What Benedict outlined in 2006 remains true eleven years later: In order to live in peace with “the rest,” Islam must find within its own religious and intellectual resources a way to affirm religious tolerance. Continue Reading »
Cardinal Sarah teaches us silence—being silent with Jesus, true inner stillness, and in just this way he helps us to grasp the word of the Lord anew. Continue Reading »
Ratzinger’s achievements are significant not just for the following they’ve produced, but for the keen insights and teachings they contain. Continue Reading »
( English Version | German Version )Die Zeiten, in denen eine neue Form geboren wird, sind äußerst rar in der Menschheitsgeschichte. Es muß viel zusammenkommen, damit so etwas gelingen kann. Große Form zeichnet sich dadurch aus, daß sie imstande ist, die Epoche, der sie entstammt, zu überleben . . . . Continue Reading »
The times in which a new form is born are extremely rare in the history of mankind. Great forms are characterized by their ability to outlive the age in which they emerge and to pursue their path through all history’s hiatuses and upheavals. The Greek column with its Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian . . . . Continue Reading »
Everyone has a right to their opinion about the state of Catholicism in 2017, but no one has a right to invent their own Church history. Continue Reading »
In going to Lund to participate with Lutherans in a joint commemoration of the Reformation, Pope Francis is following in the footsteps of his two papal predecessors, both of whom were deeply committed to the ecumenical pathway set forth in the documents of Vatican II. Continue Reading »
Life, even Catholic life, is full of ambiguities, but some things either are or aren’t. It’s a ball or a strike. It’s a Toyota or a Ford. You’re baptized or you aren’t. The papacy would seem to be one of these you-are-or-you-aren’t realities. According to the law of the Church, a man . . . . Continue Reading »
A friend and I are arguing over the word traditionalist as applied to Catholics. He criticizes “traditionalists” but means only the “cranks,” he insists: No “sane person” would call himself a Catholic traditionalist; only cranks do that. When he writes “traditionalist,” my friend has in mind a careful definition that excludes the likes of Cardinal Burke and Pope Emeritus Benedict, but the word in general circulation has a broader range than that, and many gentle souls get caught in its net. Continue Reading »