The great error of most economic thinking these days is not that it is too keenly focused on the economy, but that it has all but forgotten it. A good friend of mine, a wise theologian, has encouraged his students to distinguish between what Aristotle calls chrematistics, the craft of amassing wealth, which Aristotle viewed … Read more
A common trope in social policy debates is to claim that the public’s changing opinion on the policy at stake, rather than the policy’s moral or substantive justifications, merits changing the platform of one’s preferred political party. This notion seems recently to have taken root on the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, and … Read more
This past year America has seen a trumped up “War on Women” that claimed women’s freedom depends on “reproductive rights.” At the height of the Presidential election, the Obama camp courted the female vote with an exhortation to “vote like your lady parts depend on it” (in an e-card on the Obama campaign Tumbler that … Read more
It’s been more than ten years since I first noticed something odd about the generally pleasant—and generally Catholic—students at the college where I teach. The boys and girls don’t hold hands. Let that serve as shorthand for the absence of all those rites of attraction and conversation, flirting and courting, that used to be passed … Read more
Cardinal Kurt Koch who is the President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity recently gave an interview in which he remarked that Pope Benedict prefers to call his approach to the Second Vatican Council not a “hermeneutic of continuity” but a “hermeneutic of reform.” The expression using the word “continuity” rather than “reform” … Read more
There’s been a strange turn of opinions about fatherhood—at least in recent public debates. Decades of research have now documented the tremendous challenges children face when they grow up without their fathers. But you would never know it by looking at some of the recent public arguments for “genderless parenting.” So what do the decades … Read more
Many headlines of the last week announced a fourth century papyrus fragment containing the Coptic phrase, “Jesus said to them, ‘My wife.…’” While some provocateurs used the occasion to belittle Christianity, commentary was mostly restrained, in keeping with the cryptic and scanty nature of the papyrus, its late date, and lack of additional support. This … Read more
Jesus said, “Suffer the little children to come unto me…for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.” I’ve suggested in an earlier essay that chastity is but the giving of due reverence to the goodness and the holiness of sexual being, male and female. A land where chastity—not mere abstinence, and not prideful scorn of … Read more
It may have erupted in the Twitterverse and on MSM sites, but the only possible surprise element may have been the timing. Maybe. Because President Obama’s was among the most expected and awaited coming out moments in the nation. Which makes you wonder, what was outed, per se? So President Obama has come out in … Read more
A small town in Vermont has recently been ordered to cease its immemorial tradition of opening meetings with a prayer. The order came from a judge who does not live near. A public school in the city where I am writing these words has banners hanging from its gymnasium ceiling, one of which featured a … Read more
The debate over same-sex marriage has prompted a lot of thinking about the nature of marriage itself. One solution to the current crisis has been mooted by libertarian writers: privatise marriage. Here Patrick Burke, a libertarian, explains why marriage is special and governments still have a role. Libertarians believe in having as little government as … Read more
Some libertarians, notably Ron Paul, say it should not. Another says that is foolish and irresponsible.
Digital textbooks. That is the latest idea from the White House for lifting the performance of American schools — a strategy on which Korea and other countries are already ahead. Something certainly needs to be done; a new report from the Harvard Business School identifies the education system from kindergarten through to the end of … Read more
The following essay first appeared in Disorientation: How to Go to College Without Losing Your Mind, ed., John Zmirak. It is reprinted with permission of the publisher. You might be surprised to hear feminism described as a “heresy.” Like most Americans, you may assume that the feminist movement simply asserts that women are full … Read more
The following review first appeared in the October 2007 edition of Crisis Magazine. Women and the Common Life: Love, Marriage, and Feminism, by Christopher Lasch and Elizabeth Lasch-Quinn, W.W. Norton and Co., 1997, 196 pages, $19 Christopher Lasch’s Women and the Common Life, a collection of essays compiled with the help of his … Read more
The name Dietrich von Hildebrand is not, perhaps, as well known as it should be among intelligent and literate Catholics — or, for that matter, among Christians of any ilk. He is a man whom Pius XII referred to as “a 20th-century doctor of the Church.” Those who remember this pontiff will recall that he … Read more
Most Americans are unaware that about $700 Billion a year of federal taxpayers’ money is handed out to non-taxpayers allegedly below a poverty line (in addition to $250 Billion a year given out by the states). After Barack Obama became President, he increased federal welfare spending by a third because, as he promised during his … Read more
My husband and I are madly in love. I feel the need to announce this publicly because, on the surface, it can be hard to tell sometimes. Some days, the most romantic thing Dan and I do is grunt at one another about the funny noise the dishwasher is making again before going to bed, … Read more
My daughter first entered our parish church in my arms, to receive the sacrament of baptism. This August, again in a long white gown, she walked on the arm of her Dad to the sacrament of matrimony. There had been sacraments in between. As she came down the aisle a bride, I saw momentarily a … Read more
Who reads the (British) Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care? A few more people this month than last, judging from the coverage given to an article in that worthy publication by British psychologist and agony aunt, Susan Quilliam. Her essay spiced up the journal’s usual menu of condoms and chlamydia with the attention-grabbing headline: “‘He … Read more