Pope John Paul II’s considerable effect on our times is conceded by admirers and critics alike. The imprint of the shoes of this fisherman can be found throughout the new democracies of east central Europe, Latin America, and East Asia. His critique of “real existing democracy” has helped . . . . Continue Reading »
Natural Law and Metaphysics I was puzzled by many aspects of Phillip E. Johnson’s exposition of the Grisez-Finnis natural law theory in his review of my book In Defense of Natural Law (November 1999). One mistake, however, is so fundamental and important that it cannot be passed over in silence. . . . . Continue Reading »
As Time and other premillennial makers-of-lists have discovered in recent months, there is no lack of candidates for the position of emblematic figure of the twentieth century. In the world of politics alone, there are several plausible nominees on a slate that includes the admirable and . . . . Continue Reading »
God’s Politician: Pope John Paul II, the Catholic Church, and the New World Order by david willey st. martin’s, 258 pages, $18.95 Fifteen years ago, as the long pontificate of Paul VI drew to a close, a consensus on the qualifications for the next pope began to take shape among liberal Catholic . . . . Continue Reading »
It is now well over three years since the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe. Scenes of Polish workers carrying Lech Walesa triumphantly on their shoulders, of students dancing on top of the Berlin Wall, and of throngs cheering Vaclav Havel in Wenceslas Square have been replaced by sickening images . . . . Continue Reading »
The editorial in our May 1991 issue was titled “Christian Mission and the Third Millennium.” It described the complicated connections between the Christian missionary enterprise and the future of an essentially Western civilization that is, in however ambiguous a manner, a product of the . . . . Continue Reading »
I propose a “rereading” of Pope Leo’s Encyclical by issuing an invitation to “look back” at the text itself, but also to “look around” at the “new things” that surround us, very different from the “new things” at the final decade of the last . . . . Continue Reading »