The dust is beginning to clear (before the next great explosions of cultural and political competition take place). For a time, I have felt the need to keep silent on the question of Brexit. Forces on the Left and Right left me in a state of paralysis—xenophobia, neoliberalism, secularism, migrant and refugee status, and every other foible of contemporary European politics. What to think? In what follows, I don’t pretend to offer an answer; the reader ought to know that... Read more
Many of us know the Catechism, but to live the faith, that is different, that is a holy sacrifice—an exercise in Christian foolishness. My ability to know the truth without living it—to radiate the joy proper to the fulfilled Christian—troubles me. I have little difficulty in writing, reading, and offering advice to others when it comes to the Faith, and yet that is not Christianity. What is a faith dead in practice, lived in staleness? What is a rebuke without... Read more
About a week ago I chose to take a temporary break from social media, mostly because my life has become too busy to deal with it all—discussions, arguments, opinions, you name it. Emotionally and temporally, there’s simply too much to do and feel (feel even to the point of numbness) in the digital world. We are human; we too often let our emotions drive us, and more often than not, that makes for a tumultuous online experience, especially when one... Read more
Like most people I woke up today to horrific news: the murder of more than 50 people at a queer nightclub in Orlando, Florida. Perhaps unlike most people, I was not particularly interested in the biography of the perpetrator, his story, his motivations. Evil had become an anonymous force, a faceless god of chaos, not one man, a shooter driven to hellish deeds. Instead, I felt desolate—a sense of total misery, an acute awareness of my own sins, and... Read more
There was a time when I considered becoming Eastern Orthodox. The richness of the theology, its emphasis on mystery, the centrality of theosis—and a passion for Westerners like Eckhart and Eriugena—made “conversion” appealing, though only ever in my heart. Factors stopped me—nationalism, ethnocentrism, quibbling—hardly the antidotes to the hyper-rationalism, Americanism, and pretension I found in American Catholicism. A talk with a priest here and a little research there quickly revealed a sad reality stirring in Orthodoxy, a self-obsession, the words... Read more
My last two posts (available here and here) have attempted defenses of the current pontiff. Predictably enough, they’ve elicited some negative responses, accusing me of uncritical papal apology. Nowhere have I stated that Pope Francis can do no wrong. Like any man he is wrong—a lot. My issue, however, has always been with cramming his every decision into a pre-formed narrative. It’s deeply saddening—so many Catholics have created the framework for a self-fulfilling prophecy. In truth, I tire of seeing... Read more
History is repetition; all that happens has happened and will happen. So says Qoheleth: All things are wearisome, too wearisome for words. The eye is not satisfied by seeing nor has the ear enough of hearing. What has been, that will be; what has been done, that will be done. Nothing is new under the sun! Even the thing of which we say, “See, this is new!” has already existed in the ages that preceded us. There is no remembrance... Read more
Pope Francis—pontifex maximus of cheap grace and haphazard forgiveness, the kind of bishop who would’ve asked the deacons to hand over the holy books during a Roman persecution, or really would do whatever the authorities demand—in short, he’s bowed to the world, remitting sins like some Galilean lunatic or something. Or so the story goes. Cheap grace commanded and dispensed through Amoris Laetitia and the Jubilee Year of Mercy are not, however, the hallmarks of the Franciscan pontificate. No. Justice... Read more
Now Peter and John were going up to the temple area for the three o’clock hour of prayer. And a man crippled from birth was carried and placed at the gate of the temple called “the Beautiful Gate” every day to beg for alms from the people who entered the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked for alms. But Peter looked intently at him, as did John, and said, “Look at... Read more
In good Christian fashion, I’ve often tried to take my cue from Nietzsche and philosophize with a hammer. Even if the idols do not shatter, a chink in a previously-solid veneer means a hard-won skirmish. Though, the very work of such destruction always leaves one vulnerable to idolatry in another form. Some traditionalists smash the dreams of “Modernists,” but fall into a web of pseudo-history. And many a “liberal” sees history so clearly as to turn ressourcement into license for... Read more
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