As worldwide Anglicanism implodes, Catholics may remember the heady days of Anglican-Catholic ecumenical relations. In 1966, the last great archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey, met with Pope Paul VI in the Sistine Chapel. The archbishop and the pope embraced and signed agreements to begin the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission. The pope gave … Read more
Over the next few days, three of our writers will offer lighter reflections on why they prefer a given genre of music — Rock, Broadway, and Classical.  We begin today with Rock and Roll.   ♦ ♦ ♦  My childhood was marinated in the thunder of Beethoven, the depth of Mozart, and … Read more
Barack Obama’s tax advisers recently posted a piece in the Wall Street Journal about their candidate’s tax plans. Their article was designed to triangulate, painting their candidate as a tax cutter and the Republican opposition as a secret tax raiser. It was well-written and well-argued — not that you can really trust anything you read … Read more
Scene: The Democratic Convention. Denver, August 26, 2008. HILLARY CLINTON motions her hand to speak. FIRST CITIZEN. Stay, ho! and let us hear Hillary. THIRD CITIZEN. Let her go up into the public chair; We’ll hear her. — Noble Hillary, go up. HILLARY. For Obama’s sake, I am beholding to you. [Goes up, clad in … Read more
Joe Biden’s voting record on abortion in the United States Senate is likely to cause heartburn for two groups of people: ardent pro-choicers and Catholic bishops. Biden is a Catholic; and yet for the last ten years, according to the National Right to Life Committee, he has voted the “wrong” way 88.5 percent of … Read more
“It is the duty of those serving the people in public place,” said Grover Cleveland in his first inaugural address in 1885, “to closely limit public expenditures to the actual needs of the government economically administered.” That was, for Cleveland, plain common sense, and his practice proved that he meant it. He was an implacable … Read more
Sometimes the Church’s public face in a given country can make you proud, and sometimes it has to make you a little sick. American Catholics can justly take satisfaction that our bishops were almost alone in beginning the fight against abortion; the Southern Baptist Conference, of all things, at first backed Roe v. Wade, and … Read more
I do not own a television set, I do not like the cynicism of the Olympic organization, and I’m put off by propaganda spectacles in totalitarian countries. From this, the gentle reader may infer my opinion of the Olympic Games in Beijing. Add to this the fact I am Canadian — we don’t win … Read more
Last month, I reported on the persecution of Christians in Iraq and the continued vulnerability of their remaining communities. Extortion and violence by Muslim extremists have driven 500,000 Christians out of Iraq — about one quarter of the 2,000,000 Iraqis who have left the country since the beginning of the Iraq War. And another 2,000,000 … Read more
If ever there were a book designed specifically for the enjoyment of InsideCatholic readers, surely it is Benjamin Wiker’s new 10 Books that Screwed Up the World: And 5 Others that Didn’t Help. Wiker should be renowned (if he is not already) for Moral Darwinism: How We Became Hedonists — a book that at once … Read more
As I opened the package that arrived in the mail, a little voice inside my head told me I was nuts. “Have you lost your mind?” it wanted to know. “You can’t have nice things!” The little voice was right, I suppose. If 13 years of parenting have taught me nothing else, they have quite … Read more
Freud once asked, “What do women want?” And he found it a difficult question to answer. Let’s narrow the question down to a particular woman, and we’ll find the question somewhat easier: “What does Hillary want?” And while we’re at it, we may as well add: “What does Bill want?” — for of course they … Read more
 It was only a few years ago that I began exploring Christianity after a life of atheism. I’ll never forget the time I was up late at night, feeling lost and slightly depressed as I searched around the Internet for arguments in favor of God’s existence, and I stumbled across a series of heated … Read more
Every social problem we face today — from racial discrimination to abortion — is tied to other underlying root causes. It makes sense, then, for society not to neglect long-term proposals when trying to check these matters. But such strategies are never a ready substitute for fighting social problems in the near term. And that’s … Read more
An atheist who bears an uncanny resemblance to Jack Chick theorizes on What Rome Is Up To when a couple of Catholic sources remark that the discovery of life on other planets poses no particular threat to the Catholic Faith. This piece is a classic example of how sin makes you stupid. Our Bright knows … Read more
Render Unto Caesar: Serving the Nation by Living Our Catholic Beliefs in Political Life Charles J. Chaput, Doubleday, 258 pages, $21.95 Twenty years ago, Richard John Neuhaus foresaw a new era of Catholic engagement with American society and politics. “This can and should be the moment in which the Roman Catholic Church in the United … Read more
"Hello. My name is Steve, and I’m a ‘traditional’ Catholic." So begins my admission of membership in a disparate group that, as you’ve already read, is far too well known for its bitterness, anger, and lack of evangelical spirit. I don’t like being typecast in this way. Just because I have a profound … Read more
Students of history will always find the month of August a little ominous. In August 1920, the Red Army invading Poland (led by neoconservative hero Leon Trotsky) nearly captured Warsaw and spilled into central Europe, whence it might well have conquered a prostrate Germany, Austria, and Hungary — just for starters. The heroic Polish defeat … Read more
“In the earthly liturgy we take part in a foretaste of that heavenly liturgy which is celebrated in the holy city of Jerusalem toward which we journey as pilgrims. . . . We sing a hymn to the Lord’s glory with all the warriors of the heavenly army.” The Second Vatican Council’s account of empyreal … Read more
Here’s a truism: If you’re running for President, don’t answer a question by saying, “That’s above my pay grade.” After all, if you want to occupy the White House, there is no higher pay grade. You are the boss, and the buck stops with you. But Barack Obama used precisely that expression when asked by … Read more