Special Edition II

Edited by Xavier Rynne II

As Synod-2015 ends its first week of work, a crucial point of conversation and debate over the next two weeks is coming into clearer focus as other, more mediagenic proposals fade into the background.

10 Oct 2015 0

Sex and Tradition

by Peter J. Leithart

In a few carefully argued pages in his recently translated The Crisis of Modernity, the Italian Catholic philosopher Augusto del Noce explains the “ascendance of eroticism.” Del Noce died in 1989, but his account could have been written yesterday. He illumines why Fifty Shades of Grey . . . . Continue Reading »

9 Oct 2015 0

Letter Number Ten

Edited by Xavier Rynne II

During the first week’s work of Synod-2015, numerous Synod fathers have commented on what seems to them the Eurocentric character of the Instrumentum Laboris, the Synod’s basic working document now being digested in the circuli minores (the Synod’s language-based discussion groups) as well as commented upon in the Synod’s general assemblies. 

9 Oct 2015 0

Letter Number Nine

Edited by Xavier Rynne II

With the Synod on the Family well underway in Rome, considerable attention has been given (and not only in the media) to the “Kasper Proposal” to admit the divorced and civilly-remarried to Holy Communion. No doubt discussion on this will continue, although Pope Francis has made it abundantly clear that he doesn’t want the Kapser Proposal to be the dominant issue, the principal focus of attention, at Synod-2015. Continue Reading »

8 Oct 2015 0

Scientists Explain the Origins of Religion

by Russell E. Saltzman

I’d say, after reading this essay, we can just sleep in next Sunday. We now have a scientific excuse to stay home and pull the covers up: the origins of religion. It opens by asking what role religion still “plays in today’s American society.” Wait, you may ask. What does religion . . . . Continue Reading »

8 Oct 2015 0

School Shootings and the Book of Job

by Abigail Rine Favale

Last Thursday morning, I was teaching a freshman honors seminar in Newberg, Oregon. We were discussing Genesis 32, that enigmatic passage where Jacob wrestles with God. Just south of us, in Roseburg, Oregon, my students’ counterparts were being murdered in their writing classroom. In another of . . . . Continue Reading »

8 Oct 2015 0

The Moral Universe of Hannibal

by Alexi Sargeant

A woman lovingly plucks a dead pheasant. A man places a human arm on a cutting board with care, readying his chef’s knife. A woman sinks into a bathtub, seemingly dropping into an abyss. A corpse is lifted on high, framed by wings made of broken glass.All these images (horrific, gorgeous, . . . . Continue Reading »

7 Oct 2015 0

Letter Number Eight

Edited by Xavier Rynne II

As has been noted in this space before, it’s virtually impossible to have a serious discussion when the basic materials allowed into the conversation are three-minute sound-bites. 

7 Oct 2015 0

Issues Beneath Issues at Synod 2015

by George Weigel

Written from Rome: Since Pope Francis announced that two Synods would examine the contemporary crisis of marriage and the family and work to devise more evangelically dynamic responses to that crisis, a lot of attention has focused on issues of Catholic discipline: How does the Church determine . . . . Continue Reading »

7 Oct 2015 0

Letter Number Seven

Edited by Xavier Rynne II

Two addresses, given on the morning of October 5, set down important markers for Synod-2015 on its first formal day of work. Pope Francis began by urging the Synod to “always keep before our eyes the good of the Church, of families, and the supreme law, the salus animarum [the good of souls].” The Holy Father then defined the unique character of a Synod: Continue Reading »

6 Oct 2015 0