten a major face-lift. Not only have we completely redesigned our look, but we’re now full color from cover to cover. Our reasons are many, but the main one is simple: This is our small way of thanking you for being a faithful Crisis reader. You see, … Read more
Catholic pundit Kate O’Beirne famously called the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) the “Democratic Party at prayer.” In an ongoing series on the bishops in CRISIS, we only slightly amended that by noting the USCCB’s commitment to the defense of innocent life—a stance not shared with the Democratic Party. Soon the USCCB will … Read more
Several Catholic leaders have recently commented that Catholics should not be “single issue” voters, meaning that they shouldn’t vote exclusively on the abortion issue. I agree. But it’s not necessary to be a single-issue voter to give the life issues the priority they deserve. Catholics should be “dominant issue” voters. The Catholic Church proposes a … Read more
Conservatives, by and large, don’t trust the arts. The suspicion goes back to four centuries before Christ when Plato famously argued that the passions awakened by artists were a threat to the state. In 1965 the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) was created, along with its sister, the National Endowment for the Humanities, as … Read more
This summer in Boston the Democratic Party will formally nominate a pro-abortion Catholic, Senator John Kerry, as its candidate for president. This is the man who went out of his way during the primary to identify himself as the most pro-abortion of all the candidates. When asked what his first act as president would be, … Read more
Mel Gibson’s Passion is finally in movie theaters. Now people can see for themselves what all the hubbub is about. Most, I believe, will leave the theater shaken to the core by the terrible beauty of Gibson’s masterpiece. The media-driven expectation of an anti-Semitic portrayal of the Jews will be swept away by the spectacle … Read more
The sex-abuse scandal has underscored the importance of independent Catholic journalism. The Church needs objective Catholic voices—both as a defense from embedded media bias and as an encouragement to stand by the Magisterium. With that in mind, Cruses has been a dues-paying member of the Catholic Press Association (CPA) for many years. But this afternoon, … Read more
In the next couple of months, the National Review Board will issue two reports. On January 6, the board will announce the results of its diocesan audit that measures compliance with the charter the bishops adopted in June 2002 to protect children and youth. And on February 27, the board will release its survey—compiled by … Read more
During the November meeting of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in Washington, D.C., the president of Call to Action presented the bishops with a letter from 6,000 Catholics asking that celibacy become optional for the priesthood. Their motivation, as quoted in USA Today, was to make the Eucharist more widely available. Sounds … Read more
The television and radio interviews are already taped and waiting to be broadcast. The passing of Pope John Paul II will unleash a media spin on his papacy guaranteed to make you nauseous: This was a pope who cared about the poor but did not engage in dialogue, a pope who traveled the world to … Read more
Before e-mail, I could have never received personal messages from hundreds of people in a single day. But as our weekly e-mail newsletter has grown, so has the number of readers who take the time to respond (and, yes, I read them all). Most of the messages are positive in tone, and some contain useful … Read more
“Letting Hudson define Catholicism is like letting Osama define Islam.” Thus columnist Ellen Goodman opined in the Boston Globe on August 3. Normally, I wince when I read criticism about myself in print, but this made me smile. It’s an encouraging sign when an important leader of the opposition, a leading journalist, for example, begins … Read more
…a surprising one. One of the cofounders of CRISIS, Michael Novak, is a leading neoconservative. (Novak is also greatly indebted to Maritain as well as a neo-Thomist of a different…
The following excerpt is from Jay Leno’s opening monologue on The Tonight Show (April 23, 2003): “Republican senator from Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum—well, let me finish. Don’t hiss me. You can hiss the guy later. He is causing quite a lot of controversy this week with remarks he made about gays…. This is the quote: ‘I … Read more
During my eight years at Crisis, the conversation that most often reoccurs is the one about the fate of the Catholic university and college. It begins inevitably with an alumnus complaining about the latest anti-Catholic outbreak on the hallowed grounds of their former college campus and ends with their asking me for advice. I always … Read more
Robert Reilly is on assignment overseas for the next few months. His column will resume upon his return. In the meantime, some of his friends will be filling in. For my part, I would like to offer Crisis readers a personal list of the 14 best film scores according to two criteria: (1) Each score … Read more
For years the Vatican has been fighting the United Nations. Through its status as a full member of international conferences, the Holy See Mission to the UN has aggressively, but diplomatically, opposed the “population control” policies of the UN bureaucracy and its member nations. Led by the former UN nuncio Archbishop Renato Martino (now president … Read more
Just over a month ago, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger issued a remarkable statement on Catholics and politics. Doctrinal Note on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life clarified once again the problems of duplicity that emanate from a U.S. Congress where almost half of all Catholic senators and representatives are pro-abortion. Cardinal Ratzinger’s … Read more
Nanci Pelosi is a conservative Catholic. Sure, she may be in favor of abortion, women priests, and homosexual marriages, but according to the House minority leader, that has no bearing on her life as a Catholic. How does she define “conservative Catholic”? In a January interview with the National Catholic Reporter, Pelosi explains, “I was … Read more
With a decision on a plenary council put indefinitely on hold, the next major step in addressing the causes of the sexual abuse crisis is the upcoming apostolic visitation to our nation’s Catholic seminaries. Questions will be asked—as they should be—about how much Catholics can trust that the seminaries will undergo truly zealous scrutiny. The … Read more