In the Responsory for the Office of the Third Friday of Advent, we read: “For if one hopes, even though his tongue is still, he is still singing always in his heart. But the man who has no hope, no matter what clamors and shouts he makes to be heard by men, is speechless in … Read more
This year Georgetown University celebrates the two-hundredth anniversary of its founding by Bishop John Carroll. It is the oldest university in this country with Catholic origins. Interestingly, the University of Bologna in Italy, the oldest university in the world, the Alma Mater Studiorum, is currently celebrating its 900th Anniversary. Throughout medieval and modern times, Bologna … Read more
On December 23, 1923, Isak Dinesen, from her farm in Ngong in present-day Kenya, wrote to her mother in Denmark: I wish I could smell the Christmas tree and the indescribably delicious aroma of roast goose out here; it is quite right… that “the nose is the memory,”—but I am sure that you will all … Read more
Not often in history has a single event had the multifold and far reaching effect upon a whole civilization and, more poignantly, Western consciousness than the Great War. Prior to 1914, from at least the eighteenth century, in the West one of history’s great calms reigned, a calm made up of rationality, civility, of respect … Read more
James Boswell reached Motiers, Switzerland on December 14, 1764. He had climbed on horseback over a peak he called the “Mountain Lapidosa”—the “Rocky Mountain,” probably Mount Chasseron—but almost the first thing he did was to “alight” at the door of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Boswell was twenty-four and wanted to “use his time well.” By some fast … Read more
In the recent film “Wedding in Galilee,” two traditional Muslim couples were shown together praying, while the camera zeroed in on some beads sliding along a wire with their chant. In his essay “Worship in the Parish Communities” (Feast of Faith, Ignatius, 1986), Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger mentioned the importance of not making Mass our only … Read more
Not too long ago, I received a letter from my friend Robert Reilly, who had recently switched from the U.S. Consulate in Berne to the Intercollegiate Studies Institute in Bryn Mawr. Thanks to Anne Burleigh, I had been on a binge of reading Jane Austen, which I had mentioned to Reilly. “I am glad to … Read more
My cousin Kathleen and her husband Chuck Oldsen were in Washington from San Diego for about a week this spring. One Sunday, we drove over to Gettysburg, a place I had not seen for almost thirty years, when I went with the late Father Dick Spillane. In many ways, Gettysburg remains the most powerful of … Read more
As Ronald Reagan comes to the end of his presidency, we can acknowledge that he has been almost the only public figure of his rank consistently to oppose abortion as a civil policy, with the intention of doing something about it. That he was not able to do more is almost exclusively due to the … Read more
In February, I was invited by my colleague, Professor Jan Karski, to attend a performance at the Kennedy Center of the Washington Dance Society. Professor Karski’s wife, Pola Nirenska, is a well-known director of modern dance. The final dance of the evening, set to some music by Ernest Bloch, was entitled “Dirge, 1981,” based on … Read more
James Boswell was in Wittenberg, in Saxony, on 0 30 September 1764, on his “Grand Tour” in Germany and Switzerland. He visited there the tombs of Luther and Melanchthon. The convent which housed the remains of these famous Protestant divines had, unfortunately, been “miserably shattered by the bombardments,” but the tombs were still intact. Boswell … Read more
A good friend sent me something off the Scripps-Howard wires the other day, a Denver dateline about how Coors Brewery manages its sales. In the article, Peter Coors stated, “Believe it or not, in the beer industry any more, you’re not really selling beer. You’re selling packaging, and you’re selling image….” No doubt, this observation … Read more
The lesson from Isaiah at Midnight Mass on Christmas reads, “Thou has increased their joy and given them great gladness.” I am often struck by the fact that in Christianity joy and gladness are not so much a product of our own activities but something much more, something that happens when all that the Greeks … Read more
My editor called up the other day from the deep recesses of downtown South Bend to remind me that my column for the present issue of Crisis was due. At first I thought of doing something on Nietzsche, or Allan Bloom, or Josef Pieper, if for no other reason than that their books were sitting … Read more
In his Autobiography, G.K. Chesterton, who as he tells us was in despair as a young man, decided finally that he had had enough of this pessimistic thought and had decided to revolt against it. He found very little help from the standard sources, he recalled: But as I was still thinking the thing out by … Read more
Dennis Bartlett, in San Francisco, lent me his copy of A Spiritual Aeneid, which is Ronald Knox’s autobiography, first published in 1918. Dennis has a 1958 Sheed & Ward edition with a Preface by Evelyn Waugh. I actually intend to return this book someday. As I also have an edition of The Pastoral Sermons of … Read more
“For who will dare to say or believe that it was not in God’s power to prevent both angels and men from sinning? But God preferred to leave this in their power, and thus to show both what evil could be wrought by their pride, and what good by His grace.” —St. Augustine, City of … Read more
Book III, Chapter 7 of St. Augustine’s Confessions is entitled, marvelously: He Deplores His Wretchedness, That Having Been Born Thirty-Two Years, He Had Not Yet Found Out The Truth. In a culture whose public (oftentimes even ecclesiastical) doctrine, is theoretical “pluralism” — that is, that there is no “truth” but one’s own private feelings — … Read more
My brother-in-law, Jerry Vertin, in Steven’s Point, Wisconsin, has a collection of Gilbert and Sullivan records. While I visited this summer, I was listening to the Yeoman of the Guard, which came with a printed libretto. In Act I, I came across the following passage of Jack Point: My masters, I pray you bear with … Read more
On Pentecost, 1986, John Paul II published a fundamental encyclical, Dominum et Vivificantem, on the “Holy Spirit in the Life of the Church and the World.” This encyclical is meant to be the third part of a series on the Trinity — still, as Frank Sheed used to remark, the most fascinating of topics to … Read more
