FTR I had no idea, when I let loose a couple pertinent rants over the past few days, that The Pillar would be breaking such a major story yesterday, right on topic. Quick comments rather than an essay: #1 Darwin Catholic (who also writes for The Pillar) states perfectly my own shock at the knee-jerk response, by some, to the investigative reporting that went into the story: “We Must Not Be A Church of Lies”. #2 For my own part, I’m appalled... Read more
One of my teens is determined to make a Taylor Swift fan out of me, and some time ago she introduced me to “Bad Blood”, lyrics here. I couldn’t deny the effectiveness of the artistry, but I was struggling to relate: The reality is that I just don’t have many bad relationships in my life, and even those few are merely tragic, not hateful. I’m surrounded by pretty good people. It’s nice. I was listening to the song with my... Read more
Just read The Pillar’s summary of the new Motu Proprio radically restricting the use of the “Extraordinary Form” aka “the Traditional Latin Mass”. Personal reaction: Lord have mercy. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve attended a TLM, and still have fingers left to use in the future (and I hope to do so). I sometimes attend a Latin-language Novus Ordo; I often attend, by choice, a very high-church, liturgically solemn classical choral Mass; the other top-choice Mass... Read more
Let me start by saying: My personal, non-medical, non-expert (but Old Married People do know a thing or two) opinion is that “conversion therapy” is a lousy idea. I think this because I think human sex drives are pretty deeply embedded in the brain. I think, therefore, that even when we don’t like some aspect of our sexual inclinations, and even when for very good reasons we determine we must not act on our internally-driven desires, it is healthier and more realistic... Read more
Just browsed a puff-piece at The Atlantic about the history of gender-neutral singular pronouns in English, and I was wondering what brought that on, then remembered ’tis the season. You would think that since I went to a Pride Festival* today, I would not have forgotten quite so quickly what month it was. But I had. Probably because the local festival just had people at it. Not overly memorable, since most of the places I go have people. So, anyway, having been... Read more
I want to speak briefly to the problem of the horrible people you go to church with (or don’t, because they are horrible). A lot of times when we talk about “mercy” what we really mean is “things aren’t that bad” or even “actually that’s just fine.” It’s super easy for a modern, affluent, suburban, pretty-cleaning-livin’ Catholic to get to the part where Jesus dines with prostitutes and be like, “Oh yeah. I’m broad-minded and loving and welcoming like Jesus... Read more
Just saw OSV’s book video for The How-to Book of Evangelization for the first time today (I know!). Not gonna lie, I watched it a couple times. Verdict: They aren’t wrong. It’s a really good book, y’all. You can thank Rebecca Willen, my editor at OSV, for that, because it was going to be okay-with-some-fatal-flaws until she shook me hard and made me fix all the things. Anyway, as a person who is extraordinarily biased, the video definitely made me smile. Read more
If you have been faithfully married for a long time, you are likely out of touch with just how different the world of sex and dating is now than when you were young and single. (By “long” here, I mean “decades” not “it feels like forever”. Not in any way minimizing the challenges and victories of the earlier years, but if you are still in the early years, you probably know more about the contemporary single-world than those who’ve been... Read more
Interesting thing I learned this morning, reading this article at STAT about the rise in congenital syphilis in the US: There’s a plan. Not sure who within the HHS developed the plan and I haven’t had time to read through it and develop an opinion. I did a quick concept-search and found this consoling passage on scientists doing science: CDC advises that the most reliable way to avoid STIs is to not have sex (i.e., anal, vaginal, or oral). Also, for... Read more
Late January I wrapped up the public side of one heckuva fantastic conference, took a deep breath . . . and completely fell off the edge of the world. Looking back, that freefall was a long time coming — and yet it took me by such surprise I didn’t even realize it was happening, at the time. Four months in, I haven’t got any good answers, other than my profound thanks for the many people who care about me and... Read more
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