Paris Is No Stranger to Sacrilege
The Neo-paganism evident in the expensive show put on for the opening of the Olympics was just another example in a long history of official French ultra-secularist de-Christianization.
No Mercy for Sin Itself
It is one thing to tolerate your brother’s sin—because you yourself are a sinner, after all. It is another to accept it in principle, explicitly or implicitly.
Marseille: a pro-Islam bishop for an Islamified city
As everyone knows by now, the Catholic Church—at least in the West—has been shrinking. Due in large part to the sex-abuse scandals, the Church has not only lost membership, but also trust. Along with the decline in numbers has come a decline in authority, influence, and respect. Meanwhile, the world’s fastest growing religion continues to … Read more
France: A Tale of Two Faiths
Last March, an Islamist terrorist stormed a supermarket in Trèbes, France, shot two people dead and took others hostage. In negotiations with police, the terrorist agreed to accept a police lieutenant’s offer to swap places with the last hostage, a female cashier. The police officer, Arnaud Beltrame, was subsequently killed. In honor of his heroic … Read more
France Honors a Catholic Soldier Murdered by a Terrorist
Lieutenant Colonel Arnaud Beltrame (44) has become famous overnight. His family could well have done without his fame, since it came at such a cost—the sacrifice of his own life. He offered himself as a hostage in exchange for a wife and mother who was held captive by the terrorist Radouane Lakdim. Lakdim had taken … Read more
If Charles Martel Were Alive Today
Sunday was the 1,276-year anniversary of the death of Charles, King of the Franks. Charles, who won the decisive victory at the Battle of Tours against the Umayyad Caliphate (an Islamic state), gained the nickname “Martel,” meaning “the Hammer.” This battle was the beginning of the expulsion of Islam from, and victory of Christendom over, … Read more
Pro-Life Counseling Becomes Illegal in France
France, the land of the French Revolution, of liberty, fraternity, and equality, is displaying few of these qualities these days. Not that the French revolutionaries ever did in their time. They guillotined those who belonged to the wrong class, the wrong (i.e. losing) political party, those adhering to Church and King and ultimately each other. … Read more
Tolerating Terror
The slaying of Father Jacques Hamel at the altar of the church of Saint Etienne-de Rouvray in Normandy should be the envy of every priest: to die at Mass, the holiest hour of the world. The president of France was heartfelt in his mourning, but Monsieur Hollande was also historically remiss when he said: “To … Read more
French Politicians Deny Reality in Wake of Nice Terror
In war, the inability or refusal to recognize the enemy’s intentions and capabilities has disastrous consequences. America experienced this on December 7, 1941. But as 9/11 and subsequent events have demonstrated, it is a lesson soon forgotten and often reviewed in sorrow and bitterness. Sadly, there is little reason to think that the leaders of … Read more
On Seeing Omaha Beach
General Mark W. Clark, whose Fifth Army led the capture of Rome in June of 1944, was the last of the fighting World War II field commanders to die (at age 87 in 1984). He never doubted the importance of the role America played in the liberation of Europe. Nor the idealism that moved so … Read more
The Paris Horror: Real and Explicable
There is a film clip of Charles Trenet singing the song he wrote, “La Romance de Paris” in Jean Boyer’s film of the same name, with smiling people gathered round as the accordionist accompanies the swaggering “fou chanteur” with his broad grin and popping eyes. It is charmingly nostalgic until you realize that it is … Read more
Controlling Thought in French Schools and Beyond
France as a whole—if we can speak that way of a high culture whose chief unity consists in a shared distaste for consensus—has behaved irrationally only in those historic moments when called upon to defend reason. When a true Frenchman has lost an argument on the basis of its merit, his last recourse and gravest … Read more
From Charles Martel to Charlie Hebdo
On three different occasions, my wife and I chaperoned student tours to Paris. Looking over my journals now, post-Charlie Hebdo, I notice that on each of these trips there was occasion to record uneasy incidents with Arabs who seemed determined to disrupt the fabled joie de vivre of Parisian life. Truth to tell, the Parisians … Read more
René de La Tour du Pin & the Renewal of the Social Order
In their headlong rush to tear down the infrastructure of privilege and exalt equality and liberty, the French Revolutionaries ripped apart the social fabric which had developed in France over the centuries. In the wake of their orgy of destruction, intermediate social bodies were weakened or abolished, amongst which were the corporations or guilds. In … Read more
Suicide at Notre Dame a Warning to the West
The mainstream American right has remained almost entirely silent about the recent suicide of the French historian, Dominique Venner. The reasons for this, I do not know—perhaps it is a squeamishness about the symbolism of his final act, or a lack of understanding of it. Perhaps it is a refusal to see what the people … Read more
The French Defy Socialists over Gay Marriage
Many should be aware of the massacres and massive human rights violations visited upon the Catholic Church during the French Revolution, especially in the Vendée, but there is another more recent period in French history in which the Church was violently oppressed that has received far less attention. Historian Jean Sévillia’s Quand les catholiques étaient … Read more
Léon Harmel: Pioneer of the Just Wage
You could call the nineteenth century stupid, but hardly dull. At its birth, it was the stage for Napoleon’s antics and for the heroism of the captains of wooden ships; at its death, the old Europe itself was giving way before the hard, cold era of aluminum, centralized planning, and the IRS. Sure, it was … Read more
Eat the Rich Now, Starve Later
There is one group that is not protected from hate-speech: the rich. For the rich it is permissible, and in some circles de rigueur, to speak disparagingly or hatefully. This, I imagine, is because it is widely supposed that if you hate the rich you must love the poor, and love of the poor, at … Read more
Will France Take a New Strategic Direction Under Hollande?
New political leaders do not invent new national strategies. Rather, they adapt enduring national strategies to the moment. On Tuesday, Francois Hollande was inaugurated as France’s president, and soon after taking the oath of office, he visited German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin. At this moment, the talks are expected to be about austerity and … Read more
St. Jean de Brébeuf
Why, there is Echon come back again . . . my nephew, my brother, my cousin, you have finally come back to us!” Thus with the warmth typical of their people did the Huron Indians greet their beloved father, Jean de Brébeuf. In the Huron tongue Echon meant “the strong one” or “the one who … Read more