I’m grateful to Holy Cross for the education I received there years ago, but I can’t help but think that its current identity crisis will negatively affect the quality of the education and formation it now provides. In response to “growing anti-Muslim tensions” in the United States, Holy Cross initiated a yearlong discussion to decide whether … Read more
Fun Is Not Enough (2017) is the collection of all 125 columns written by the late Father Francis Canavan, S.J., for the monthly catholic eye from April 1983 until November 2008, a couple of months before his death. The book was edited by Dr. Dawn Eden Goldstein, Assistant Professor of Dogmatic Theology at Holy Apostles College … Read more
In the wake of the recent Florida school shooting, a chorus of well-meaning folks is demanding, “Enough—it’s time to do something!” As usual that “something” includes tougher gun controls and universal background checks—technocratic “solutions” that are ineffective at best and detrimental at worst. In Fyodor Dostoevsky’s epic novel, The Idiot, a well-meaning prince is driven … Read more
The reality of joy provides, I think, the most obvious refutation of the ideology of materialism—the attempt to reduce human beings and human lives to the body, to matter and its effects. For joy is proper not to the body, but to the spirit. It is the soul that is joyful or joyless, not the … Read more
I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book. ∼ Groucho Marx The affair is not over yet. Though some affairs must end, others must go on. Yes, though civilization is uncivilized, though truth is relative, though ugly is beautiful, though God is … Read more
Hollywood has produced a terrific, though historically inaccurate, movie based on the life of showman P.T. Barnum. It is a singing and dancing extravaganza that is highly compelling, though the songs are of the pop variety. Even so, the opening sequence alone, which recapitulates the story of Barnum’s fictional life, is worth the price of … Read more
On January 26, Wycliffe College, a graduate school federated with the University of Toronto, hosted a discussion on the question: “Is there meaning to life?” The three participants included, philosopher and theologian William Lane Craig, atheist philosopher Rebecca Goldstein, and clinical psychologist and professor of psychology Jordan Peterson. This encounter made me reflect more deeply … Read more
Nearly fifty years go, my parish secretary, who was elderly even then, kept the parish accounts using an abacus. I gave her the latest kind of electric adding machine, which she used dutifully, but I noticed that she then checked the results with her abacus, an instrument that has been reliable since long before the … Read more
A recent article in The New York Times on America’s declining fertility rates—“American Fertility Is Falling Short of What Women Want” (I note the article’s title appears to have changed)—was as concerning and risible as the news they reported. The concerning part was its statistical confirmation of a trend bedeviling (not just) the Western world: … Read more
As eighteenth century English writer Samuel Johnson might have put it, “Nothing concentrates the mind like knowing that I am dust, and to dust I shall return.” And nothing is a more bracing reminder of that reality than the imposition of ashes on Ash Wednesday. Placed on the forehead in the form of the cross, … Read more
Every so often we’re witness to a splurge of commentary about Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, as if the general populace is suddenly reminded that the man who resigned the Chair of Peter is in fact still alive. Most recently, reactions to a letter he sent to Massimo Franco of Corriere della Serra, in which the … Read more
Considering how much emphasis modern churchmen put on trust, it’s worth noting that the Bible does not have much to say about trusting others. Of course, the Bible tells us to trust in God, but there is no corresponding command to trust our fellow men. Of the six references to “trust” in the RSV Reader’s … Read more
The gun control debate has reignited with the recent Florida shooting. Despite the passionate commentaries on all sides, no one seems to be able to answer the question of when the shootings will stop. As much as liberal media want to blame guns, police or government, this is a moral problem. It involves the acts … Read more
Just a few short weeks after the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, spoke about Amoris Laetitia as a paradigm shift for the Church, Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago has reiterated the same portentous message. In a lengthy address given to the Von Hügel Institute of St. Edmund’s College on February 9, Cupich describes Pope … Read more
This year Ireland will hold a referendum on the issue of abortion. The date has not yet been set but the vote will probably take place in May. Since 1983, enshrined in the Eighth Amendment to the Irish Constitution, there has been a constitutional ban on abortions taking place in the Irish Republic. This prohibition … Read more
Thanks to the adulterators of children’s literature, the natural anticipations when approaching forgotten classics have been skewed. Everyone expects that everything will be picturesque, nice, and most importantly, safe. For reality is far too dangerous, far too harsh a thing, and children must be protected from it at all costs. Real stories for real boys, … Read more
The accusation of modernism gets thrown around a lot, especially in traditional circles. As a descriptor of heresy, modernism is a vague term. Modernism can refer to a movement of art and architecture, as well as to the general spirit of modern thought as a rejection of the past. These are genuine usages of the … Read more
“The devil also exists in the twenty-first century, and we need to learn from the Gospel how to battle against him,” Pope Francis preached in a homily on April 11, 2014. Many are the weapons in our struggle against evil. In Ephesians, St. Paul urges us to put on the whole armor of God, including … Read more
Within the last year and half I have traveled four times to Poland. I have by no means covered the broad expanse of this great country, but I have managed to visit Warsaw, Sulwalki, Lublin, Kraków, Oswęciem, Wadowice; I have spent much time in Katowice in Upper Silesia, and its surrounding towns such as Tychy, … Read more
Divine Mercy Sunday is April 8, 2018, the Octave Day of Easter. Devotion to Divine Mercy has been growing worldwide for many years and was added to the calendar of the universal Church in 2000, the year St. John Paul II canonized St. Faustina Kowalska. St. Faustina Kowalska was a nun who, in the 1930s, … Read more