On April 28, a Friday morning, about ten-thirty, I boarded United Express at Islip, Long Island, for the flight back to Washington. The plane landed at about noon at Dulles. On the flight back, I thought I had better make arrangements for a ticket to the West Coast to see my family after classes ended … Read more
A week after Tad Szulc’s biography of Pope John Paul II appeared in the bookstores, David Shaw, the media critic of the Los Angeles Times, wrote a remarkable four-part series arguing that the American press — obsessed with issues of sexual morality and incapable of understanding the Church in terms other than those drawn from … Read more
The older I grow the more I listen to Haydn. There is something measured in his pace that goes with daily life. The sturm und drang of youth is over and I can no longer bear the emotional excesses of Romanticism. Of course, there is always Mozart. But listening to him involves the pain of … Read more
The word “breakfast” obviously means the moment when we break a fast, when we first eat in the day after our night of sleep. The word probably had something to do with the older and perhaps wiser rules about Holy Communion, fasting from midnight before one receives the Sacrament. To break the fast, with its … Read more
The attempted suicide of Western classical music has failed. The patient is recovering, no thanks to the efforts of music’s Dr. Kevorkian, Arnold Schoenberg, whose cure, the imposition of a totalitarian atonality, was worse than the disease — the supposed exhaustion of the tonal resources of music. Schoenberg’s vaunted mission to “emancipate dissonance” by denying … Read more
The Supreme Court is at it again. The Justices are looking this term at two church-state questions which have long perplexed them. One is the yuletide baby-Jesus-in-the-public-square problem. This time, in the case of Pinette v. Review Board, a private group set up a Latin cross near the Ohio state capitol. This public space has … Read more
Was Hildegard of Bingen a saint? One might think so from the way this 12th-century abbess wrote music. She compiled her Symphonia harmoniae caelestium revelationum (“The Symphony of the Harmony of Celestial Revelations”) over the course of a long life that creatively did not begin until she was in her forties (b. 1098). In 1141, … Read more
That something is wrong with human nature has been known since ancient times, in all cultures, by any individual who, like Augustine, reflects on himself, on his own life, in the unclouded honesty of his memory. But let me be more accurate: On the whole, human nature seems to be intact; human nature is good, … Read more
Have you ever suspected that all church music sounds the same, at least in certain genres? If you have heard one plainchant, you have heard them all? No matter how much the New Agers rave about the monks of Santo Domingo de Silos, who must be somewhat perplexed by the new pop chart audience for … Read more
One Sunday noon hour during January, it was the Epiphany in fact, I read Michael Medved’s article in Policy Review (Winter, 1995) about what was “right” with America. Naturally, he had to mention what was wrong. “The problem with this country isn’t too much violence on TV, and it isn’t too much promiscuous sexuality in … Read more
The Holy Father’s new book is available throughout the world — Urbe et Orbe. He is the only man on earth today who has an immediate worldwide audience, and about whom no one can be indifferent. The idea of the Pope of Rome writing a bestseller is such a delight. How are we to keep … Read more
In the little town of Iowa where I was born, there were two Catholic churches—Sacred Heart and Saints Peter and Paul. From my very youth, these two apostles, Peter and Paul, were visibly associated; and I have always liked the very ring of the words “Saints Peter and Paul” when spoken aloud. The Church celebrates … Read more
A couple of years ago, I was to spend Christmas Eve with one of my nephews and his dear family. Though I will not specify where the following account took place, following St. Luke’s example, I will say that I was an eye-witness to the truth of what follows in this sober account. I write … Read more
Generally, before publication these columns are faxed to me by Scott Walter to see if there are any corrections to be made to the text before final publication. This exchange has been going on for six years now. In late July, I received the galleys for the September issue. In the course of the instructions, … Read more
Reading the Divine Office each day requires some attention and diligence, but also routine and repetition. I have a great fondness for C.S. Lewis’s remark that if you have only read a great book once, you have not really read it all. This is why we priests and whoever else read the whole Psalter every … Read more
In And the Beagles and the Bunnies Shall Lie Down Together, there is a sequence on the Great Pumpkin, Charles Schulz’s not-so-subtle homage to Christmas, about how the Great Pumpkin rises out of the Patch and looks for sincere boys and girls to whom to give lots of toys. Peppermint Patty and Linus are sitting … Read more
OXFORD—Courtesy of The Chesterton Review, I recently spent two days in Zagreb, trying to organize a small conference there on ethics and economics. Why Croatia? Why Chesterton? Those who’ve read The Napoleon of Notting Hill must know the answer; for those who haven’t, a few clues may explain. In the main square of Zagreb, near … Read more
Adoremus in Aeternum Sanctissimum Sacramentum!” the initial words of John Paul II, on June 12, 1993, when he was at the Eucharistic Congress in Seville, in Spain, in its famous Cathedral. The words mean simply, “Let us adore unto eternity the most Holy Sacrament.” The moving photo in L’Osservatore Romano (June 23) shows the Holy … Read more
This year, the mayor’s race in New York City — always of special interest to Americans — may just be more important than ever. This interest in New York, of course, is not because it is everyone’s favorite city. Yet, New York is a city most Americans have visited and all know about. The outlines … Read more
Before spring semester began, I sat down and read the remarkable new catechism that the Holy Father has just presented—Le Catechisme de l’Eglise Catholique (Paris: Mame/Plon). It was a welcome, indeed exhilarating experience. This book is not merely an aid to understanding the faith but itself a grace and even something of a miracle. I … Read more
