R. R. Reno

Michael Greve at the American Enterprise recently posted in a Liberty Fund blog a trenchant analysis of the recently announced HHS regulations that will compel all insurance policies to cover contraception, sterilization, and morning after pills He provides a very lucid analysis of the way in which . . . . Continue Reading »

I have long suspected that free-market libertarians aren’t all that different from postmodern relativists who insist that human beings have no natural end, no normative patterns for life. Some recent editorials in the Wall Street Journal confirmed my suspicions. Last Monday, in advance of the New Hampshire primary, a staff editorial assessed Rick Santorum’s economic message, giving him a mixed review. What leapt out, however, was this sharp attack… . Continue Reading »

In a New York Times Op-Ed , history professor Sara Ritchey makes much of the fact that married Anglican clergy will become Catholic priests under the new Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter. Ritchey provides some useful historical background that outlines the early medieval shift to an . . . . Continue Reading »

The National Catholic Reporter is almost always predictable, and their choice for 2011’s “person of the year” was true to form: Elizabeth Johnson . Johnson, a professor of theology at Fordham University, is a standard issue Catholic Theological Society of America theologian, which . . . . Continue Reading »

Here’s the basic data from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life : Among the 57% of Iowa caucus-goers who describe themselves as born-again or evangelical Christians, Santorum finished in first place with 32% support. Ron Paul garnered 18% of the evangelical vote, while Romney, Newt . . . . Continue Reading »

I imagine that Leon Wieseltier and I disagree about many things. But I’ve long found him to be a reliable enemy of cant. I was not disappointed by his recent Washington Diarist column in The New Republic . He takes Duke University philosophy professor Alex Rosenberg and author of The . . . . Continue Reading »

2011”my first full year at First Things, and my first year as Editor. During the quiet days after Christmas I found myself paging through the year’s issues. There’s a lot to savor. Here are some of my favorites. “The Man-Made Messiah” (January). It’s the Lubavitcher rebbe, Manachem Mendel Schneerson whose followers stand outside the “mitzvah tanks” (the RV style trucks that blare klezmer music) on the eve of major Jewish holiday, asking passers-bye, “Are you Jewish?” … Continue Reading »

You really have to check out this very clever and well-done video, The Fight of the Century . I’m not a fan of rap music, but it’s a supremely verbal musical idiom that works well with the substance of this music video, which is the difference between F. A. Hayek’s free market . . . . Continue Reading »

Once animated by revolutionary ardor, our secular intellectuals have reached a dead end. Today they pen books that reassure the powerful, providing a justifying mythology for America’s ruling elite. That’s the only reasonable way to read The Swerve: How the World Became Modern , a new . . . . Continue Reading »

Christianity has long been susceptible to antinomian temptations. St. Paul’s pointed and often rhetorically violent rejections of the role of Jewish law in the lives of Jesus’ Gentile followers are difficult to untangle, and it is easy to fall back upon simple juxtapositions between law and . . . . Continue Reading »