2026
Lying and “the Right to the Truth”
I was reading the work of a modern, progressive moral theologian the other day. And he gave what has become a disturbingly common response to the classic moral conundrum: whether you can lie if you are hiding Jews in your house and Nazis knock…
Columbus, Marco Rubio, and the Nations
I wouldn’t have taken a more than average interest in Christopher Columbus if ill-informed and sometimes ill-intentioned people hadn’t made it necessary. Fairfax County, Virginia, where I’ve lived for more than thirty-five years, abolished…
Awake the Dawn – The Catholic Thing
Psalm 57:8 declares: “Awake, my soul, Awake O harp and lyre! I will awake the dawn!” This is a poetic verse, but does it make sense? Normally, we think of the dawn awakening us as the first light comes through our bedroom window. But we…
The Vatican Should Reaffirm the Culture of Life
The Catholic bishops of Arlington and Richmond, Michael Burbidge and Barry Knestout, urged Virginians to reject Ballot Question 1 next month, a proposed constitutional amendment that would expand legal access to abortion. The bishops warned that…
Armenia and the Task of Remembering
‘One death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.’ It’s a line typically attributed to Josef Stalin, an accomplished veteran of mass homicide, though it probably predates him by decades. The words are nonetheless true. The mind can…
Newman and the Rosary – The Catholic Thing
Many Protestants who become Catholics pass through three stages in their Marian devotion. They begin by thinking the Rosary is not something bad, as they had supposed; they next come to think it is very good; and finally, with experience and as…
Newman and the Rosary – The Catholic Thing
Many Protestants who become Catholics pass through three stages in their Marian devotion. They begin by thinking the Rosary is not something bad, as they had supposed; they next come to think it is very good; and finally, with experience and as…
Lepanto: 455 Years Later – The Catholic Thing
“On October 7, AD 1571, the fleet of the Holy League under the command of one Don Juan de Austria defeated the Turkish fleet in the Gulf of Lepanto. That was how they would put it; that was how they would teach it to their children. And it was…
The Catholic Knight Who Stopped Slavery in West Africa
The Catholic cemetery at Mortlake in South West London has an agreeably rural feel, and is worth a visit: it’s about 20 minutes from Waterloo on the line going down to Richmond, and a short walk from the station. It is chiefly famous for the…
Pope Leo’s Unfinished French Revolution
The large crowds that turned out for Pope Leo everywhere in France surprised everyone – not least, sad to say, the French bishops. Let’s hope that his visit has even greater effects. But just days later, France is gripped by widespread rioting…