On June 30, 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Harris v. McRae and upheld the constitutionality of the Hyde Amendment, which had prohibited federal funding for Medicaid abortions since 1976. Three decades later, Harris v. McRae remains the pro-life movement’s most important legal victory since Roe v. Wade created a “right to abortion” in 1973… . Continue Reading »
A too-long-undiagnosed bout with Lyme Disease has left me challenged with arthritis and some neurological damage. The arthritis has its uses: I can predict rain, and the pain gives me something to offer up in prayer, or as penance. Not so the neurological issues. At the peak of my illness I was unable to figure out how to do the dishes … Continue Reading »
I hardly ever lock my door”which makes me, I think, a pretty extreme example of a freeloader. I may be wrong, of course. Perhaps lots of people don’t lock their doors. It can’t be so many that the word gets around. If too many of us didn’t lock our doors, then the criminals would lose their assumption that the average door is locked. But as long as enough people lock their doors, I can ride along on the locked assumption. Even in New York… . … . Continue Reading »
On June 28, the Supreme Court released the decisions that finished the business of the year. Notable among them was the judgment handed down in McDonald v. Chicago on the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms. Just two years earlier a slim majority of the Court affirmed for the first time that the plain words of the Amendment meant, in fact, what layers of long articles in the law reviews could not quite explain away… . Continue Reading »
When he died from a spear wound in June 363 AD, while on campaign in Persia, the Emperor Julian was only thirty-two years old. His reign as Augustus had lasted just nineteen months. His great project to restore the ancient faith of the “Hellenes” and to turn back the inexorable advance of the “Galilean” religion perished with him … Continue Reading »
“You know, there’s a porn store for Android … . You can download nothing but porn… . Your kids can download porn. That’s a place we don’t want to go, so we’re not going to go there.” Those are the now famous words of Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple … Continue Reading »
Recently, Kenneth Howell, an adjunct professor who worked for Newman Center at the University of Illinois in Champaign/Urbana, was told by his department chair that he could no longer teach there. His offense: explaining and clarifying the Catholic moral teaching on homosexuality while teaching a class on Catholicism. A couple of students complained to the department chair with the usual charge: his moral reasoning is hate speech that creates a hostile environment for gays and lesbians… . Continue Reading »
My home is a 45-minute drive from Gettysburg National Military Park, a site I’ve visited many times, never without some emotion. The nature of that emotion crystallized for me a few years ago when I took some Australian friends on an audio tour of the battlefield with the help of Father Scott Newman, pastor of St. Mary’s Church in Greenville, S.C., who drove the other car in our small motorcade… . Continue Reading »
As I was sitting alone in the cafeteria one afternoon, far from home, overwhelmed and lonely on a campus of 20,000 students, an older student walked up, smiled, and asked if he could join me. He took a seat as I prepared to engage him in a heady discussion of politics, philosophy, science. Thrilled to have the company, I was mentally preparing for anything he threw at me… . Continue Reading »
When we consider the question of illegal immigration and border control, as we should if we are to be responsible citizens, we should remember that before all else we are disciples of Jesus who said, “Inherit the Kingdom of my Father, for when I was a stranger, you welcomed me.” … Continue Reading »
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