Like Fr. Oakes , I am intrigued by the pope’s warnings against “the dictatorship of relativism”¯for relativism poses a far more profound problem than behavioral license. The value of human life itself is being relativized. Indeed, it strikes me that the most crucial question . . . . Continue Reading »
Those visiting England between now and October 15 will have the opportunity to visit an exhibition, at the Royal Academy, of works by the Italian-born artist Amedeo Modigliani. One of the prodigies of Eliot’s Wasteland generation, Modigliani died, as he had lived, in sordid squalor. Having . . . . Continue Reading »
Back in early July, right after the Episcopal Church USA finished its general convention, declining to “repent”—as requested by the Archbishop of Canterbury—of its confirmation of the openly gay, openly cohabitating V. Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire, I wrote an . . . . Continue Reading »
"The path to prison starts at conception," explains Kaye McLaren , a researcher helping New Zealand investigate its crime problem. And so, she—along with the nation’s top Youth Court judge and its Children’s Commissioner—propose setting up national databases of (1) . . . . Continue Reading »
In one form or another, the headlines all read, "Pope Forbids Guitars" (although my favorite variation appeared in the Irish News : "Pope’s Rock Rap Hits Just the Right Chord"). But Benedict XVI didn’t really ban guitars, or any other instrument. He just urged that . . . . Continue Reading »
Cultural studies, postcolonialism, and postmodernity have so completely corrupted higher education that one wonders if their infiltration of English departments beginning some twenty years ago was a right-wing plot. The unreadable jargon, coupled with a seamless blend of utopianism and cynicism, . . . . Continue Reading »
For anyone who isn’t sick of the debate over Mel Gibson, anti-Semitism, and whether people who liked The Passion should repent in sackcloth and ashes now that its creator’s sheets-to-the-wind sentiments about the Jews have been revealed, I’d recommend dipping into Mark . . . . Continue Reading »
Frederica, you write , "One way that war is hell, and something that may be a clue to some mysterious spiritual truth, is that soldiers who kill are much more traumatized by that than by any injuries they sustain." That’s certainly been the conventional wisdom since Vietnam, and I . . . . Continue Reading »
Further to my comments about The Lord of the Rings , I wanted to mention a new documentary about Tolkien’s epic that does it anything but justice. Tolkien described The Lord of the Rings as "a fundamentally religious and Catholic work" and, on another occasion, insisted that the fact . . . . Continue Reading »
In his post yesterday, my former boss Robert P. George did not mention the public statement on marriage signed by an impressive array of scholars to which he is a signatory. Likewise, he didn’t note that this scholarly document has already made significant contributions to the public debate . . . . Continue Reading »
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