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The Diminishment of the DC Archdiocese Continues Apace

Cardinal Robert McElroy, the bishop of San Diego who has enjoyed a meteoric rise through the hierarchy under Pope Francis, has been named the Archbishop of Washington, DC, succeeding Cardinal Wilton Gregory, whose resignation was accepted by the pope.

While any faithful Catholic will be dismayed by this news, it should come as no surprise. McElroy was always destined to leave San Diego for a more influential diocese. The very fact that the bishop of a suffragan diocese was made a Cardinal—while being under a metropolitan archbishop (Los Angeles Archbishop José Gomez) who wasn’t himself a Cardinal—was unprecedented. He was clearly being groomed for greater pastures. The irony, however, is that McElroy’s appointment doesn’t increase McElroy’s influence as much as it diminishes the importance of the Archdiocese of Washington, DC.

Recall the recent history of this archdiocese. This century began with Theodore McCarrick being named the archbishop of Washington, DC in November 2000, swiftly followed by his being added to the College of Cardinals a few months later. McCarrick was only archbishop in DC for five years, but his reign established the pattern for the archdiocese. He was particularly talented in two important roles of a bishop: raising money and recruiting priestly vocations. I lived in the DC archdiocese throughout McCarrick’s tenure, and I can confirm that, for all his significant faults, he was a genius at raising money and he did attract many priestly vocations (including many good men). It was these two talents, in fact, that made him one of the most influential men in the Church throughout his career, and that influence continues to permeate the Archdiocese of Washington, DC.

Of course, McCarrick was also a predatory monster. 

After McCarrick came two archbishops who followed in his ideological footsteps: Donald Wuerl and Wilton Gregory. Both are members of the progressive wing of the hierarchy, although Wuerl—who covered up McCarrick’s crimes—often fooled people into thinking he was a moderate or even a conservative prelate. Cardinal McElroy is firmly in this camp as well and so continues the progressive leanings of this office. He vigorously opposes withholding the Eucharist from obstinate public defenders of abortion such as Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden, and he has often promoted false LGBTQ+ ideology, refusing to condemn acts that have always been considered sinful by the Church. He will likely be a vocal opponent of incoming President Donald Trump (as vocal as he was silent about President Joe Biden’s embrace of abortion and “gay rights”).

But McElroy is far more connected to McCarrick than just ideological agreement. He is, in many ways, a perfect successor to Theodore McCarrick, someone he worked to protect. Richard Sipe, an expert on priestly sex abuse, warned McElroy about McCarrick’s proclivities in 2016, two years before they became widely known, and as far as we know, McElroy did nothing beyond a bureaucratic paper-filing in response. Further, McElroy voted against the USCCB petition pressing the Vatican for more transparency and speed in the McCarrick investigation. McElroy also failed to act in an egregious case of priestly sexual abuse in his own diocese. With this past, McElroy not only shouldn’t be elevated to Washington, DC; he should be removed as bishop altogether.

Yet he is now the next archbishop of Washington, DC. While this is clearly considered a promotion by the Vatican, it diminishes DC more than it elevates McElroy. Catholic prelates have two types of authority: institutional authority and moral authority. It’s true that the holders of certain positions, such as the archbishops of New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington, DC, enjoy certain privileges and are often called upon to speak for the Church. Institutional authority only goes so far, though; what is vastly more important is moral authority. Bishop Joseph Strickland, for example, is one of the most influential American prelates today, and he doesn’t even hold institutional office anymore. Most bishops, in fact, hold little moral authority due to their cowardice in opposing the evils of our age. Further, over time the diminished moral authority of a See’s occupants can in turn diminish the institutional authority of the office itself. And if there’s anywhere that’s happened, it’s Washington, DC, and McElroy’s appointment only accelerates that process.

In the end, Robert McElroy hasn’t been promoted as much as the Archdiocese of Washington, DC has been demoted. Pray for the good priests and people of that archdiocese that they may serve Our Lord faithfully in spite of the poor shepherd they have been given.

We Win in the End

As you’ve surely noticed, we’re in the middle of our twice-yearly fundraising campaign. We offer all of our content for free, but as the saying goes, it’s not free to produce. We incur costs bringing quality orthodox Catholic commentary to you every day, such as author stipends, website management and hosting, accounting services, and a salary for yours truly.

We take pride that we run on a shoe-string budget around here, far less than most of the other content providers in our space. I don’t have a huge staff (actually, I’m the only full-time employee of Crisis), and we don’t rent out fancy offices or studios (everything is done from my home office, so no rent costs). 

Further, we don’t have a single donor or two who payrolls everything (which means we aren’t beholden to such large donors). To give a sense of our donor base, our average donation in the past year is $31, spread across more than 7,500 donors. We truly appreciate every donor, no matter the amount they give. 

If you believe, as I do, that the work we do here at Crisis is important, please consider supporting us. You can make a tax deductible donation here: 

Crisis Christmas 2024 Fundraising Campaign

If you donate before the end of the year, your donation will be doubled thanks to the generosity of one of our donors. We especially appreciate monthly donations which allow us to budget going forward.

Speaking of donors, may I ask for your prayers for the soul of Annette, the wife of one our most faithful supporters? She passed away last week. Prayers for her husband and their entire family would also be appreciated. During this holiday season, keep in prayer all those who have lost loved ones in the past year.

One last thing. Our name is Crisis Magazine and so of course we focus on the crisis in the Church and in the world. But it’s important to remember that no crisis, no matter how severe or dire, can overcome the love of God that we see in the newborn babe of Bethlehem. God came down to us and became man so that we might be lifted up to Him and become like Him. This is the Good News that we must always keep in mind as we read the bad news each day. We need to fight for the Faith in the halls of Congress, the public square, and in the pews, but always knowing that as long as we stay on God’s side, we will win in the end.

Wishing all our readers a blessed Christmas season.

Trump Wins: Let the Work Begin

In spite of facing the most unhinged and vicious opposition from a plethora of powerful figures in government, media, academia, and other influential institutions in this country, Donald Trump has been elected to a second term as President of the United States.

From the moment he declared his initial run for the presidency in 2015, Trump has endured more attacks than any other candidate in memory. These attacks range from lies about his connections to Russia to literal attacks in the form of two assassination attempts, including one that left him bloodied on the ground (before he famously got back up and urged his followers to “Fight! Fight! Fight!”). The past eight years have been a steady drumbeat of accusations against him as being every form of evil, including “literally Hitler.”

But here’s a sobering thought: all those attacks will look like child’s play compared to what’s coming. Don’t for a minute think that Trump’s overwhelming victory—which proved that the American people decisively rejected the lies about him—will slow down his enemies. In fact, it will likely embolden them.

I predict that defeat will lead Trump’s opponents completely over the edge (if they haven’t already fallen over it). Every single day of a second Trump term will be filled with demented politicians and talking heads accusing Trump of the most vile evils. Every single governmental act by Trump will be compared to a Nazi pogrom. This is going to be ugly.

Fortunately, Republicans also won the Senate and will likely retain the House. This will at least allow Trump to enact some of his agenda (assuming the Republicans don’t fold in the face of opposition, as they have too often in the past). Hopefully congressional Republicans will finally realize that the attempts to demonize Trump by the Left are a failed project and they can be ignored without fear of losing the next election. You can only cry “Hitler!” so many times before people tune you out.

What I find most fascinating about the Trump victory, though, is the coalition he brought together to make it happen. This has been the most significant political realignment I’ve seen in my lifetime, even more so than the Reagan Democrats of the 1980’s. Trump’s win in 2024 does not look at all like his victory in 2016. While he retained his passionate base, his most prominent supporters this election cycle wanted nothing to do with him back in 2016. And I would argue we have Covid to thank for that.

Trump’s win in 2024 does not look at all like his victory in 2016.Tweet This

To be clear, Trump was bad on Covid when he was President. And he’s never apologized for that, or even suggested that he was anything but “the greatest” when it came to his response to the pandemic. Yet the people who were the best at recognizing and opposing the tyranny that grew out of Covid all coalesced around Trump: RFK, Jr., Elon Musk, Tucker Carlson, Tulsi Gabbard, J.D. Vance, and Vivek Ramaswamy.

Five years ago every single one of these people, with the exception of Tucker Carlson, were opposed—sometimes vehemently—to Trump. Now they are his biggest backers. They don’t have a lot in common with each other, either. Yet now they all see Donald Trump as the best hope to restrain the creeping totalitarianism in our country. They support free speech; they oppose the forever wars; they oppose government programs making our children chronically ill. Most importantly, unlike the Woke Left, they don’t hate you and me.

To be clear, this new political realignment is a cause for concern for conservative Catholics, for it has put social issues like abortion and homosexual “marriage” on the back-burner. This is where our work comes in. We must convince the Trump Administration that true prosperity cannot come to our nation if we continue to slaughter the unborn and discard the sacredness of marriage. But the good thing about the Trump Administration is that, unlike the Woke Left, they will at least give us a hearing. Now we have to work to make that hearing count and truly make America great again.

God’s Wake-up Call

As I noted in the Crisis Point podcast yesterday, we seem to be living in apocalyptic times. Every week brings some new and horrific disaster, whether that be a new war breaking out or a new cataclysmic hurricane forming. Combine that with the heresy and corruption rampant in the Church and the insanity of our current election (have we already forgotten that one of the candidates has faced not one, but two assassination attempts?), and it’s enough to make one wonder whether we are living in the End Times.

I can’t answer that question, but I do think these happenings are a wake-up call for Catholics; specifically, a call to wake up and pray.

There’s lots of theories as to why the practice of Catholicism has fallen so dramatically in recent decades, and why the Western world has degenerated into paganism (and of course those two are not unrelated). Many of those theories have merit, but I would argue that a decline in prayer is a major part of the problem—and therefore an intensification of prayer is a major part of the solution.

Here at Crisis, author and spiritual theologian David Torkington has recently written a number of articles on the decline in mystical theology over the past few centuries, which he argues has in turn has led to a decline in prayer among Catholics. I think he’s identified an important cause of our culture’s—and our Church’s—decline. When a people do not pray, they cannot expect divine protection.

Some might balk at that last sentence, but it is biblical to the core. Many would think it means God is a petty tyrant, punishing us for the least mistake or sin: “You aren’t praying? Then here’s a hurricane to punish you!”

That of course is ridiculous. But Catholics have long believed that prayer really does impact our world, and a lack of prayer can lead to negative consequences in our lives. This isn’t Prosperity Gospel nonsense, but instead an understanding of how a loving Father works. A loving Father doesn’t indulge his children constantly, and when he sees a child following a wayward path, he often allows that child to experience the consequences of his actions in order to turn the child around.

When God removes His protection from us, it’s not primarily to punish us; instead, it’s to jolt us out of our complacency. And if there’s one thing the Catholic world became over time is complacent. Dramatic and traumatic events in our lives should—and often do—send us to our knees. We realize how dependent we are on God for everything in life, and so we turn to Him and ask for His assistance. Like the wayward child, we realize how much we need our Heavenly Father at all times. Times of prosperity often lead us to forget God’s central place in our lives, and the Western world has experienced prosperity beyond imagination in the past century.

So, again, I think the current apocalyptic events are a wake-up call to prayer.

Of course there are many ways to pray and many good devotions. One, however, in my mind stands above them all: the Rosary. Many Marian apparitions in the past century and a half have urged us to pray the Rosary daily, and I would argue that the Rosary is the devotion that heaven itself wants us to prioritize in our day and age.

My friend Joshua Charles, host of the Eternal Christendom podcast, apparently agrees. He just began The Great Rosary Campaign, which is “a yearlong Rosary campaign for the conversion of cultural leaders who are fallen away Catholics and non-Catholic Christians.” What an excellent idea! I encourage you to sign up to this campaign.

But no matter what you do, pray more. Pray of course for those in the path of war or natural disaster, and pray for those suffering under the ideological evils of our age. But also pray for the conversion of sinners (another common request of Marian apparitions) and pray for the Catholic Church. At the end of every traditional Low Mass, we pray for “the conversion of sinners and the exaltation of our holy Mother the Church.” This is an excellent intention for our Rosaries as well.

God is sending us a wake-up call: Will we hit the snooze alarm, or will we get up and pray?

The Temptation of Boromir

My favorite character in the Lord of the Rings has always been Boromir (although sometimes Samwise vies for the crown). I consider the fall of Boromir as perhaps the most emotional and gripping scene in the entire trilogy.

Boromir represents the race of men, both in the book and in real life. He is strong and proud, able to do much good for those he rules and protects. He sees the One Ring as an opportunity; not for evil, as Sauron would, but for good. Its power, when wielded by the right man (Boromir considered himself the “right man,” and not without justification), could bring down Sauron and establish an era of peace for Middle Earth.

For those who aren’t familiar with the story, it sounds like a good plan. Yet those who recognize the corrupting influence of the One Ring know it is doomed to failure. Instead of establishing a reign of peace, a land ruled by Boromir and the One Ring would eventually end up exactly like one ruled by Sauron and the One Ring—just with different management.

Boromir’s temptation is the temptation of the Great Western Powers today, particularly America. Like Boromir, we represent the “good guys.” We’re not Mordor or the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany. We’re Gondor. Being the good guys, we tend to think that anything we do, as long as it is for our cause, is just. We can and should wield powerful forces—often more powerful than we like to admit—to advance Democracy and Freedom.

We saw this temptation most clearly with the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. You’ll find countless justifications for these immoral acts throughout the internet, but ultimately they come down to, “We were the good guys; they were the bad guys; we were therefore justified in what we did.” Yet Catholic moral theology makes clear that one cannot do evil—and dropping a nuke on a city filled with civilians is the definition of evil—that good may result.

Even if the dropping of those bombs shortened the war—a disputed point—what was the cost of those horrific acts? In the almost 80 years since the destruction of those two cities, many evils have been justified by American forces. For example, I’ve seen politicians recently argue that we should turn Palestine (and some include Iran) into a “parking lot”, and refer to Hiroshima/Nagasaki as a defense. Once you drop a nuke on a city, just about anything and everything is on the table, so to speak.

Even if the dropping of those bombs shortened the war—a disputed point—what was the cost of those horrific acts?Tweet This

But the implications of those evil acts can be more subtle. What happened to the American soul with those bombings? We were unquestionably on the side of Good in World War II; yet we committed a horrific act of evil to end that war. Like using the One Ring, embracing evil, even in the cause of good, takes its toll. I can’t help but wonder if the many evils that have arisen in our country since 1945—particularly abortion—have been at least partly due to a huge chunk of our soul being lost.

A more recent example of falling for the temptation of Boromir is the Israeli pager attack on Hezbollah. Thousands of pagers were exploded by remote control, injuring thousands and killing at least 32 people, including two children. I saw many conservatives cheering (and even laughing) at this attack, which cannot be considered just by Catholic morality.

Like the atomic bomb dropping, the pager attack takes another piece of the Western soul. Do we really want to live in a world where our wearable electronic devices are potential bombs? Where we justify setting off explosives in public areas, with no thought of collateral damage, all because we’re the “good guys?”

If an organization like Hezbollah carried out such an attack, is there any question we would quickly label it terrorism and self-righteously condemn it? But when “we” use the One Ring, all is justified. The indiscriminate way in which the “good guys” deal out death and destruction these days makes one wonder if in fact there are any actual good guys left.

In Tolkien’s epic masterpiece, Boromir is eventually redeemed. He recognizes the folly of his “logic” and ends up sacrificing his life for two hobbits. His redemption can be the story of each of us in the story of our own temptations, but I also pray that it becomes the story of the Great Western Powers, who have been using the One Ring so much in recent decades they are becoming gollumized. 

It won’t matter who rules us in the end if the rulers are using the One Ring to stay in power.

The Power of an Apology

Last week on the Crisis Point podcast Kevin Wells and I were discussing the response of the bishops to Covid back in 2020. Both of us felt that the fact that every single American bishops shut down the public celebration of the Mass for over a month is something the Church has yet to recover from.

Apart from the countless souls who didn’t return to Mass after the shutdown was lifted, there was the clear message sent by our spiritual fathers: Mass is “non-essential.” The most important activity on earth—literally!—was deemed not as important as shopping at Home Depot or getting an abortion at Planned Parenthood. At a time when spiritual assistance was most needed, most of our spiritual fathers checked out (listen to the episode to hear the story of a heroic and saintly priest who did not check out).

There’s simply no way to measure how that decision impacted the spiritual lives of Catholics throughout the country. Even before Covid Mass attendance was pitiful among self-identified Catholics; as low as 10% according to some estimates. But when the leaders of the Church say by their actions the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass isn’t that important, the consequences are dire.

Both Kevin and I suspect that many bishops now realize this. It’s likely one of the driving forces behind the 3-year Eucharistic Revival they planned. The bishops knew that belief in the Real Presence was low before Covid, and the Mass shutdown didn’t help.

But will the Eucharistic Revival be enough to turn things around? Perhaps, but I would argue that there’s one major thing missing from this multi-year event: an apology.

Imagine the power of the bishops saying: “We were wrong. We should not have locked you out of our churches. We should not have denied you access to the Sacraments. We realize now what a bad decision that was, and we promise not to do it again. Mass is essential.”

With that simple apology, the bishops would make abundantly clear that they truly believe the Eucharist is the “source and summit” of our faith; that it is necessary for salvation; and that the Sacraments must always be available to the faithful, even when—especially when—we are living through a crisis like the Covid pandemic.

When we recorded the podcast last week, not a single bishop was on record with an apology. On Saturday, I posted on ????: “I wish our bishops knew the spiritual blessings that would be unleashed on the Church by a simple and sincere public apology for shutting down public Masses during Covid.”

I didn’t expect any type of episcopal response, and after posting I left to go pick up my daughter at a parish event.

Then I started getting text messages from friends directing me to an ???? post by Bishop Joseph Strickland. He had responded to my post with a heartfelt apology: “Eric, I offer my apology as you have requested. I was duped by the media hype and should have been stronger. Let us pray for all shepherds to have stronger supernatural faith as we face more challenges in the future. May Christ be our Light in whatever darkness we face.”

I was beyond grateful. Here was a successor to the apostles, who himself had shut down access to Mass during the Covid lockdowns, admitting he made a mistake. What a man of humility! I of course accepted his apology and thanked him.

Some might say, “Too little, too late.” But such people don’t understand Catholicism. It’s not about our falls, it’s about getting back up. We all are sinners, and it’s likely most of us, if we were in the position of the bishops in 2020, would have done the exact same thing. So it’s not about blaming bishops and pointing fingers at them. It’s about moving forward, which can only be done when we acknowledge our past mistakes. Repentance is the key to unlock revival, but repentance only happens after an acknowledgement of fault.

If we truly want a Eucharistic Revival in this land, we need apologies from the bishops for their actions during the Covid lockdowns. I call on all our bishops to join Bishop Strickland in apologizing. If you do, you will find Catholics ready to forgive, and spiritual blessings unleashed in your local churches.

The Trump Betrayal

The relationship between the pro-life movement and Donald Trump has always been a tenuous one. Trump has never spoken our language, and his opposition to abortion has always seemed pragmatic at best. Yet, unlike previous Republican presidents who did speak our language, he was primarily responsible for achieving the Holy Grail of the movement: the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

Achieving that long-sought goal strengthened the bonds between Trump and pro-lifers, and it seemed that the bond could never be broken. Apparently Trump himself wants to test that assumption.

Since his 2024 campaign for re-election began, Trump has appeared more squishy on abortion than before. Perhaps he saw how the abortion issue hurt the Republicans in the 2022 mid-terms and wanted to avoid that result. Or perhaps he felt that pro-lifers were solidly in his base, so he could reach out to form a broader coalition this time around.

Whatever the reason, Trump is doing all he can to distance himself from the pro-life cause.

At the Republican National Convention, the abortion plank in the Republican platform was softened considerably. Pro-abortion figures were given prominent speaking roles. Abortion was barely mentioned in any of the speeches.

That alone was concerning, but somewhat understandable from a political perspective. No matter how much pro-lifers want it to not be true, the reality is that the pro-life position is a losing proposition in national elections, so downplaying it makes political sense.

But Trump has gone much further than just downplaying abortion. He seems hell-bent (and I use that word purposefully) to prove the Harris campaign wrong for arguing that a Trump Administration will make abortion illegal. Frankly, Trump appears weak, desperately trying to convince people he’s not the anti-woman mean ogre the Harris campaign makes him out to be.

Trump has gone much further than just downplaying abortion. He seems hell-bent (and I use that word purposefully) to prove the Harris campaign wrong for arguing that a Trump Administration will make abortion illegal.Tweet This

Last week he posted on Truth Social: “My Administration will be great for women and reproductive rights.” While some trumpsplainers tried to argue that “reproductive rights” doesn’t necessarily mean legalized abortion, all rational people know that’s exactly what reproductive rights means.

Then yesterday he dropped two bombs into the heart of the pro-life movement. First, he expressed support for Florida’s proposed amendment to constitutionally protect abortion, stating that the current law banning abortion after 6 weeks is “too early.” His campaign later backtracked a bit, but it’s clear Trump is opposed to any restrictions on abortion before at least 15 weeks.

But the final nail in the coffin was when Trump declared that his administration would have the government pay for IVF treatments or force insurance companies to pay for them. Let’s set aside the fundamentally anti-conservative notion that the government should be paying for optional services. This proposal not only would fund the destruction of human life; it would force Catholic institutions to pay for services they find deeply immoral.

During the Obama administration there was a part of Obamacare that would force companies to cover birth control. Catholics were rightly up in arms and many Catholic institutions fought against the mandate. Trump’s proposal is actually worse, as it would fund the destruction of human life on a massive scale.

At this point, it’s ridiculous to call Trump a pro-life candidate. He’s not. He’s pro-abortion by any reasonable definition. Perhaps not as pro-abortion as Harris, but pro-abortion, nonetheless. 

So does that mean Catholics should not vote for him?

Not necessarily. For years many Catholics have wrongly claimed, “No Catholic can vote for a pro-abortion candidate.” But this is not what the Church teaches. The reality is that a Catholic can vote for a candidate who supports intrinsic evil (as Trump does) as long as that’s not the reason he is voting for the candidate, and there are proportional reasons to support him.

In this case, while Trump is terrible on abortion, Harris is actually worse (although I don’t think she has called for government funding for IVF, at least not yet). And there are a whole host of other reasons to not vote for Harris. So a vote for Trump is morally acceptable (as is a vote for a better third-party candidate).

Yet we need to be honest with ourselves. The two major party tickets for president are both pro-abortion this year. That’s the country we’re living in. If you vote for one of them, you are voting for a pro-abortion ticket.

As I noted, this is allowed within Catholic morality, but there’s no point in pretending Trump is something he’s not. He is representative of our broader culture, which has become deeply pro-abortion. Until we change that, it’s likely we’ll be faced with this terrible choice for years to come.

Thank You, Elon Musk

I want you to take a journey with me back in time, deep in the mists of history, to a time when many little dictators ruled a land and the people were controlled in virtually every aspect of their lives, and they accepted this dictatorial control willingly.

Yes, I want you to go all the way back to 2020.

This was an era when almost every single Governor, whether Democrat or Republican, used a virus that for most people was little worse than a common cold as an excuse to decide what businesses were essential and thus could remain open (with all the useless restrictions such as masking and social distancing, of course). Any business that was not favored by the powers-that-be were deemed nonessential and shut down mercilessly. These Governor-Dictators also decided when you could leave your homes and where you could go when you did (no beaches for you!).

I realize most of you aren’t old enough to remember that time, so you might ask yourself: Why did the people accept it? After all, America is the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave, is it not? Does it not have a history of resisting tyrants and being fiercely independent? So how did it happen that so many people went along with these clearly unAmerican actions?

While many things occurred in the decades leading up to Covidtide that laid the foundations for the people’s acquiescence to tyranny, the direct cause was the ability of government, both state and federal, to control the flow of information. Even though it was supposedly an era of unfettered access to media, in 2020 the Elites were able to control what information people saw to a great degree.

This control has always been a reality in traditional forms of media, such as radio and television, but what really made 2020 possible was the Elites’ control over social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. As someone who lived through 2020 (you young people wouldn’t understand), I saw firsthand how any deviance from the Official Narrative was quickly removed and the purveyor punished. Anyone who wanted to even slightly challenge the Narrative had to speak in code and carefully watch what he said. We know now that this censorship was directed by government officials through “suggestions” to social media operators (much like a Mob boss will “suggest” you pay him for “protection”). We also know that almost everything said about the virus was a lie.

This absolute control over the major social media channels allowed the Governor-Dictators to keep their grip on power, and had a significant influence on the 2020 elections as well. Without it, it’s unlikely they would have gotten away with it, at least not to the extreme they did. 

Fast-forward to today, four long years later, and things are different. Yes, the traditional media is still completely a propaganda wing of the Elites (notice how they turned a VP who was widely acknowledged just recently as an embarrassment to her own party into the Second Coming of Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy, and Susan B. Anthony rolled into one). Many social media outlets like Facebook are still monitoring your posts, Comrade, to make sure you don’t fall out of line.

But there is one major difference: Twitter. Or should I say, ????.

Eccentric billionaire Elon Musk purchased Twitter in 2022 in what appeared to be a fit of pique over how Twitter was censoring accounts like the Babylon Bee. Many left-leaning pundits predicted Twitter’s demise, especially after Musk eliminated 80% of Twitter’s workforce.

Well, it’s true that Twitter died. But its successor ???? is stronger than ever. Last night ???? hosted a “Spaces” interview between Musk and Donald Trump that at last count had over 1 billion people who listened to at least parts of it. The numbers dwarf anything that State Propaganda Outlet CNN could ever dream of.

The reach of ???? has gotten so significant that the democratic face the Elites show the public has started to disappear. Hours before the Trump interview, EU Commissioner for Internal Market and Services Thierry Breton sent a threatening letter to Musk (which Breton ironically posted on ????), warning the billionaire that if the interview in his view promoted “hatred, disorder, incitement to violence, or…disinformation,” then the EU would punish ????.

The reach of ???? has gotten so significant that the democratic face the Elites show the public has started to disappear.Tweet This

The response on ???? was incredible. Breton was severely ratioed and Americans in particular took affront to this obvious election interference by a foreign power (does anyone for a minute think Breton would have sent that letter if Musk were interviewing Kamala Harris?).

Musk, for his part, responded directly to Breton with an obscene meme, letting it be completely clear he wouldn’t comply.

While there’s a danger for those of us who are frequently online to exaggerate the impact of online actions in the real world, it’s hard to overstate how big a deal this is. Just a few years ago all the levers of power were in the hands of Elites who wanted to control our lives, and now, because a billionaire was fed up, there is at least one outlet where information can flow freely. (And note that Musk extended an invitation to Harris as well to come on Spaces with him. She declined.)

For years regular people have been increasingly controlled and manipulated into accepting insanities like abortion and transgenderism. And for years regular people have had no real power to resist that manipulation. But now two slightly-crazy billionaires—Donald Trump and Elon Musk—are representing those regular people and leading a resistance.

Don’t get me wrong: both Trump and Musk are not Catholic paradigms of virtue. Both have not always followed Catholic morality in their personal and professional lives. Both have policy ideas that do not conform to Catholic teaching. But both right now seem to share one thing in common: they are fed up with powerful people dictating reality for everyone else. And because they are themselves powerful people, they can actually do something concrete to fight it.

Elon Musk isn’t our savior, and he alone can’t make the world a better place. But he has done more than most to make it at least possible to resist tyranny and oppression, and for that, I say:

Thank you, Elon Musk.

War Must Become a Primary Issue for Catholics in Presidential Elections

I believe opposition to war is as important, or even more important, than opposition to abortion in presidential elections. I realize this is a controversial take to most readers of Crisis, but hear me out.

Let me first establish my pro-life bonafides. I believe every single abortion, without exception, is murder and should be illegal. Legalized abortion in this country is a holocaust crying to heaven for God’s vengeance. My modern-day heroes are the brave men and women who have been arrested for trying to prevent women from aborting their children. Every abortion doctor, and every abortion-mill worker, should be in jail.

For a long time I was essentially a single-issue voter, and that issue was abortion. On more than one occasion I didn’t vote for the Republican candidate for President because I didn’t think he was pro-life enough. Where a candidate stood on foreign policy and military conflicts wasn’t high on my list of priorities, but I generally favored the more interventionist candidate.

Now, in 2024, my voting calculus has changed (it has been slowly evolving for years, but this is the first year I’m concrete about it).

During my lifetime the United States has been involved in countless overseas conflicts, from outright wars to small-scale military operations. Vietnam War, two Iraq Wars, the occupation of Afghanistan, conflicts in Libya, Bosnia, Somalia, Syria, Yemen: the list goes on and on. In not a single one could America’s involvement be justified under Catholic Just War Theory.

We’ve also been heavily involved in provoking many more conflicts and engaging in proxy wars, most notably the current Russia-Ukraine war. Our neocon foreign policy has been a disaster for decades and has led to untold suffering and death, along with increased ill will and outright hatred for America around the world (thus creating the foundation for future conflicts).

I don’t think most American pro-lifers truly grasp the scale of the horrors our foreign policy has unleashed on the world. We often talk about the invisibility of the unborn, and how the fact that we can’t see the victim is a major reason abortion is accepted by so many.

The same is true for these foreign conflicts. Even though millions have been killed in conflicts involving the United States, and millions more have been horribly injured or had their lives otherwise devastated, we don’t see them. The dead Ukrainian or dead Yemeni or dead Palestinian are mostly invisible to the average American.

This is why neocon propaganda works so well. Politicians can engage in scaremongering about invented future dangers (“Russia will invade Poland!” “Iraq will nuke New York City!”) to frighten the public into supporting their latest war; meanwhile, no one sees or considers the eventual victims of their propaganda, the countless war dead in a far-away land.

So in terms of death and evil, the consequences of our foreign policy are nearly as destructive as the abortion holocaust. But voting calculus can’t be determined by numbers alone (abortion is solidly the greatest killer today), but by what can be done to stop it.

In the post-Roe world, the debate over the legality of abortion has moved mostly to the states. It’s true that the federal government still plays a role in abortion-related policies, but whether or not abortion is legal or illegal now falls on the individual states.

Foreign policy, however, is 100% in the domain of the federal government, and has increasingly become in the modern age mostly based on the whims of the president. (When was the last time the president asked Congress for a declaration of war? 1942, for those wondering.) The reality is that the president has far, far more impact on American foreign policy than he does on American abortion policy.

The reality is that the president has far, far more impact on American foreign policy than he does on American abortion policy.Tweet This

This is why I would argue that a presidential candidate’s positions on foreign policy (specifically foreign policy related to war and military conflicts) is as important, if not more important, than his or her positions on abortion. While a president can do little in our current environment to stop abortion, he or she can be extremely influential in minimizing or even stopping bloodshed around the world.

Note that I’m only referring to the presidential election. When voting for a state representative or governor, then abortion policy becomes paramount again, as these men and women can actually have an impact on making abortion illegal where you live (and they have no direct impact on foreign policy). When it comes to federal candidates like congressmen or senators, both foreign policy and abortion policy matter in that they may be voting for funding of both foreign wars and abortions. Again, the important variable in the voting calculus is the impact a politician can have on a specific issue.

I’ve always hated the “If you are really pro-life you would support my pet project” line, and so I won’t use it here. But I will urge Catholics, when voting for president,  to consider the death and destruction around the world brought on by our government’s horrible foreign policy.

Antisemite: A Now-Meaningless Term That Should Mean Something

In the lexicon of worst things to be called in the second half of the 20th century, surely “antisemite” is at the top of the list (perhaps tied with “racist”). After the evils of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust were revealed to the world, no rational person wanted to be associated with that word.

That’s a good thing, obviously. Hostility and hatred toward a people is a sin and must be rejected. Yet, as often happens in this fallen world, people have thwarted something good for their own purposes. “Antisemite” has become a term used to silence discussion and defeat one’s enemies without troubling oneself with rational argument.

Did you say something critical of the modern state of Israel’s political policies? Antisemite.

Did you repeat publicly what the Bible clearly states, that Jews were instrumentally involved in the death of Jesus Christ? Antisemite.

Did you note that many Jews are influential in Hollywood (even without accusing them of any conspiracy)? Antisemite.

When someone with a foreign policy disagreement is labeled the same as someone who systematically butchered millions of Jews, that label no longer has any real meaning.

When someone with a foreign policy disagreement is labeled the same as someone who systematically butchered millions of Jews, that label no longer has any real meaning.Tweet This

There are two wrong reactions to this devaluing of the term “antisemite.” The first is to double-down on the term and continue to use it to label any opponent. This tactic has diminishing returns, emptying the term of any meaning. Because of this overuse, calling someone an antisemite just doesn’t pack much of a punch anymore.

The second wrong reaction is to pretend there is no such thing as an antisemite. Because “antisemite” is used so carelessly today, and most often incorrectly, it’s easy to reject the existence of antisemitism. “I was ridiculously called an antisemite for opposing American foreign aid to Israel, so there is no such thing as an antisemite.” That’s faulty logic.

There are still antisemites in the world, and it’s still a sin to be one.

What actually makes a person an antisemite? Dictionary.com defines it as “a person who discriminates against or is prejudiced or hostile toward Jews.” The problem with that definition is that there’s a lot of room for semantic games with the terms “discriminates” and “prejudiced.” Any action that is critical of a Jewish person or a Jewish group may be labeled as discrimination and prejudice, so this definition is no help.

How should the term be defined? I would argue that we fall into antisemitism, and thus into sinful territory, when we irrationally assign the wrong of an individual Jew, or even a group of Jews, to the corporate body of the Jewish people.

If a Jewish person wrongs you and you condemn him, that’s not sinful or antisemitic. But if you then argue that “the Jews are out to get Catholics,” you’ve gone astray. Even if a group of Jews is out to get you, a Catholic, you can’t then say that “the Jews” are at fault. No, individual Jews are at fault, not the corporate body of the Jewish people.

This even applies to larger groups of Jews. If you oppose the policy decisions of the Israeli government—a government elected by a large body of mostly Jews—that’s not antisemitism. But if you apply the bad decisions of that government to “the Jews,” then you are wrongly blaming a people for the sins of a group of individuals within that people.

Like many ethnic groups, Jews are disproportionately represented in certain industries. One example of this is the widely-recognized outsized influence of Jews in Hollywood. Because of this influence, some people posit that there is a Jewish plot to undermine our culture through that industry. That conclusion doesn’t follow from the evidence. All that can be said is that some Jews are involved in promoting degeneracy, not “the Jews.”

Assigning corporate blame for the faults of a few is not only sinful, but counterproductive. Instead of targeting the actual individual perpetrators of evil, we waste time in conspiracy theories that do nothing to actually shut down the evil. Our time would be better spent evangelizing Jews to become Catholic.

Yes, there are antisemites in the world today. Sadly, however, since the term has lost its practical meaning, using that term to describe them, even if accurate, is probably an exercise in futility. Better to point out their sin and call them to repentance, rather than engage in semantic debates on what makes an antisemite. Because ultimately what matters is not dictionary definitions, but resisting hatred or animosity toward a people and bringing people to Christ.

Confrontational Catholicism

I’ve been publicly talking about the Catholic Faith for more than two decades. I’ve done this informally on a one-on-one basis as well as formally at parish and diocesan events. For the longest time I followed the primary rule established among public Catholics:

Above all, be nice.

Of course, the Nice Rule is not presented that way. It’s presented as being “charitable” and respecting each person’s “dignity.” Don’t get me wrong, we absolutely are called to charity, and each person does have dignity. But those were just code words for the actual underlying rule, to be nice. We don’t want anyone thinking Catholics are meanies, after all. We are obsessed, in fact, in how people perceive us, desperate for human respect from our opponents.

This attitude is based on the fundamental shift that occurred in the Church in the 1960’s, when Catholic leaders no longer felt we should proclaim the truth, but instead we should dialogue with error. If we all sit down at the table and hash things out, surely our enemies will come to their senses. But this can only happen if we are nice and polite.

The Nice Rule might have made some sense in the past. Although the culture was already deteriorating, basic Catholic beliefs were still considered socially acceptable and a legitimate option in the marketplace of ideas. Further, in the public mind there were still associations of Catholicism with the Inquisition and burning heretics (the historical veracity of which was irrelevant to the public imagination), so presenting a smiling front was seen as a way to disarm non-Catholics and advance the promulgation of the Faith.

But whether or not that was ever an effective strategy, it no longer makes sense in today’s world. The culture has radically changed in the past two decades, making the Nice Rule a defeatist strategy. Our opponents don’t want to sit at a table with us; they want to crush us. Yet I still see public Catholics continually stress that we must be charitable (read: nice) toward homosexual activists or that we must respect the dignity (read: downplay the insanity) of transgender people.

Our opponents don’t want to sit at a table with us; they want to crush us. Tweet This

Today we live in an era where powerful forces—in government, the media, academia, and other elite institutions—are actively working to eradicate our faith and groom our children for depravity. Applying the Nice Rule to these enemies is doomed to failure.

If someone supports a man shaking his bare ass in the face of kids at a Pride Parade, he is not a dialogue partner.

If someone labels Catholics as antisemitic or racist or misogynist or homophobic or transphobic, simply for believing Catholic teaching, he is not someone to debate.

If someone insists there’s nothing wrong with a man leaving his wife and family to find his “true self” as a “woman,” he is not someone to be reasoned with.

Most importantly, if any of these people support using State power to crush dissent from their views (and most of them do), then being nice just hastens the day faithful Catholics are arrested for their beliefs.

So what does this mean in practice? What does it mean to no longer be “nice?” It doesn’t mean we are jerks; but it does mean we stand up directly to evil, regardless of how our enemies may react. To put it simply, we are confrontational.

Let me give a recent example. Last Saturday, I joined a group of 100+ men who prayed the Rosary at the steps of our Cathedral church. This might not sound remarkable, but what made this different is that we did this while the city’s Pride Parade was starting right next to the Cathedral.

We held flags and images of the Sacred Heart and prayed in reparation to the Sacred Heart for the sins of the Pride participants. We asked God to convert the hearts of the unfaithful and have mercy on us all.

Now here’s the thing: I am sure that the Pride participants looked at us as if we were unloving, bigoted “haters.” One yelled out to us “Jesus wasn’t white!”, implying that we were all white supremacists. Our public image wasn’t “nice;” it was inherently confrontational.

I’m sure this is why many Catholics, especially public Catholics, don’t support such efforts as ours. Our event wasn’t advertised in any parish bulletins, and the Archbishop wasn’t endorsing us. Even if these Catholics oppose Pride activities, they don’t want to come across as uncharitable (i.e., not nice). Yet what we were doing was the most charitable thing possible: praying for their souls, proclaiming the true Faith, and directly combating the demonic forces present at the parade.

I saw a similar dynamic in the early 1990’s with the pro-life movement. Many of the respectable pro-life leaders opposed our direct action efforts at abortion clinics—sidewalk counseling, praying, and rescuing. They worried that it gave the pro-life movement a negative image; it was too confrontational. Yet that direct action was responsible for countless lives saved. We didn’t care that we didn’t look nice; we weren’t in it for PR, but for saving babies. Pro-abortion forces were going to hate us no matter what, so there was no sense in restricting our activities in order to get them to like us. 

Let me give another, albeit non-Catholic, example. Recently Tucker Carlson was at an event in Australia in which a liberal reporter started asking him questions that were set up to make Carlson look like a violent racist. 

Carlson masterfully turns the tables, refusing to accept the reporter’s false premises. He confronts her directly, even mocks her. Some might say Carlson was not being “charitable,” but his direct confrontation with her actually was charitable, for it revealed the truth for all to see. Catholics need to be just as confrontational when we are attacked and maligned.

Faithful Catholics today need to realize we have already lost the PR battle: our culture elites hate us and want to destroy us, no matter how nice we might try to sound. In that environment, we need to fight back and directly confront our enemies. We need to be praying at Pride Parades, directly opposing Drag Queen Story Hours, and urging our public libraries to not promote LGBTQ+ books. Yes, we’ll be seen as uncharitable and mean, but that’s our image anyway for simply not agreeing with their evil. So we might as well work against that evil.

We are the Church Militant, and we need to start acting like it again.

The Persecution of Donald Trump

Let me lay my cards out on the table: I don’t like Donald Trump. I never have. His faults are legion, and, aside from the significant exception of his Supreme Court picks, I was wholly unimpressed with his first term as president. He’s weak on abortion and gay marriage, he surrounded himself with swamp creatures while in office, and his actions in response to Covid were disastrous.

But do you know who I like far less than Donald Trump? His enemies. They are a veritable Who’s Who of the Worst People. From Deep State operatives to elite globalists to screeching Leftists, the people who hate Donald Trump are also the people who hate this country and hate me. The very fact that they despise Trump makes me pause in my own distaste for the man.

Since 2016, Trump’s enemies—and if you are a regular reader of this magazine, they are likely your enemies, too—have been hellbent (literally) to destroy him. At times I scratch my head as to why they hate him so much; contrary to what CNN or MSNBC will tell you, he didn’t rule as a dictator or try to “overthrow democracy.” He did post a lot of mean tweets, I guess. I suspect that much of the hatred toward him is that he didn’t have any interest in starting new wars, unlike almost every president for the past 60 years, and so the military-industrial complex and their friends in the Deep State wanted him out of the way.

So even before he stepped foot in the Oval Office in 2016 they have tried to pin the most ludicrous charges on him. He colluded with Russia (he didn’t). He attempted an insurrection (he didn’t).

Think about those charges for a moment. The sitting president of the United States was accused for both treason and insurrection, two of the worst possible crimes in any country. If true, he would deserve the death penalty in even the most civilized countries.

Of course, neither were true, which is why all the legal attempts to bring him down over the past few years have been unrelated to either of those serious charges. Instead, he has been charged with petty crimes based on novel legal theories (“Well, this isn’t actually a crime in the books, but if we look at the law while squinting and during a full moon, we might just get him!”). Now they have convicted him on 34 acts that are not even clearly illegal. It’s obvious this is a political witch hunt. Donald Trump’s crime is that they desperately don’t want him to be president. 

Now they have convicted him on 34 acts that are not even clearly illegal. It’s obvious this is a political witch hunt. Donald Trump’s crime is that they desperately don’t want him to be president. Tweet This

To be clear, I think all modern presidents are criminals. So I’m not pretending that Trump is innocent as a dove. But he’s no worse (and much better) than someone like Bill Clinton or Barack Obama or George W. Bush. Those men, however, are feted and treated like royalty. They get to live off the riches that a life of “public service” now gets you. But Trump? He is treated as Hitler Incarnate while being prosecuted for petty crimes.

While I don’t know how this will impact the 2024 election, my first reaction is that the enemies of Donald Trump have overplayed their hands. I’ve already seen a number of people who either were undecided or were against Trump now leaning toward voting for him in November. I’m one of them. While I might not be convinced that Trump would be a great president, I am convinced that I don’t want to live in a country that uses the legal system like a third-world country, punishing political opponents under the guise of “justice.” If Donald Trump is in jail on November 5, I will vote for him even if I have to write his name in the ballot.

I do have two fears, however. The first is that this conviction will be used to keep Trump off the ballot, which would truly be a blow for democracy. For no matter what you think of Trump, he’s clearly the frontrunner to be the next president, supported by tens of millions of Americans. That leads me to my second fear. The justifiable frustration and anger among Trump supporters might lead a few of the less stable ones to do something stupid. This would then lead to January 6th type accusations and could even lead to canceling the election. If this sounds like paranoid conspiracy theory territory to you, then I’m afraid that you haven’t been paying close attention.

I do think there is a silver lining in all this. Our country has been living under an illusion for decades. That illusion is that our elected leaders look after our best interests, and that our justice system is unbiased and fair. I don’t think that’s been true for a long time, and now it’s abundantly clear to millions of Americans (as well as most of the rest of the world). By breaking the illusion, Trump’s conviction hopefully serves as a wake-up call. We don’t live in a democratic republic, a shining city on the hill. We live in a banana republic, a decaying country on its last legs.

The question remains: is it too late to save it?

What One Priest Had to Say About Crisis

Every spring, when we set out to raise the necessary funds to sustain Crisis Magazine throughout the rest of the year, I have an incredible opportunity to reflect on what it is that makes this publication so important. 

As donations come in (and they are coming in, alright! We are now almost 50% of the way towards our crucial $100,000 goal. Will you join the campaign now if you haven’t already?), I often receive thoughtful comments and emails from readers. It occurred to me that though I see these heartfelt notes all the time, you may not know just what a strong community you are a part of. 

So I want to give you a quick glimpse behind the curtain today. 

Many of our readers are mothers and fathers concerned about how the movements of the Church will affect their children; professors shaping young minds who need to be able to thoughtfully respond to the issues of the day on the fly; and parishioners who seek to understand what’s going on beyond Sunday Mass.

And some — a larger number than I would have guessed, based on the concentration of readers in Vatican City — are members of the clergy, the faithful men making decisions about how to lead their flocks. Not a few of these clergy are bishops, successors of the Apostles.

Just last month, I received an email from a priest letting me know he had just made a $100 donation and started a new monthly gift. Why?

He shared, “As a priest, I find your podcasts extremely helpful in writing my homilies. You are the best “Homily Service” without intending to be, bar none. Today’s podcast about AI is just one more example. Please continue the great work and service you are doing.”

Will you join the Spring Crisis Campaign with a gift in the amount that’s right for you today?

As you well know, and this reader comment confirms, the Catholic world needs a daily news website offering orthodox commentary on the issues afflicting the Church and political sphere today — but we simply cannot keep this service strong without you. 

Thank you to all who have given so far. If you haven’t yet made your Spring contribution, time is running out!

I hope you’ll join us. I mean it when I say every gift counts. Whether you can set aside $10 or $15 a month, toss an additional $50 in the Crisis basket, or even cover the cost for other readers through a $500 or $1,000 gift, your support matters.

Thank you, again, to all of you who are already supporting Crisis as donors and especially to all of you who are supporting this mission through prayer.God Bless You,

Eric Sammons
Editor-in-Chief

P.S. Remember, our Spring Crisis Campaign ends on midnight this Friday! Donate today to join the crucial $100,000 Spring Crisis Campaign before the deadline >>

Harrison Butker for President

Three-time Super Bowl Champion Harrison Butker is the latest target of the Woke Mob. His offense? Butker, a Catholic, spoke about Catholicism at a Catholic school’s graduation ceremonies. Clearly he now must be canceled.

Of course it’s more complicated than that. Butker specifically spoke of those aspects of Catholicism that we’re not supposed to talk about—such as a woman’s primary vocation to motherhood, the horror of abortion, and the evils of our degenerate culture. As long as Catholics speak only on “safe” Catholic beliefs, like kindness toward our neighbor and care for the poor, we’ll be left alone, but if any Catholic dare—and Butker dared—to publicly speak about Catholic beliefs that contradict our current zeitgeist, well, then we can’t have that, can we?

Here are some of the “controversial” things Butker said:

  • “Abortion, IVF, surrogacy, euthanasia as well as a growing support for degenerate cultural values and media all stem from the pervasiveness of disorder.”
  • “Our own nation is led by a man who publicly and proudly proclaims his Catholic faith but at the same time is delusional enough to make the sign of the cross during a pro-abortion rally.”
  • “To the gentleman here today, part of what plagues our society is this lie that has been told to you that men are not necessary in the home or in our communities. As men, we set the tone of the culture. And when that is absent disorder, dysfunction and chaos set in this absence of men in the home is what plays a large role in the violence we see all around the nation.”

And most offensive to modern, feminist-tainted ears:

  • “I think it is you, the women, who have had the most diabolical lies told to you, how many of you are sitting here now about to cross the stage, and are thinking about all the promotions and titles you’re going to get in your career. Some of you may go on to lead successful careers in the world. But I would venture to guess that the majority of you are most excited about your marriage and the children you will bring into this world. I can tell you that my beautiful wife Isabelle would be the first to say that her life truly started when she began living her vocation as a wife and as a mother.”

These plain statements of Catholic belief are now controversial, but the reason they are controversial is because Catholic leaders, by and large, have been silent about these hard truths for over a generation. In the eyes of the world—and in the eyes of the average Catholic—Catholicism consists mostly of being nice and getting along with others. Deep truths about mankind which the Church offers the world, such as the humanity of the unborn and the fundamental differences between men and women, have been kept under a bushel basket while the world around us crumbles under its system of lies.

This strategy of silence on the part of our Catholic leaders is due to what I call “ghettoitis.” It is an affliction held by many bishops and priests for decades now. Catholic leaders are so desperate to be accepted by American society—to get out of the Catholic ghetto—that they will downplay any Catholic teachings that might offend the world’s ears. So they have played nice, all in an effort to get a seat at the table.

But the strategy backfired. Instead of getting a seat at the table, we became the lapdog, begging for scraps while our worldly masters pat us on the head as they go about their diabolical business. Playing nice has led to us becoming irrelevant; we are only allowed to speak on “safe” topics and are forbidden to preach the hard truths of Catholicism. We have gone from self-silencing ourselves to being forcibly silenced by the Woke Mob. Yet, as Butker said, “if we are going to be men and women for this time in history we need to stop pretending that the ‘Church of nice’ is a winning proposition.”

Playing nice has led to us becoming irrelevant; we are only allowed to speak on “safe” topics and are forbidden to preach the hard truths of Catholicism.Tweet This

The efforts to silence Harrison Butker are escalating—the NFL has condemned his remarks and a petition has started to demand that his team, the Kansas City Chiefs, cut him from their roster. He is only facing this cancellation because our shepherds have been silent for so long. Their silence has led to demands that a faithful Catholic be silenced for saying Catholic things. While we can’t go back in time and change the failed strategy of silence, we can, going forward, speak out. Now is the time for all faithful Catholics—bishops, priests, religious, and lay alike—to stand behind Harrison Butker and say to the world that full unadulterated Catholicism will not be silenced.

All that being said, do I really think Harrison Butker should be president? Lord, no, I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. But I do think we need leaders willing to speak out on the deep truths about humanity, opposing the lies of feminism, the homosexual/transgender movements, and the woke mob. Sadly, too many of our leaders, both religious and political, are unwilling to do this, but thank God at least one public figure, a football kicker no less, is willing to do so.

God bless Harrison Butker.

Why I Didn’t Sign the Call for the Resignation of Pope Francis

Last week a group of 17 prominent Catholics released a “Call for the Resignation of Pope Francis.” In the lengthy statement, they claim that “the words and actions of Pope Francis have caused an unprecedented crisis in the Catholic Church.” The statement details a laundry list of alleged crimes—against canonical, civil, natural, and divine law—committed by Pope Francis during his pontificate, as well as alleged heresies he has promulgated.

Due to these crimes and heresies, the signatories call for Pope Francis to resign the papal office. If he refuses, the signatories request that cardinals and bishops ask Francis to resign. If Francis still refuses, the signatories finally ask the cardinals and bishops to declare that he has lost the papal office. So you see this statement is more than just a call for the resignation of Pope Francis; it is a call for his deposition.

In most times in Church history, such a statement would be shocking and scandalous. But we don’t live in “most times;” we live in an unprecedented time in which the holder of the papal office is a source of division and confusion, rather than one of unity and clarity, as is intended by Our Lord. Desperate times lead to desperate measures, as they say, and calling for the resignation and even deposition of the pope is clearly a desperate measure. But that does not necessarily make it a bad measure.

Prior to the statement’s release, I was asked to add my name but I declined. I have signed similar public statements in the past, but I did not feel comfortable adding my signature to this particular one, and I’d like to explain why.

I should make clear first that while I don’t know all the signatories, I do know a few, and I have a deep respect for two in particular, Dr. Peter Kwasniewski and John-Henry Westen. I do not doubt the sincerity of their motives, and I know they have thought through this statement in prayer and even trepidation. It was not a rash decision made out of human frustration that led them to sign it, but instead a deep love for the Church, for the office of the papacy, and for souls.

Further, while I have not fully researched every claim made in the statement, on the whole I essentially agree with their analysis of the Francis pontificate. This pontificate has been deeply scandalous, and this statement will be a useful resource for historians when writing about this black mark in the history of the papacy.

This pontificate has been deeply scandalous, and this statement will be a useful resource for historians when writing about this black mark in the history of the papacy.Tweet This

So why did I not sign it myself?

First, I think these public statements have diminishing returns. When the first ones were released a few years ago, it was a real story: distinguished Catholics willing to publicly criticize a pope’s actions. But it seems to me that most Catholics now take a “ho-hum dog bites man” approach to them. It’s no secret that many Catholics have serious concerns about Pope Francis and are willing to state them publicly, so another statement isn’t really that newsworthy or effective in moving the needle in the discussion.

Second, it seems a bit unseemly to me for lay people to be calling for the pope to resign. The papacy isn’t a political office in which we start impeachment proceedings when we don’t like what the office-holder is doing. Calling for the resignation of the pope comes across a bit like Republicans trying to oust Bill Clinton or Democrats doing the same to Donald Trump. While the papacy has always been surrounded by political machinations, public calls for the pope to resign or bishops to pressure him to resign is a step too far, in my mind.

There’s also the problem that Francis is the immediate successor to the first pope to resign in eight centuries. To have two popes resign, in succession, gives a strong impression that the papacy is just another political office that can be manipulated and controlled by political factions in the Church. This was the impression of the papacy during the 10th century pornocracy, and it led to an extreme diminishment of the office.

But I have a deeper concern. Note that both of my concerns thus far are prudential matters. I understand that Catholics of goodwill might disagree, and feel that the harm done by this papacy far outweighs the harm that might result from a statement calling for the pope’s resignation. My last concern is more pressing, for it is theological in nature.

The statement declares, “If Pope Francis refuses to resign, the duty of the bishops and cardinals is to proceed to declare that he has lost the papal office for heresy.” This is a daring claim, for the fact remains that it is a debated point in Catholic theology how a pope can be deposed, or even if it is possible. Theologians have debated this in the past with no definitive resolution (despite what that anonymous Catholic account on Twitter might insist). Yet this statement declares that it is the “duty” of the bishops and cardinals to do so.

Can cardinals and bishops declare that a sitting pope has lost his office? If so, how many prelates does it take to make it legitimate? A majority, more than 25%, or something else? What if other cardinals and bishops reject that declaration? What if the pope refuses to accept the declaration?

These are all questions without definitive answers. A number of years ago I wrote an article arguing that a pope cannot be deposed, a position shared by Bishop Athanasius Schneider. Since writing that, however, I have become less sure of that viewpoint. History is messy, including papal history, and I think a good argument can be made that past popes have been deposed on rare occasions, typically by emperors. That being said, there’s still no clear mechanism today for deposing a pope (other than perhaps to have an emperor again!).

To me, then, a statement calling on cardinals and bishops to depose a pope is putting the cart before the horse. First there would need to be agreement on whether such a deposition is possible, and if so, the mechanism to make it happen. Until then, such calls are premature.

My heart is with the signatories of this call, and Catholics must come to grips with the depths of scandal of this papacy. We need to pray for the pope and the Church, and expose the errors and crimes of Pope Francis. But calling for his deposition just adds to the confusion of our times instead of helping relieve it.

Should We Have AI Doing Catholic Apologetics?

Catholics Answers just announced the release of the “Father Justin” interactive AI app, which will “provide users with faithful and educational answers to questions about Catholicism.”

I have to admit, I have a lot of conflicting thoughts on this.

As a former tech geek, I still get excited by advances in technology. On just that basis, it’s amazing what these apps can do. I took “Father Justin” on a test drive, and “he” did a good job of answering even difficult questions. I asked about abortion, homosexuality, the traditional Latin Mass, the legitimacy of Pope Francis, and many other topics. Every time “Father Justin” gave a solid, faithfully-Catholic answer (he almost even sounds like Jimmy Akin at times). There’s no comparison between this AI and something like ChatGPT when it comes to receiving truly Catholic answers.

I’m also a fan of Catholic Answers, so I’d rather see them develop something like this than, for example, the National Catholic Reporter or Catholics for Choice. Interactive AI apps are the rage right now, so having a solid Catholic organization dipping its toe into that space is probably needed.

But…(you knew there would be a “but,” didn’t you?)

I can’t help feeling some trepidation about this foray into artificial intelligence. As I noted above I’m a former tech geek, and there’s a reason for the “former” part. I’ve become more wary over the years of the negative impact of modern technology on our lives, so I don’t embrace every new “advance” as an unqualified good, or even as something morally neutral. Modern technology impacts us in ways we don’t fully understand, and in ways, I would say, that make us less human. There’s real concerns with AI beyond sensational claims of robot overlords, and I fear that the blurring of AI with “real life” could have long-term negative consequences on society.

Further, and I’m sure Catholic Answers would agree, apologetics is much more than just answering questions correctly. There’s always a relational element to both evangelization and apologetics. For example, someone is going to hear an apologetic answer differently from a close friend than from someone they don’t like, or from a stranger. Who knows how they will receive it from a computer pretending to be a priest? Human society is made to be modeled after the Trinity, which is an eternal relationship of Three Persons, and AI in many ways breaks that model. I understand that the Internet already started this process, but that doesn’t mean every step in that direction must be taken.

Another concern with the “Father Justin” app is the decision to make the AI character a priest. Not only is “Father Justin” dressed as a priest, but in one answer “he” gave me, “he” actually started his answer with, “As a Catholic priest…” I understand this was done to give “him” a certain air of authority; as Catholic Answers said, “We wanted to convey the spirit and nature of the responses users can expect—authoritative yet approachable.”

But there’s a reason impersonating a priest is a serious canonical crime: a priest is sacramentally “another Christ” and gets his authority not from knowing the most Catholic theology, but from his ordination. Having a lay person as the AI character would definitely make it seem less authoritative and less distinctly Catholic to the average user, but I’m not sure making “him” a priest was for the best.

None of my concerns are meant to question the motivations of Catholic Answers, of course. I understand that the reality is that we live in a world where many people engage in question-and-answer exchanges with AI, so having a faithfully Catholic option is an understandable desire of many Catholics. Yet I can’t help but think that there’s deeper issues here, ones that threaten to undermine a Catholic incarnational understanding of the world, all while sincerely trying to advance Catholicism.

Call me an old fogey (I’ve been called worse), but at least for me I’ll continue to consult and recommend real people, not computer simulations of them, for better understanding the Catholic Faith.

Have You No Decency, Holy Father?

Ideology is not the same thing as religion. Most religions, even though often wrong about many things, seek to better the person practicing it; they have similar moral codes, which typically include kindness to those less fortunate and decency toward others. Ideology, on the other hand, cares little for individual persons and focuses completely on the goals of The Cause. Things like kindness and decency are jettisoned in pursuit of those goals. Think of the difference between a Quaker and a Communist: which would you rather have as a neighbor?

I bring this up because of the recently released memoirs of Pope Francis. At one point in the included interviews, the subject of the Covid vaccines came up. I’m not here to re-litigate either the morality and effectiveness of the vaccines. We covered this topic in-depth here at Crisis, and to be honest, what we said back then has turned out to be completely true. In short, the vaccines were tainted with abortion and the morality of taking them was at the very least questionable. No one was morally required to receive the vaccines, as even the Vatican acknowledged. As to effectiveness, only the most hard-core ideologues still think the vaccines were able to stop or even substantially slow the spread of Covid. People of good will now recognize the vaccines at best simply lessened the symptoms in some people, and at worst caused more injuries than they prevented.

Sadly, Pope Francis appears to be one of those hard-core ideologues, not a person of good will. And like most ideologues, he is happy to deny reality and to demean and disparage any who might disagree with him. He stated that “being against the antidote [the Covid vaccines] is an almost suicidal act of denial.” Considering the fact that there is absolutely no evidence that the Covid vaccines prevented deaths on any significant scale (and likely caused deaths in some who took them), this statement is itself an “act of denial:” a denial of reality. But this is the way of the ideologue: reality and facts don’t matter; all that matters is The Cause.

But it gets worse. Francis then made a veiled—and disgraceful—comment about Cardinal Raymond Burke, who opposed the vaccines and almost died of Covid. The pope said, “There were even a few anti-vaxxers among the bishops: some came close to death.” This was the second time Francis made such a jab at Cardinal Burke. He describes Burke as an “anti-vaxxer” when he knows that neither the Cardinal nor most opponents of the Covid vaccines were against all vaccines, and he implies that Burke almost died because he didn’t get the vaccine when those who didn’t get vaccinated didn’t have higher death rates than those who did get vaxed.  

To be honest, my first thought upon reading the pope’s comments was, “Is he really so petty?” Not only are his statements not very Christian, they are not even decent. I wouldn’t expect such a low remark from a good-natured atheist, much less a Catholic, much less the leader of the Catholic Church. Even if the pope were right about the effectiveness of the vaccine (but again, he isn’t), to treat someone’s serious illness as a means to promote one’s viewpoint is despicable.

Unfortunately, though, we’ve come to expect this from our current leader. Like the ideologue he is, Pope Francis treats his perceived enemies with contempt. It’s no secret the pope doesn’t like Cardinal Burke and so he is an obstacle to be overcome in Francis’s drive to achieve his goals. What’s amazing is how much both the mainstream and Catholic media still carry water for Francis, claiming he’s about “mercy.” Perhaps for those who don’t dare raise their voices against his Program, but not to any who put the Faith (or medical safety) before obeisance to the Pope’s Program.

While this behavior from the Supreme Pontiff is disappointing and discouraging, it’s no longer surprising. Just yesterday the Vatican News website featured an image created by the monster Fr. Marko Rupnick on the front page. This is a man who has done such horrific and blasphemous acts I don’t want to even list them here. Yet Pope Francis’s Vatican has such contempt for Rupnick’s victims that they still treat the disgraced priest with respect and even admiration. Why? Because Rupnick has been an ideological friend, and ideologues are as forgiving of their friends as they are ruthless to their enemies.

I realize bad news related to Pope Francis has, at this point, become wearying. We don’t cover every single uncharitable act or confusing statement made by Francis. Yet it is important to periodically note that, like some popes before him, this pope is not a good man, much less a good pope. As we near the end of Lent, let us offer prayers and penances for Holy Mother Church, and pray that she be blessed with a good and holy pope, or even a decent one, very soon.

The Interview That Could Reshape the World

How often does an interview with a nation’s leader become a 1,000-year history lesson? If you live in America, never. Can you imagine an American politician being asked a question and beginning his answer, “Well, in 1842 we saw…” Heck, our current president can’t even remember what happened yesterday, much less in 988. But if you are interviewing Russian President Vladimir Putin, such a discussion is at least a possibility, as can be seen from his interview this week with Tucker Carlson. (One has to wonder how much of this extensive history lesson was simply a flex; a demonstration that the Russian President can mentally run circles around the American President.)

The 2-hour-long interview was a fascinating glimpse into the mind of the Russian leader, something we rarely see here in the censored United States. It likely came across as boring to a lot of Americans (a Daily Beast headline read “Putin Nearly Bores Tucker to Death with 2-Hour History Class“), but that’s because our collective memories barely go back a few months, much less hundreds of years, and our attention spans are limited to 280 characters and edgy memes. Yet a deep understanding of history is essential to understand our current world geopolitics.

In fact, it is Americans’ ignorance of history that allows the propaganda machine of our Political Class to operate successfully. For the past two years, these Elites and their flunkies in the Corporate Media have pretended that history began on February 24, 2022, the day Russia invaded Ukraine (or, as Putin puts it, when Russia “intensified” the conflict that he says began with the Ukrainian coup d’état in 2014). This ignorance allows flaks from Hillary Clinton to George Weigel to present a cartoonish version of what is happening there: Putin=Hitler; Russians=bad, Ukrainians=good; Putin only invaded because he has imperial designs on all of Europe.

Knowledgeable analysts have always known this was a ridiculous and dishonest assessment, but it was necessary for the military-industrial complex here in the US to sell our role in the conflict to the American people. Sending billions of dollars to Ukraine (much of which actually goes to American military contractors) is only palatable if it is sold as an existential threat to our country, which it never was.

Putin’s long history lesson was full of gaps, of course, and purposefully only included events that make Russia look favorable. Of course, that’s how most political leaders tell history: in a favorable light to their own country. Yet the history he told since the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991 is essentially correct, and knowledge of this time period is vital to understanding today’s conflict.

The United States and the West repeatedly broke promises made in good faith to Russia, and has repeatedly provoked Russia over the past 30 years by consistently moving the NATO border—along with our military bases and missiles—closer and closer to Russia’s border, against the clear warnings of Russia’s leadership (Putin is not alone in Russian leadership in decrying this expansion).

To be clear, “provoked” is not the same as “justified.” Noting the factualness of Putin’s account of recent history is not a defense of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But it’s necessary to acknowledge these realities if peace is ever to be achieved. We must recognize that Russia will defend its own interests, and demanding its complete capitulation is a fool’s errand.

Thus, if we insist on the cartoonish representation of Putin as a modern-day Hitler, we’ll never be willing to sit down and negotiate an end to this bloody conflict. Sadly, this is exactly what happened in March 2022, one month after the invasion, when British Prime Minister Boris Johnson (clearly in union with the Biden Administration) forced Ukraine to reject a peace initiative, an initiative Ukraine itself was ready to sign.

If we insist on the cartoonish representation of Putin as a modern-day Hitler, we’ll never be willing to sit down and negotiate an end to this bloody conflict.Tweet This

Yet my purpose here isn’t to re-debate U.S. involvement in the Russia-Ukraine conflict (I’ve already commented on it here, here, here, and here). Instead it’s to note how important Tucker Carlson’s interview was for promoting peace, and how it reflects the changing landscape in media, a change I believe is vital to the cause of peace and freedom.

The Corporate Media is happy to caricature Putin as a thuggish dictator, just as they caricature Donald Trump as a wannabe dictator. This satisfies their masters in the Political Class, and so they do all they can to censor their targets. It’s easy to caricature someone if you never allow him to present his own point of view. But with the rise of alternative media, the Corporate Media’s ability to engage in such censorship is weakening.

(I know that CNN and others say they repeatedly asked for a Putin interview and were refused. Do you blame him? In just the past few months, the media has refused to broadcast some of Trump’s speeches, and cut out sections of an interview with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. that they claimed was “false information.”)

Fortunately, people are waking up to this game. As just one indicator of the Corporate Media’s decline, it would take 226 days for CNN to have as many cumulative viewers during prime time as Carlson’s interview with Putin received in its first 17 hours. More and more people are rejecting the sound-byte-driven, Narrative-pushing Corporate Media for the long-form, open-to-different-views alternative media. This terrifies our ruling Political Class, because they know the more knowledgeable the populace, the weaker their grip on power.

Getting to hear from Vladimir Putin directly is a good thing, period. That doesn’t mean we must embrace his narrative any more than our own President’s (Putin’s claims about wanting to “denazify” Ukraine, for example, seem to be cynically driven for propaganda purposes). Hearing from the “other side,” however, does allow us to realize that in every conflict there are multiple points of view, multiple grievances, and each side has its own perspective of what led to the conflict and what continues it. Recognizing that fact is the first step toward peace, and for interviewing Vladimir Putin, we should all thank Tucker Carlson. 

Let’s Pray That Texas Doesn’t Blink

The years-long showdown between Texas and the Federal Government over the Texas-Mexico border took a dramatic—and potentially dangerous—turn this week. The Supreme Court (with Amy Coney Barrett as the deciding vote) ruled that Texas could not prevent the Federal Government from taking down the barbed wire fence that Texas installed along part of the border. In turn, Texas Governor Greg Abbott ordered the Texas National Guard to defend the barbed wire fence (and thus the border), saying that it was a matter of the state’s self-defense that supersedes the Supreme Court ruling.

The stakes were raised even higher when 25 Republican governors signed a letter in support of Governor Abbott. Some governors also pledged to send their own national guards to support the Texas resistance to the Federal Government. Not surprisingly, many now speak of a potential civil war brewing.

While a civil war would be horrific, I believe all right-thinking Americans should support Texas in this fight, and in fact should support more states standing up to the Federal Government, even to the point of considering secession.

I’ve made clear over the years my own support for secession. I think our country is simply too big to succeed. Our political system has gotten progressively more and more oppressive over the years, and our current Federal Government makes many past empires seem like subsidiary dreamlands in comparison. We need to break up into multiple nations, and hopefully this Texas resistance is a step in that direction.

When I first argued for secession back in 2015-2016, I knew it was a fantasy, and most people regarded the idea as quixotic at best, treasonous at worst. But then 2020 happened. The different responses taken by states to the Covid pandemic reminded Americans that states do matter; they are not just cogs in the Federal Machine. Millions moved as a result, and a certain patriotism toward one’s state rather than the country as a whole was strengthened. Now people started to wonder if their state would be better off outside of the Federal Government’s control.

National Divorce is part of the national conversation, and it’s being taken more seriously by more people. Good. But there’s still so many false assumptions made about a potential National Divorce, most of them stemming from public school indoctrination about our nation’s history.

National Divorce is part of the national conversation, and it’s being taken more seriously by more people. Good.Tweet This

First, a breakup does not automatically mean a civil war. Many nations around the world have broken up over the years without a shot being fired. The most obvious example is the Soviet Union, but there are others as well. The current situation in Texas, for example, does not have to escalate into violent bloodshed: the Federal Government could just back down and recognize Texas’s right to defend itself. Bloodshed will only happen if the Federal Government wants it to happen.

Another false assumption is that a National Divorce would result in two and only two new nations. It must be North/South or something simplistic like that. But a National Divorce could lead to three, four, or even more new nations. There’s no natural law that requires a certain minimum size of a nation (see: Europe). While the Corporate Media likes to separate us into Blue States and Red States, the reality of our differences is far more complex. While Montana and Alabama might both be Red States, how they want to govern and live can vary widely. Why force them together?

It’s also believed by many that a national divorce must follow current state lines. The reality is that we are mostly divided between city and rural areas—Chicago is as unlike parts of southern Illinois as many European countries are from each other. A National Divorce could include many state divorces.

This might sound like chaos. After all, why would anyone prefer the uncertainty of shifting borders over a unified, peaceful nation? When that “unified, peaceful nation” uses its power to trample on individual’s rights, shoves cultural degradation on its citizens, creates money out of thin air to further enrich the Elites, and spends more money protecting Ukraine’s borders than our own, then uncertainty becomes much more attractive. Or at least becomes the better of two bad choices.

National Divorce, if it is to happen peacefully, would not happen overnight. In fact, it already began in 2020 with the flight of many people to states that were better on Covid policies. As states make clear where they stand on the issues that matter, citizens will continue to vote with their feet—the only vote that really matters. Florida and Texas have already seen massive immigration from other states in the past few years and there’s no reason to think that will slow down.

That immigration will strengthen leaders’ resolve to stand up to the Federal Government. Look at Ron DeSantis. He barely won in his first run for Governor of Florida, but won reelection by a landslide, helped partly by new Floridians who came due to his strong leadership during Covid. If Governor Abbot doesn’t fold, look for more people to move to Texas as well. 

This internal immigration is a good thing, as it makes National Divorce more inevitable, and more peaceful. At some point, most people will wake up and realize that it’s easier to go our separate ways rather than fight to control each other. 

Let’s pray that Governor Abbott and the people of Texas continue to stand strong, and that one day we look back at this conflict as but one step to a peaceful National Divorce.

There’s Some Good in This Church and It’s Worth Fighting For

It’s been a month since the release of Fiducia Supplicans, and faithful Catholics can be forgiven if that scandalous document put a damper on their Christmas spirit. After all, it’s yet another scandal coming out of a Vatican full of them lately, and it’s easy for Catholics to become demoralized in the face of this reality.

The possibility of demoralization and even despair among faithful Catholics today is the reality behind the most common question I receive from readers: How do we live joyfully as Catholics when from all human appearances the Church seems to be self-destructing? How can we remain faithful to God’s promises when we see millions of souls—including the souls of loved ones—being lost every year?

I won’t pretend to have the definitive answer to these tough questions, although I do try to address them in a recent podcast. I can say what I personally do, what I would call “detached monitoring and response.” What I mean by that is that I monitor what is going on at the highest levels of the Church, for I know those activities have a real impact on people I care about—my family, my friends, my fellow parishioners. Of course, this is the purpose of Crisis: to inform readers of the crisis in the Church and help them navigate through it.

I also, when necessary, respond to the various scandals happening in the Church. We are sometimes criticized here at Crisis for supposedly rejoicing in scandal so that we can have more click-baity articles to publish. Nothing could be further from the truth: I’d love to shut Crisis down tomorrow, because that would mean there is no great crisis in the Church to which to respond. However, there is a crisis, and so we will continue to respond to it. Each person of course has a different sphere of influence and so each person’s response will be different. But we can’t put our heads in the sand and act like everything is awesome. Souls are too valuable.

So I monitor and I respond to today’s crisis. But it’s a detached monitoring and response. By that I mean that I don’t obsess about the latest news from Rome (or from Washington); I don’t spend all day doomscrolling my social media feeds to see the latest scandal and the reactions to that scandal, and the reactions to those reactions. That’s not healthy, spiritually, mentally, or even physically.

But just resolving to not do something usually doesn’t work long-term: the pull of social media and its algorithms is strong. So we must replace that activity with others. And here is where I think we open our eyes to see the good that God is doing in the world. These things are usually not “news-worthy” in the sense that they won’t make the front page of the New York Times or even Crisis Magazine, but in God’s eyes they are likely vitally important.

For example, just since the release of Fiducia Supplicans, at my parish alone the following has happened:

A recently-married young couple, who met through our parish, announced that they are expecting their first child.

Another young couple, who also met through our parish, was married in a beautiful ceremony.

Yet another young couple (this time, my own son and his fiancée) celebrated the mostly forgotten but still beautiful Rite of Betrothal.

This is God working in my own little corner of the world, and I’m sure He’s working in yours as well. We just need to raise our eyes from our devices to see it. And over time, these small activities will make a large impact on the Church and the world. They are the mustard seed which grows into the beautiful and fruitful tree.

Beautiful acts of faith are happening all over the world as well. I’m honored to be part of the Confraternity of Our Lady of Fatima and one of our current projects is building well-constructed chapels in parts of rural Philippines to replace chapels that are little more than a few bamboo poles and a steel roof.

Note the condition of the old chapel in which these wonderful Catholics are standing.
The new chapel, almost completed.

These faithful Catholics, who often only are able to hear Mass once a month or less, will now have a beautiful—and more permanent—place of worship, all because of the charity of other faithful Catholics.

I don’t want to give the impression that I’m advocating a pollyannaish view of the Church. I know we’re in a crisis and to ignore that reality is to reject Our Lord’s call to live in this time of trial. Yet in the midst of these trials God is still pouring out His graces, we just need to look up to see it happening all around us.

(And yes, I’m currently re-reading The Lord of the Rings [which is also a great way to keep a good perspective on today’s crisis], thus the title of this article. Be like Sam!)

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