One of the greatest aspects of writing is the ability to think. Without thinking one cannot ponder, reflect, and contemplate ideas, memories, jokes or other things that combine to make words written on a page for others to read so they can then think about what you wrote. Thinking can also be one of the hardest things to do when writing because it requires focus, recall and concentration. When you’re tired often as I am, it becomes a challenge. Our next writer reminds us of the joys and romance of thinking as a writer. Take a journey of the mind and heart as you
Meet Catholic Writer, Thinker and Romantic Douglas O’Banion
C.B. 1. “Tell me something interesting about yourself.”
Author Douglas – When I was around four years old, I was the ring bearer in a wedding held on my step-dad’s side. That experience seemed to have hightened my respect for enduring love and family values. Therefore, starting from the age of around four, I have been a romantic.
Interestingly, during my childhood I was an impatient romantic. I was five years old the first time I asked a girl to marry me. The next time I asked a girl to marry me I was ten years old. Both of those girls were Scottish-Americans. So, I thought that maybe God was trying to tell me something more than just ‘Scottish wives are hard to catch’.
One can never be sure about what God is trying to say specifically. Nonetheless, I was comfortable making the decision to, while living here in the U.S., serve the smallest minority on the British Archipelago; that minority who support The Church (a religious monarchy) as well as support the United Kingdom (a constitutional monarchy).
With much of life spent serving Britain at large and the small minority of Catholics who supported the U.K.’s constitutional monarchy, some people might label me a ‘Jacobite’. But I can’t be a Jacobite due to the fact that I accept the world as it is. I am not an activist.
C.B. 2 “What makes a good Catholic writer?”
Author Douglas – An unspoken respect for your readers’ personal integrity.
C.B. 3 “What do you like about being a Catholic/Christian writer?”
Author Douglas – What I sometimes, but not always, like is that writing reveals ‘you’ to you and it matures you. On that point, I often think of G.K. Chesterton who was a successful British author who didn’t convert to Catholisism until later in his career. I suspect that during so many hours of writing Chesterton cleared away the brush from his mind to eventually reveal that he had always been Catholic. All author’s learn something when they write. Chesterton learned that he was Catholic. What I learned was that I like that sort of thing.
C.B. 4 “What is the main focus of your particular writing or what do you like to write about?”
Author Douglas – The main focus of my recent books is various applications of adoption. Adoptions of close family members, adoptions of new homelands, adotions of new information, and other adoptions. The subject of adoption encompasses or touches vital topics including; loyalty, honour, rebirth, law, mercy, trust, the sense of belonging, personal integrity, ethics, and the growth of The Church’s membership.
C.B. 5 “How does your Catholic Faith influence your writing?”
Author Douglas – One of the many ways that my Catholic Faith (particularly the part of attending Mass and paying attention) influences my writing is that it makes it natural for me to not belabour any point that I am making in writing. I think of it this way – My Catholic mindset, makes my writer’s default set to ‘quality over quantity’.
C.B. 6 “What’s your favorite article/post/book/story you have ever written?”
Author Douglas –
The Gift
Dear reader, the world is full of imperfect people who imperfectly write, imperfectly love, imperfectly speak, and imperfectly draw conclusions.
Considering that God knows all (He is omniscient), I’m not surprised that He gives mankind a gift for us to use to smooth out the rough, imperfect edges of ourselves, the rough, imperfect edges of each other, and the rough, imperfect edges of our societies.
People have always had various ideas about how they want to go about addressing mankind’s imperfections. Therefore, the Gift has often been ignored in lieu of people’s own imaginative ideas about how to deal with human imperfections.
As for me, however, when I’m faced with imperfections or limitations, I often simply reach for the Gift. It’s a gift that when rejected can start wars, and when accepted can bring peace. It’s a gift that when rejected can leave wounds opened, and when accepted, heals. It is, in my opinion, a divine gift that bridges the gaps between our imperfections and the higher hopes that God has for us. It’s a divine gift that also bridges the gaps between our personal aspirations and true reality. This gift quiets arguments, stills waves, and rights the imperfectly innocent. It’s a gift that a person can know they have accepted perhaps only when they show the Gift to other people.
The Gift is Mercy.
I know of that gift as well as I do only because of God’s earlier gift: Jesus Christ.
C.B. 7 “What’s your favorite topic/subject to write about?”
Author Douglas – True Romance; that which is between a man and woman destined to be one another’s husband and wife. That’s my favourite genre to write, but I likely won’t publish any of it because I only publish my writtings or books that I want to hand down to my children.
C.B. 8 “What’s your favorite scripture verse?”
Author Douglas – Matthew 5:37 Let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘yes’ and your ‘No’. Anything more is from the evil one.
C.B. 9 “What are you currently working on?”
Author Douglas – I am currently working on a nonprofit book.
C.B. 10 “Name a favorite Saint or Catholic or other person who inspires you in your life.”
Author Douglas – My Catholic ancestor who was the first of us to convert from paganism. Such a Catholic ancestor existed for most Westerners alive today.
C.B. 11 “”Who is your favourite living author?”
Author Douglas – Pope Leo XIV
C.B. 12 “If you could have lunch with any deceased writter who would it be, what would you eat, and what would you talk about?”
Author Douglas – It would be C.S. Lewis. We’d eat a roasted chicken served with fruit and a loaf of crusty french bread. At the earliest convenient time during lunch, and after he told me ‘no’ to any questions regarding Heaven and the afterlife, I would ask him to tell me about his time spent at The Eagle and Child Pub when he and the other members of The Inklings met there in the 1930’s and 1940’s.
C.B. 13 “Name a favorite movie/tv show or music you find worth sharing with others.”
Author Douglas – Miracles from Heaven (movie 2016)
C.B. 14 “Can you see one of your books being made into a movie or tv series?”
Author Douglas – Yes.
C.B. 15 “Name your favorite historical event.”
Author Douglas – The signing of The Edict of Milan in 313 A.D..
This interview was published on April 22, 2026
The day these events took place
1876 – The first National League baseball game is played at the Jefferson Street Grounds in Philadelphia.
1889 – At noon, thousands rush to claim land in the Land Rush of 1889. Within hours the cities of Oklahoma City and Guthrie are formed with populations of at least 10,000.
1906 – The 1906 Intercalated Games open in Athens.
1930 – The United Kingdom, Japan and the United States sign the London Naval Treaty regulating submarine warfare and limiting shipbuilding.
1969 – British yachtsman Sir Robin Knox-Johnston wins the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race and completes the first solo non-stop circumnavigation of the world.
1970 – The first Earth Day is celebrated.
C.B. 16 “What else do you want people to know about anything?”
Author Douglas – I’d like them to know the value of a classical education by them getting one.
Also, I Have published twin books
I was told that after arriving in Ireland during the first century AD, the Irish gave my ancestor and his brother a covert Gaelic-sounding name that was a reference to my ancestor Queen Boudicca. That covert name was Ui Bhanain.
I can’t speak or read the Irish language. But by way of dictionaries, I know that Ui translates into English as the words ‘from’, ‘son of’, or ‘grandson of’. I also know that the Irish word bhan is associated with the words ‘bean’, ‘woman’, and ‘lady’. Therefore, I can only guess that the ain suffix stems from the Irish number one a haon (pronounced ‘ah hain’). With those things accounted for I estimate that in Irish Gaelic my British ancestor’s covert name Ui Bhanain meant ‘From the First Lady’.
The former I published in 2023 and from an entirely British-Catholic perspective. The later I published last year (2025) and presented it from the perspective of an American giving Britain a British book.
By me making the books British and American twins, I was easily able to get down to the fundamentals concerning the importance of Christianity in the Western world. In the books I use a fictitious storyline to create a court case that was settled in Saint Patrick’s time 432AD , and in the last chapter I settle the court case again in the year 2025AD.
I worded the court case in such a way that I didn’t need to prove that Christianity was absolutely true. I merely had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that British Society benefits from Christianity. The book unfolds like a court case that starts in chapter one with a lot of information and then proceeds chapter by chapter getting more and more contextual. I included the sorts of writing the Western intellect has been built from; poems, parables, essays, and court documents.
I use the twin books not just to strengthen our international friendship and N.A.T.O. alliance, but also to comfortably contrast the two nations (The UK and The U.S.) I contrast the two by having the British version end with a monarch’s signature, and the American version left blank where a monarch would be. Our two nations have had that difference for 250 now, and we still have common intellectual roots, that are not political common roots, but rather Catholic.
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