Disciplining yourself to do what you know is right and important, although difficult, is the highroad to pride, self-esteem, and personal satisfaction.If you set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.There is no such thing as . . . . Continue Reading »
Here’s an instructive exchange between Luke Timothy Johnson and Eve Tushnet. Johnson is a distinguished New Testament scholar at Emory University and Tushnet is a writer living in Washington, D.C. She is a recent convert to Catholicism and identifies herself as a lesbian. The exchange appeared . . . . Continue Reading »
A few years ago, I was in the middle of giving a lecture in Paris about religious persecution and martyrdom during the twentieth century when a woman stood up and shouted, “The French state has been repressing and killing Christians ever since the Revolution¯and it has to stop!” Her . . . . Continue Reading »
In America we tend to have a division of labor. The university professors are dry and dusty academics. Jim Lehrer brings them on to his show , and they pull their beards and make well-considered comments about Afghan or Kurdish or Shi’ite history and its possible relevance to present affairs. . . . . Continue Reading »
It is often assumed that G. K. Chesterton and J. R .R. Tolkien were reactionary, antimodern writers. In a certain sense they were. Tolkien regarded nearly everything worthy of praise in English culture to have ended in 1066. He scorned the imposition of Norman culture on a vibrant English tradition . . . . Continue Reading »
Remember the culture wars? In light of September 11 and the continuing War on Terror, it seems hard to believe that there was a time when Jesse Jackson chanting with Stanford undergraduates seemed like a real threat. The fight still rages on in some quarters, however, generating, as it did two . . . . Continue Reading »
The news this next year will be dominated by the presidential race. That is near to inevitable. In that race, there are few things as consequential as the location of authority, and, in particular, the authority of the courts.Way back in 1956, Hannah Arendt wrote an essay titled “What Is . . . . Continue Reading »
Now that the New York Philharmonic has accepted the North Korean government’s invitation to perform in Pyongyang , the question most worth asking is: Can music stop a man from killing people? The German filmmaker Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck has said that writing his much-acclaimed film The . . . . Continue Reading »
According to a news story from Reuters , a recent Tufts University study (available here ) says that “if nothing is done to combat global warming,” then, by the year 2100, “two of Florida’s nuclear power plants, three of its prisons and 1,362 hotels, motels and inns will be under . . . . Continue Reading »
It is not a matter of revving ourselves up to experience again the wonder of the Christ Mass. There is no point in trying to recapitulate Christmas as you knew it when you were, say, seven years old. That way lies sentimentalities unbounded.The alternative is the way of contemplation, of demanding . . . . Continue Reading »
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