As the opening decade of the 21st century draws to a close, the world is confronted with a vast, ever-changing array of media platforms. Gone are the days when newspapers, magazines, and rabbit-eared television sets dominated our consumption of information. We now live in an age of fiber-optic television, cell phones as powerful as desktop … Read more
Last week I was privileged to moderate a debate between two of the best writers on religion in the English-speaking world, Boston College philosopher Peter Kreeft and Jihadwatch director Robert Spencer. How was I able to land two eminent speakers on the same night? Easy: I was their editor. Both Kreeft and Spencer contributed eloquent … Read more
“What are we coming to? Where will it all end?” Who among us has not heard anxious questions like those, or asked them ourselves? What is going to happen, we ask, in Afghanistan and Iraq? Will the sorely tried people of those tormented countries ever enjoy peace? When will our brave troops be able to … Read more
I have sometimes ridiculed the Left’s commitment to abortion as its sole core principle by referring to the “sacrament of abortion.” It stands at the center of a belief which holds that the Imperial Autonomous Self is the highest good and that, therefore, all (including the very life of another human being) must be sacrificed … Read more
Anyone who has been to a Catholic conference has heard the following remark rise up out of the audience: “What we really need to do is to pray and get before the Blessed Sacrament!” Anyone who has spoken at a Catholic conference has had to confront this statement. Usually, in order not to appear like … Read more
A tip-of-the-hat to The Anchoress, who linked to this piece in which various experts with Divinity-School letters appended to their names convey their opinions about whether demons exist. The expert consensus is that they don’t. (No reasons for thinking this are given, naturally, because reason is irrelevant to expert consensus.) In reading some of these … Read more
At a dads’ get-together a few days ago, one of the guys said that he was planning on having his kids pay for college themselves because he wanted them to stay Catholic. At this rather-bizarre-on-the-face-of-it statement, many of the guys had questions, and this fellow proceeded to say that from his experience, kids who had … Read more
Yesterday, the pope released a statement on immigration for the World Day of Migrants and Refugees, coming up in January 2011. Titled “One Human Family,” Benedict addresses the dignity of all immigrants while acknowledging nations’ rights to regulate their flow: “The World Day of Migrants and Refugees offers the whole Church an opportunity to reflect … Read more
Well, this is charming: The ad is the brainchild of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, and Matthew Archbold at the National Catholic Register calls it “the most anti-Catholic political ad you’ll ever see.” Could be… but frankly I find it so confusing as a piece of advertising that I’m not sure it even rises to that … Read more
Trick-or-treaters might be coming around with UNICEF donation boxes. Don’t give ‘em a dime — UNICEF pushes for abortion and sterilization as part of its efforts to improve the lives of women and children. Beyond the immediate irony of that idea, it’s not even good policy. According to CatholicCulture.org (emphasis mine): Pro-family UN watchers are … Read more
The world is full of talented failures — people who either didn’t live up to their abilities, or who did, but in a way that diminished their humanity and their character. God made us to be better than that. And our nation and our Church need His people to be better than that. Scripture tells … Read more
Read the first few paragraphs of this AP story on Catholic bloggers, and see if anything in particular strikes you: Pressure is on to change the Roman Catholic Church in America, but it’s not coming from the usual liberal suspects. A new breed of theological conservatives has taken to blogs and YouTube to say the … Read more
Archbishop John Nienstedt of St. Paul-Minneapolis made headlines recently when he distributed a DVD to his 800,000-member diocese reiterating the Church’s teaching on marriage. In an interview with AP about the project, reported by USA Today, he defended the Church’s involvement in what some see as a purely political issue — encouraging other Catholics to … Read more
To raise the possibility of an all-male liturgical ministry is to invite tribulation. Those who prefer the traditional arrangement of male altar servers, lectors, and so on are nervous about vocalizing their convictions, let alone acting upon them. This in itself is significant: Regardless of where one stands on the issue, it should give us … Read more
Archbishop George Lucas of Omaha has been forced to suppress the Intercessors of the Lamb, a formerly-Catholic association of the faithful in his archdiocese. After the group requested recognition as an official Catholic organization, the archbishop undertook a canonical visitation: “It was my hope from the beginning that the Intercessors and the archdiocese would move … Read more
And you thought liturgical dancers were just harmless distractions… According to Catholic News Agency (CNA), Cardinal Gabriel Zubeir Wako was almost assassinated during an outdoor Mass in Khartoum, Sudan, by a man who disguised himself as a liturgical dancer: The man disguised himself and joined the liturgical dancers at the crowded stage where the altar … Read more
The Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274) holds a central place in the tradition of Roman Catholic intellectual and spiritual life. The matrix of Aquinas’s own mystical experiences was the thirty-some years of Dominican ministry and community life that this Neapolitan nobleman began in 1244. We see Aquinas’s spiritual self-understanding reveal his deep personal love … Read more
Popular Catholic blogger Jeff Miller of the Curt Jester thinks my notion of a Catholic Tea Party is a “bad idea.” It may, in fact, be a bad idea, but if so, not for the reasons he gives. There’s no need to rehearse the entire argument, because it comprises variations on a single theme: the … Read more
On the first day of the new year, in anticipation of his declaration of “Total War” twelve days later, Adolf Hitler had decided to make better use of manpower, weapons, and armor-plating by scrapping the High Seas Fleet. On January 3, Canadian troops landed in North Africa, one week before the Soviet Red Army entered … Read more
Heather King, whose memoir Redeemed Matthew Lickona reviewed for IC here, has a new blog at “Shirt of Flame” that’s well worth your time. Last Friday, she reflected on Simone Weil, the French philosopher whom King (affectionately) calls a “Catholic-in-spirit nutcase,” and the motivations behind Weil’s refusal to be baptized in the Church — in … Read more