Joseph Bottum

Last Friday, September 24, the archbishop of Denver, Charles J. Chaput, gave a talk to a conference of the Religion Newswriters Association. Called “Religion, Journalism, and the New American Orthodoxy,” it was an intelligent and sophisticated analysis”and really, quite uncontroversial in its conclusion, although you wouldn’t know that from the response of the religion reporters who were present… . Continue Reading »

So, I’ll be making a swing through Colorado, lecturing and reading, from November 1 to 3. More information as things finalize, but, for now, save these dates: 1) Lecture, “Hope and Apocalypse: Where We Are Today,” at 7:00 p.m., at Bonfils Hall at the John Paul II Center, 1300 South . . . . Continue Reading »

Valerie Tarico, Ph.D., has a new book out, Trusting Doubt: A Former Evangelical Looks at Old Beliefs in a New Light. Or maybe it’s a reprint of her old book, The Dark Side: How Evangelical Teachings Corrupt Love and Truth. It’s hard to tell. Once an author starts down the road of making a living off being a “former something-or-other,” everything begins to sound the same… . Continue Reading »

Mao’s experiment in industrializing China from 1958 to 1962 : “At least 45 million people were worked, starved or beaten to death in China over these four years.” . . . . Continue Reading »

It was a tradition I was rather fond of: Once a year or so, like the turning of the leaves, my friend Christopher Hitchens would take aim at something I’d written. His most recent , just pointed out to me by an acquaintance on Facebook, is in the journal Free Inquiry . Appearing under the . . . . Continue Reading »

So, I spent the weekend watching snippets of What’s My Line?, the game show that, running on television from 1950 to 1967, involved panelists who attempted to guess the professions of unknown contestants and, blindfolded, to guess the names of celebrity contestants … Continue Reading »

My quick romp through the South Dakota political scene is just out in the new issue of the Weekly Standard . . . . . Continue Reading »

Ron Johnson, a Republican running for Feingold’s Senate seat in Wisconsin, says America is becoming Greece , collapsing in financial crisis. True? There is this fact to add to the mix. Over at super economics blogger Megan McArdle’s web page , a commenter complained, in another context, . . . . Continue Reading »

Ann Althouse ducked into the library to escape a rainstorm the other day and picked up a copy of the Utne Reader —a magazine she says she loved thirty years ago and hasn’t read since. Her conclusion, reading it now? The ” Utne Reader is not a young man’s world—or a young . . . . Continue Reading »

There, the sign that says “Sharia,” the hand-drawn letters dribbling down in streaks as though they were bleeding. And there, another sign”this one reading “No Mosque at Ground Zero” in patriotic red, white, and blue. And there, the off-duty policemen come to join in, and there, the bikers up from Pennsylvania, and there, the microphoned speakers crying out “This is our cemetery””“This is sacred ground.” … Continue Reading »