Resolved: the Pope is not a Heretic
Resolved: Pope Francis is not a heretic, and is not spreading or promulgating heretical ideas. For two years a debate has been raging about Amoris Laetitia, or more precisely, the correct...
View ArticleWhat would “pro-life” mean in a world of sentient machines?
Last May marked the five-hundred year anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. To commemorate this major upheaval in Europeans’ worldview, one German church unveiled BlessU-2, a robot ¨priest¨...
View ArticleAnother Human Sacrifice on the Altar of the Culture of Death
This is a commentary that has become all too routine. My colleagues and I here at Vox Nova have reflected on several occasions on the American idolization of the gun (see here, here, here and here)....
View ArticleThe Ones We Lose
The ones we try to help and can’t. The ones who fall through the cracks. The ones who stop showing up to the weekly support group, who stop coming to class. The ones we see on the streets a few months...
View ArticleFinding Alternatives to Planned Parenthood: A Consistent Life Initiative
A common argument in favor of maintaining funding for Planned Parenthood is that alternative facilities, such as pregnancy help centers and community health centers, lack sufficient resources to serve...
View ArticleLove by Sacrifice
Love by Sacrifice: Two Competing Perspectives on Moral Living Note: this piece was originally published at The Flood Magazine: http://www.thefloodmag.com/archive/love-by-sacrifice/7 What does it mean...
View ArticlePrelude to a Conversion
I’ve begun to suspect I may be approaching a personal metanoia on race. I didn’t think I needed one. After all, I was raised with an unquestioned, matter-of-fact sense of racial equity and...
View ArticleThe Unborn and the Undocumented: A Lament
When I first heard reports about an undocumented teenager’s appeal for an abortion, my heart sank into my stomach. All I could think was, “This is really, really bad.” Bad for pro-life concerns and...
View ArticleThe Economy of Sex: Hugh Hefner, Harvey Weinstein, and the Marriage of...
The death of Playboy mogul Hugh Hefner in September drew accolades as well as critiques from, shall we say, some rather strange bedfellows. Some on the left praised his support for civil rights (that...
View ArticleI wish I had said this
The special senatorial election in Alabama is over, and Doug Jones has eked out a victory over Roy Moore. This has been a painful election in many, many ways. The saddest part for me is that almost...
View ArticleUs vs. Them or Just Us?
Over the past two weekends, I’ve been performing in the chorus for a Christmas concert with the local symphony orchestra. Among the many prepared remarks the director used to transition between pieces,...
View ArticleCardinal Law Is an Argument Against Integralism
Driving home Wednesday afternoon, I heard this discussion on NPR’s All Things Considered about the legacy of Cardinal Bernard Law, most famously associated with Boston’s clergy sex abuse cover-up, who...
View ArticleHow long do you kneel after communion?
This is not an earth-shattering question, but I am curious: in your parishes, how long do you kneel after communion? I ask because my new parish here in Alabama seems to kneel an extraordinarily long...
View Article“Ever Since I Became Your Brother”: A Christmas Homily for the Melancholic
Among the literary gems I picked up at a recent parish bazaar was a compilation of homilies by the 20th-century theological heavyweight Karl Rahner, titled The Great Church Year and organized by...
View ArticleYou Learn by Participating
Being the token Catholic in my family sometimes means feeling like I have to over-explain some things. While visiting family but without much going on in the way of New Year’s Eve festivities, I opted...
View ArticleKill All (Catholic) Normies
I finally got a chance to read Angela Nagle’s small book, Kill All Normies. It came out last summer, but the library never bought a copy and I was too lazy to use inter-library loan, so my wife bought...
View ArticleVolunteerism as a Way to Build Bridges
Over the past year at least, we’ve heard plenty of discourse about the divisions plaguing our country. While government policies such as the end of the DACA and TPS programs threaten to break up...
View ArticleRevisiting an old post on contraception and NFP
Many years ago I wrote a post on survey data from the Guttmacher Institute on use of Natural Family Planning. To quote from my lede: The report finds that only 2% of Catholic women use natural family...
View ArticleGoodbye to All That
Mark Shea wrote a post on his blog some time back where he basically disavowed any involvement with Catholic Tribe Right. Knowing Mark as I do, I knew it was not that he was becoming any sort of lefty,...
View ArticleIn Defense of Eros
As a lifelong lover of books, I’ve often encountered authors whom I really can’t say I like that much– and yet, I keep on reading them. And sometimes, if I read them long enough, I eventually grow to...
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