In Bruce Catton’s famous book A Stillness at Appomattox, which won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award in 1954, the historian recounts a meeting held by Abraham Lincoln with his two generals, Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman, just before the inevitable surrender of the Confederacy. “The principal order of business,” Catton … Read more
Everyone can say “the lives of blacks matter,” but you might decline to say “Black Lives Matter.” Here’s why: it’s obvious that the lives of black people matter, but the Black Lives Matter movement is a political movement with a clear agenda and an ideology that goes beyond affirming the sacredness of the lives of … Read more
Over the last few years, some unjust blue-on-black killings have led to a growing consensus that racism is systemic, pervading every institution and social structure of shared life in America. It is a conclusion unmoored from fact. I grew up in Montgomery, Alabama, during the Rosa Parks era, when signs reading “Colored” and “White” hung … Read more
Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish in Carmel, Indiana, is part of the Diocese of Lafayette-in-Indiana headed by Bishop Timothy Doherty. On July 2, 2020, Father Ted Rothrock, the parish pastor published his weekly message under the title “The lady (doth) protest too much, methinks.” In it, he described Black Lives Matter and Antifa militants as … Read more
In genius and influence, according to Christopher Dawson, Abu Hamed Mohammad Ghazali (1058–1111) most resembles Saint Thomas Aquinas. This is indeed high praise. The Persian scholar’s most famous work is The Destruction of Philosophy (Tehâfat el Falâsifah). As a Moslem thinker, he saw clearly the fundamental incompatibility between the Moslem faith and the Greek conception … Read more
The first step on the way to solving a problem is to understand what the problem is. Consequently, we can’t look to America’s bishops to offer solutions to our nation’s most pressing problem because most of them simply don’t get it. The biggest problem we currently face is an attempt to overthrow our country’s system … Read more
We are living in a strange time, to be sure—a strange amalgam of the last short years of the antebellum South and Weimar Germany. If we were selling it to a studio as a film idea, we would have to say it’s the first half-hour or so of Gone with the Wind meets Cabaret. Amid … Read more
Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510) is among many largely forgotten Renaissance artists. While Michelangelo, Leonardo, Donatello, and Raphael are household names (if mostly thanks to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), Botticelli remains largely forgotten, his works bombarded quickly snapped teenage selfies by largely oblivious teenagers visiting Florence’s Uffizi Gallery. Nonetheless, Botticelli’s paintings are among the most exquisite … Read more
Karens are everywhere, notes a June 30 article in the Washington Post, and they are the most addictive thing to watch in America’s disastrous summer of 2020. For the uninitiated, a “Karen” is a pejorative term for a white woman who is “perceived to be entitled or demanding beyond the scope of what is considered … Read more
Pope Francis has condemned racism, and what Catholic could possibly disagree? Responding to the killing of George Floyd, the Holy Father said: “My friends, we cannot tolerate or turn a blind eye to racism and exclusion in any form and yet claim to defend the sacredness of every human life.” I have to think he … Read more
Give me Attila the Hun over our present-day homegrown barbarians. There was something honest about the old-fashioned barbarians. Whether they were the Huns or the Vikings, or the Vandals or the Visigoths, there was something honest about them. They made no bones about it: they were going to sweep down, burn your village, rape your … Read more
Some mock America’s statue-smashers as ignoramuses who do not know what they are doing or why. But there are very good reasons why we see monuments cast down all over the West, including the United States. Let’s not wave this off as mindless stupidity. The radical rule is that the more you destroy, the more … Read more
Across the developed world, ignorant mobs and anarchists are tearing down statues of saints, defacing church monuments, and setting the churches on fire. Not to mention that in the developing world many Christians continue to suffer martyrdom by the thousands at the hands of secular and religious extremists. This has caused many people to finally … Read more
Baron Friedrich von Hügel was born in Germany but spent most of his life in England, having married into the distinguished family of Herberts. He was a popular spiritual writer in the Anglo-Catholic sphere of the early 20th century. One of his works, The Life of Prayer, is a short treatise that questions the assumption, … Read more
When the attacks—legal and otherwise—on Confederate monuments and heritage began to ramp up, I warned in various venues that it would not stop there. And, of course, such disparate characters as Kate Smith and Columbus followed in that train. But ever since the eruption of riots across the nation and the rest of the Western … Read more
“Yes, I think the statues of the white European they claim is Jesus should also come down. They are a form of white supremacy. Always have been…. All murals and stained glass windows of white Jesus, and his European mother, and their white friends should also come down. They are a gross form of white … Read more
Progressivism is not an ideology, but a political religion. Black Lives Matter is not a political movement: it’s a secular cult. I’m sure Crisis readers need no convincing on either point. But, should any doubts remain, consider the case of the Reverend Daniel Patrick Moloney. Until June 9, Father Moloney served as Catholic chaplain for … Read more
“We could have a summer of love.” — Jennifer Durkan, Mayor of Seattle “At last I am free!” declared Martin Niemoller, holding a small book as the prison door was locked behind him. He had been allowed to keep a Bible, and his words would have been an inscrutable paradox only to those who do … Read more
As a new wave of protests erupt in response to the death of Rayshard Brooks, many Catholics are finding themselves angered, frustrated, and perplexed, but not in the way that immediately comes to mind. For months, we have been told that we must be exiled from the public celebration of the Mass, and, in some … Read more
What if we treated the issue of race in our criminal justice system as we do in our medical system? That is, not as a cause but as an index. What do I mean? Statistics in the criminal justice system show that blacks are more likely to be arrested for violent crimes, incarcerated, and victims … Read more