A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things. ∼ Henry David Thoreau, Walden A few months ago, a young woman at Stanford … Read more
It is quite remarkable that we are fighting the same battle from before the French Revolution, the fight between sexual license and sexual morality. The fight has been non-stop. Sometimes we are winning, other times, like now, we are losing. On the one side are the radicals who genuinely believe traditional morality as espoused by … Read more
What is the worst thing about living near an open sewer? It is not that you sicken at the stench of it every time you leave your front door. It is that the noisome vapors are so pervasive, and you have lived with them so long, you no longer notice it. What is the worst … Read more
It is clear from their relatively tiny numbers—only a few million in a total population of 318,000,000—that men who have sex with men (MSM)* are not “everywhere” as MSM insist they are. It is also clear from their sexual activities, particularly related to anal sex, that their sexual practices also set them apart from the … Read more
The Sexual Revolution was supposed to liberate us from sexual stereotypes. In fact, we have replaced the old stereotypes of gay men with new and even more rigid stereotypes. Perhaps some people regard the new view of gay as more positive and affirming than the old view. But the New Gay Man is no less … Read more
I had thought Jennifer Roback Morse was getting to the heart of the matter when she pivoted to a focus on the victims of the Sexual Revolution. Her undoubtedly correct view is that gay so-called “marriage” did not start with the gays; rather, the Sexual Revolution prepared the ground beginning in the 1960s. In The … Read more
A new front has opened up in the decades long Culture War. The LGBTQ activists are now demanding legislation that would ban all forms of sexual orientation change efforts (SOCE). Those defending the therapists targeted by the legislation have pointed to the positive effects of such efforts. While this is certainly true, a more compelling … Read more
Let’s face it: The 2015 Synod on the Family is a mess. I was one who gave Pope Francis the benefit of the doubt. I now have my doubts about him. And I have no doubt at all that some of the men surrounding him are either heretics or lunatics or both. The real question … Read more
With students off-campus for the summer, the “campus rape crisis” enjoyed a similar hiatus. At the time of this writing the hiatus continues but the underlying crisis remains. The crisis is not in the competing true/false allegations of the parties involved, nor in the inability to define rape, but in the underlying hopelessness of lives … Read more
Defenders of marriage and the traditional family continue to lose battle after battle to the purveyors of sexual liberation. So predictable have their defeats become that the judicial coup at the US Supreme Court over same-sex “marriage” surprised no one. Moreover, it finally but slowly seems to be dawning on Christian leaders that much more … Read more
The long-awaited US Supreme Court ruling on the definition of marriage is as bad as we had feared. The Obergefell ruling will have harmful long-term effects on the family, the church, self-government and society. Each one of the four dissenters wrote his own opinion, to distance himself from a decision that will surely rank as … Read more
Different writers here and there have talked about 1965, fifty years ago, as a year of transition. It was a year in America when trends came into focus, culture was altered, and life changed—politically, socially, culturally, morally, and in the Catholic Church. Perhaps historian James T. Patterson provided the most detailed elaboration on these developments … Read more
The Conservative Media brilliantly covered my presentation of the inaugural event of the Anscombe Society at the University of California Santa Barbara. The College Fix broke the story, with an on-the-ground reporter posting within hours of the event, including a video of obnoxious protesters. We got coverage on The Blaze, on the Truth Revolt, and … Read more
The Boy Scouts of America is a venerable institution. I can well remember when, as a Cub Scout in southern Louisiana, I learned the mysteries of initiation into the Scouts. It was exciting to become part of such a universally respected group. There were badges denoting achievement, uniforms indicating rank, handshakes conveying to other boys … Read more
Why are so many straight people pro gay? Because the normalization of homosexuality is the premier achievement of heterosexual ideology. “Gay” and “straight” are not taxonomies but ideologies. They are not orientations but disorientations: whether bi-, homo-, or hetero-, hyphenated sexuality makes us lose our sense of direction toward the truly sexual, and the victims … Read more
It is inevitable that advocates for the Sexual Revolution will say all we need is a bit more of it. More orgasms. More sex-ed. More abortion. More contraception. Less guilt. More freedom, man. But they will never acknowledge that their revolution has been tried and found wanting, wanting being a fairly benign way of saying … Read more
I want to thank those who took the time to respond to my recent article, “Why Religious Liberty Arguments Aren’t Working.” Our focus at the Ruth Institute is crafting sound arguments and clarifying the proper context for their use. Religious liberty arguments are a case in point. While there is merit in religious liberty arguments, … Read more
In a recent issue of Crisis Magazine, Jennifer Roback Morse gave three reasons why religious liberty arguments do not seem to be working for conservatives in their battle to save traditional marriage. First, many people no longer believe in God, and thus simply don’t care much about religious liberty. Second, we are asking people to … Read more
In a recent Crisis magazine column, Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse—a valued leader in the pro-marriage and family movement—contends that “religious liberty arguments aren’t working” in the effort to retain marriage as the union of one man and one woman. In fact, she says the religious liberty argument in the marriage arena “weakens our case.” Instead, Dr. Morse … Read more
I am a very committed, very public advocate of marriage as a gender-based institution. Many of my fellow proponents of man/woman marriage cite religious liberty as an argument against redefining marriage. While I have great respect for those who promote this view, I must respectfully disagree with their assessment. The uproar over the Indiana Religious … Read more