There’s a poem by John Donne that makes a presence of an absence; his absent love becomes as real to the speaker and more fully his than if she were present. This could illustrate what Katherine Rundell wants us to see in the work of John Donne, seventeenth-century metaphysical poet and preacher, . . . . Continue Reading »
A spectre is haunting the preparations for next month’s Amazon Synod: the spectre of John Henry Newman. Continue Reading »
Those embracing Amoris Laetitia should remember the difference between a real development of doctrine and what Cardinal Newman calls a corruption. Continue Reading »
There's more to mumbo jumbo than the fact it does not actually say anything. Continue Reading »
On Catholic campuses that aspire to Top Ten or Top Twenty status in publicity sweepstakes like the U.S. News and World Report college rankings, one sometimes hears the phrase “preferred peers.” Translated into plain English from faux-sociologese, that means the schools to which we’d like to be compared (and be ranked with). At a major Catholic institution like the University of Notre Dame, for example, administrators use the term “preferred peers” to refer to universities like Duke, Stanford, and Princeton, suggesting that these are the benchmarks by which Notre Dame measures its own aspirations to excellence. Continue Reading »
A priest's op-ed provides a clear example of the problems faced by the Roman Catholic Church. Continue Reading »
David Mills has found himself in trouble—for making the stunning claim that conservative Catholics are not conservative Protestants, and conservative Protestants are not conservative Catholics. Continue Reading »
Catholics, Orthodox, and not a few Protestants have been known to reject theological novelties with a wave of the hand and an appeal to tradition. “Shouldn’t we follow the tradition rather than the judgments of an individual scholar?” Sometimes the modifier “idiosyncratic” is added to “judgments” for rhetorical oomph. “Tradition” is implicitly capitalized, for who can argue with a capital letter? Continue Reading »
There immediately follows a piece of vintage Newmanian satire. He imagines the division of mind that is bound to arise in Protestants who have become personally acquainted with individual Catholics but who have not yet given up their anti-Catholic stereotypes. The Birmingham people will say, . . . . Continue Reading »
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