The newly launched USCCB Web site on health care tackles the question: “Are the bishops promoting socialized medicine by advocating for universal access?” That’s a good question, since the prospect of a government takeover of health care has created a growing chorus of complaints about the present bills before the Congress.The bishops’ answer to the … Read more
The best religious films, and therefore the best Catholic films, convey the great truths of Christianity implicitly rather than explicitly, not unlike the mystery of incarnation itself, in which the Word became flesh in the person of an obscure carpenter from a hick town in a minor province. In addition, this list consists … Read more
I am such a Neanderthal.  Case in point: One recent day, I was furiously scrubbing the bathtub when my husband Dan peeked into the bathroom doorway.  “Hey, as long as you’re doing that,” he said, “The toilet in there is looking . . . um . . . really, really gross.”  Yes, … Read more
The tagline for the critically acclaimed AMC series Mad Men, which recently received 16 Emmy nominations and whose third season premieres on Sunday, is “Where the Truth Lies.” Set in the early 1960s, the series entwines the world of advertising, with its manipulation of images to evoke a sense of accomplishment and happiness, with ordinary … Read more
As the most immaterial art, music is often thought to be the most spiritual. By its nature, is music sacred? If so, what is sacred about it? These might seem strange questions to ask in a secular age, but the presumption that there is something special about music pervades even our culture.Consider the poster on … Read more
If ever there were a time when Catholics should not trust the United States government, it is now. The president, his administration, and the congressional leadership are removing all the abortion restrictions put in place since Roe v. Wade. And yet, the bishops are backing a proposal to give the federal government complete control … Read more
As I begin to rummage through the files I have from 1942, I notice a pastoral letter of Msgr. Sigismund Waitz, prince archbishop of Salzburg, read in all his churches on October 19, 1941, but only published in London in July 1942. Archbishop Waitz, along with other prominent Austrian clerics such as the Jesuit Rev. … Read more
This virtue business is a puzzler. If picking up the tab for a raging alcoholic, or keeping one’s gambling-addict grandma in bingo cards, doesn’t add up to Liberality, what does? Isn’t the New Testament full of admonitions like “Give till it hurts,” and “It’s 10 p.m. Do you know where your children are?” Â It’s … Read more
Reason speaks in words alone, but love has a song. Joseph de Maistre We live in an age of confusion. It might even be said that we major not only in intellectual confusions but in affective confusions as well. Many do not know how to gauge their emotions; they cannot distinguish between valid and invalid … Read more
Rev. Simon Tugwell notes that the very first thing we should know about prayer, according to St. Paul, is that we do not know how to do it. Paul makes this fact clear when he tells the Romans that  the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray … Read more
In a previous article, I suggested that the Church in Canada has capitulated to the fads and heresies of the day without a good fight. Let me fill in the details. Â In the province where we spend the summer, the Church long ago abandoned all of its grade schools, high schools, and hospitals. Read … Read more
Through the official statements of the USCCB, the Catholic bishops assert that health care is a “basic human right.” Since the release of their 1981 pastoral letter on health and health care, the bishops have consistently argued that the federal government is responsible for establishing “a comprehensive health care system that will ensure a basic … Read more
Since the Enlightenment, rationalists have liked to cite witch burning as a prime example of medieval ignorance and religious (usually Catholic) bigotry run amok. (Leftists today still denounce it as a cynical plot by the strong against the weak.) Writing history that way was simple: Historians catalogued horrors, disparaged religion (or at least someone else’s … Read more
While it is still the bicentenary year of Mendelssohn’s birth in 1809, I thought I should find a way to observe it. A trip to London in late July gave me the opportunity. At the Proms, a series of summer concerts held at the Royal Albert Hall in London, I had the rare chance to … Read more
One of the big issues under debate in the United Kingdom this summer is whether to ban the burqa. French President Nicolas Sarkozy said last month that the burqa debases women and is not welcome in his country; Britain is trying to decide whether to follow suit. Â To begin with, there is some confusion … Read more
The Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court reminded us once again of the never-ending debate as to whether judges should “legislate from the bench.” Political conservatives, of course, say that they must not. The job of judges, we are told, is to judge … Read more
The 29th section of Caritas in Veritate concerns religious freedom. What is at stake here is not the usual “church and state” hassle. To clear the air, Pope Benedict XVI states that he is not concerned here with fanaticism, in which violence is used to promote the goals of religions. It is self-evident that this … Read more
It’s easy to make fun of twelve-step groups, given their curious jargon and the fact that there are so many different varieties of them filling church basements across the country with cigarette smoke and pamphlets. In case you didn’t know, the movement has gone far beyond offering hope to alcoholics and drug users, expanding to … Read more
In this Crisis Magazine classic, Ted Gioia says it’s time for some new and improved profanity. He has some ideas… Some years ago, during the seventh inning of a baseball game, umpire John Hirschbeck got carried away in a dispute with pitcher Hideki Irabu, the temperamental but promising New York “Yankee” from Japan. … Read more
Important differences between people who get their teaching from American Tribal Pieties and those who get it from the teaching of the Catholic Church are much in evidence in the health care debate. Those moved primarily by tribal loyalties (and let me state from the outset that this by no means describes everybody) tend to … Read more
