I leaned over the low stone wall along Broadway and raised my six-year-old daughter by her ankle back to the sidewalk. Her bicycle had ended its journey in the side of my neighbor’s BMW. “Drat,” I muttered, hoisting up the stubborn child like a fish from deep water. “Carol,” I shouted, “stop screaming. You … Read more
Well, it looks like today’s Video Day. Margaret’s posting of that wonderful Sufjan Stevens rendition of “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” has inspired me. Every year on the Christmas episode of The Late Show, David Letterman invites the magnificent Darlene Love to close the show with a rocking performance of “Christmas (Baby, Please Come … Read more
“Brian Cox” and “nearly lethal levels of cuteness” are not things I would ever have expected to find together. Cox, an amazingly prolific actor probably most famous state-side for playing Ward Abbott (in the Bourne series) or William Stryker (in X2), appears to be quite a competent drama teacher, as well: (This clip reminds me … Read more
“Brian Cox” and “nearly lethal levels of cuteness” are not things I would ever have expected to find together. Cox, an amazingly prolific actor probably most famous state-side for playing Ward Abbott (in the Bourne series) or William Stryker (in X2), appears to be quite a competent drama teacher, as well: (This clip reminds me … Read more
Before we get to this morning’s round-up, I just want to thank those readers who have given to IC’s fundraising drive this week. Your support means a lot, since it’s you guys whom we aim to please! If you haven’t donated yet, please do consider it. Like Brian said, every little bit helps: If everyone … Read more
In the early 1970s, the Catholic novelist Walker Percy (1916-1990) wrote an introduction to a manual for Louisiana State University’s mental-health services, where he was then teaching a course on “the novel of alienation.” In what is possibly the most learned and humane of such introductions — usually prime examples of bureaucratic boilerplate — Percy … Read more
Sad news for those in journalism and publishing: Abandoning some of the best known names in trade publishing, the Nielsen Company said Thursday that it would shut down Editor & Publisher and Kirkus Reviews, and sell a stable of other publications, including Billboard and The Hollywood Reporter, to a newly formed media company…. For generations, … Read more
Over at the Canadian financial paper, The Financial Post, Diane Francis has a piece on what she sees as “the real inconvenient truth” being ignored at the UN’s Copenhagen conference: The “inconvenient truth” overhanging the UN’s Copenhagen conference is not that the climate is warming or cooling, but that humans are overpopulating the world. A planetary … Read more
Over the last three decades, the abortion debate has been characterized as the clashing of rights: the human rights of the unborn on the one hand and the reproductive rights of women on the other. This decades-long rhetorical deadlock has left a good number of Americans — the great majority of whom understand that an … Read more
Since 1992, the Worcester Wreath Company of Harrington, Maine, has donated and placed thousands of Christmas wreaths on tombstones at the Arlington National Ceremony. Morrill Worcester, owner of the holiday decoration company, drives a tractor trailer full of wreaths every December all the way down to northern Virginia, where volunteers assist him in laying the wreaths. The … Read more
Yesterday was the 30th anniversary of the death of Bishop Fulton Sheen, called “the greatest communicator of the twentieth century” by none other than Billy Graham. A special memorial Mass was celebrated in his honor last night at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York: To a Catholic boy like Tim Dolan, growing up in the … Read more
There was a time when the History Channel covered actual, you know, history. That day is long passed, sadly, and most of the station’s programming is now given over to ice road trucking, pawn shop reality shows, Bigfoot, and the nonsensical “prophecies” of Nostrodamus. And when it does ostensibly cover the substantive past, the channel … Read more
In a statement released today by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, President Francis Cardinal George spoke plainly in response to the defeat of the Nelson-Hatch amendment to the health-care bill in the Senate: Failure to exclude abortion funding will turn allies into adversaries and require us and others to oppose this bill because it … Read more
Earlier this week, you may have read Deal’s appeal for support on behalf of InsideCatholic. This Website and blog exist solely because of generous supporters and readers like you. So if you visit regularly — or even sporadically — please consider supporting us. No amount is too small. The owner of another Catholic site once described InsideCatholic as “the … Read more
Given my obsession with the short story form and my irrationally conflicted emotions for all things eBookish, I’m a bit ashamed that I did not notice this story until yesterday afternoon: Starting on Monday, Amazon will sell two stories, one by Christopher Buckley and the other by Edna O’Brien, through its Kindle store. The stories have … Read more
Last week I offered some theoretical and practical tips for Temperance. Since this virtue is tied in so tightly to physical health, it takes different forms in various people, and its demands can change with age. A young person with a fast metabolism can healthily eat an amount that is for somebody else “too much,” … Read more
Yesterday was the occasion of what has become my annual Christmas poetry luncheon at Buca di Beppo in Washington, D.C. This year I co-hosted the event with Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, whose Southern charm was needed to offset my post-60 gruffness. I intended to post videos of all twelve poetry … Read more
Yesterday was the occasion of what has become my annual Christmas poetry luncheon at Buca di Beppo in Washington, D.C. This year I co-hosted the event with Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, whose Southern charm was needed to offset my post-60 gruffness. I intended to post videos of all twelve poetry … Read more
Yesterday was the occasion of what has become my annual Christmas poetry luncheon at Buca di Beppo in Washington, D.C. This year I co-hosted the event with Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, whose Southern charm was needed to offset my post-60 gruffness. I intended to post videos of all twelve poetry … Read more
It’s not every day that a farmer and poet packs an auditorium so full that security has to turn people away. But that’s exactly what happened when Wendell Berry showed up at the University of Virginia last week, according to Ted Strong of the National Catholic Reporter. In his lecture, Berry outlined the need for small-scale landholders … Read more
