Commentary
When the Bells Stop Ringing
The decline of America’s ethnic churches is a familiar story, one that cuts across every region and every Christian denomination: the German and Danish Lutherans of the Midwest; the Moravians of Pennsylvania and North Carolina; the Dutch…
Trappist Bishop Varden’s Lenten guide for the pope and us
Eclectic yet edifying, the Lenten spiritual exercises shared at the Vatican by the Cistercian prelate, Erik Varden, summon spiritual insight from the lives and writings of a startling range of classic and contemporary individuals. Preached in…
Leo’s synodality – The Catholic Thing
Almost one year in, Pope Leo’s vision for his pontificate is still coming into focus. But there are a few key characteristics that are worth noting. First, and most obviously, Leo is not Francis II. For much of Francis’s pontificate, the air…
Vatican Awaits Pope Leo’s Next Moves
Lent at the Vatican this year feels like Advent in some ways, looking forward to long-expected moves by Pope Leo XIV. There are Vatican and archdiocesan appointments to be made, and there’s the likelihood of an encyclical. A social encyclical…
Cardinal Merry del Val Biographer Says His Example Challenges Today’s Nationalisms
Cardinal Rafael Merry del Val’s example of humility, statesmanship, and a profoundly supernatural approach to public life reminds the faithful that the Church’s first allegiance is not to any nation or party, but to truth itself. This was the…
The war against Iran fails just-war criteria
Many who have commented on the war on social media appear to think that as long as some aim for which a war is fought is in itself a good aim – such as deposing tyrants or preventing them from getting hold of weapons of mass destruction – then…
Assisted Suicide cannot be an option for psychiatrists
Dr. Mark S. Komrad, M.D. has served on the Faculty of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins, University of Maryland, Tulane, and LSU. He is a longtime advocate for safeguarding patients from “assisted dying” and notes that psychiatrists are meant to stop…
Confronting the Ideology of Inevitability
Protestant dispensationalism holds that the promises made to Israel remain apart from the Church, awaiting fulfillment in a rebuilt Temple, ushering in the Second Coming. Dispensationalism promotes a dangerously detailed interpretation of…
“Lived experience” and moral tradition: rivals or partners?
One question facing Pope Leo XIV will be whether to advance the “new paradigm” for moral theology proposed by Pope Francis and some of his advisors in recent years. As has often happened, the supposed “spirit” of Vatican II was being cited by…
Faith and science aren’t enemies (and young people need to hear it)
The ideology of scientism, which holds that only the findings of the natural sciences count as truth, has worsened the conflict between faith and science. And with the two pitted against each other, and many young people not wanting to be…