“Relativism” is one of those words that gets thrown around in our culture a lot, but we don’t always clarify what we mean by it. In particular, it gets used by conservatives as a slur–often to discredit a view that seems too fuzzy: “That seems dangerously relativistic to me.” On the other hand, I’ve talked to at least two people in my life who did claim to be thorough-going relativists (one was a philosophy Ph.D. student at Duke, the other... Read more

Yet again, I’m provoked to blog by the discussion over at Pontifications, where some of the issues that most concern me are being hashed out in some very thoughtful ways. There’s been some discussion recently about Eucharistic theology and practice among Protestants, and I have been defending the view that Christ is truly present (whatever the true meaning of that presence may be) wherever the Lord’s Supper is celebrated, whether or not the proper minister (i.e., an episcopally ordained priest)... Read more

I apologize yet again for being so slow to blog. I’m currently teaching three sections of Western Civ at a local state university, besides trying to finish my dissertation (at last!). Also, I’ve been working on two essays which will eventually find their way to this blog: a discussion of women’s ordination in the format of a Thomistic “quaestio,” in response to challenges from several people on the Crowhill discussion board and the comment section of Pontifications; and a long-delayed... Read more

I apologize yet again for being so slow to blog. I’m currently teaching three sections of Western Civ at a local state university, besides trying to finish my dissertation (at last!). Also, I’ve been working on two essays which will eventually find their way to this blog: a discussion of women’s ordination in the format of a Thomistic “quaestio,” in response to challenges from several people on the Crowhill discussion board and the comment section of Pontifications; and a long-delayed... Read more

In following the stimulating discussions over at Pontifications, I’ve become increasingly convinced that there are two rather different reasons why people convert to Catholicism–unity and authority. By this I don’t mean that the same person can’t be concerned with both–probably most converts are. Indeed, it would be hard to follow the one impulse into Catholicism without also finding oneself in the wake of the other. But I think on the whole one or the other is likely to be more... Read more

Those unfortunate persons who have taken the trouble to follow my posts on various Internet message boards over the past few years have noticed (and sometimes gently remarked on) my frequent flip-flops with regard to Catholicism. This instability of mind cannot be more painful to others than it is to myself, but it seems to be incurable. When the fit is on, it seems clear to me that it is my duty to become Catholic and everything else is a... Read more

S. M. Hutchens (of Touchstone magazine) recently reviewed Joseph Pearce’s _C. S. Lewis and the Catholic Church_ for _Books and Culture_. In fact, Hutchens devotes little time to Pearce’s book itself. His essay is primarily an explanation of why Lewis remained Protestant, drawing largely on Lewis’s 1933 _The Pilgrim’s Regress_. An attempt to explain Lewis’s theology on the basis of his earliest Christian writing is rather dubious from the start. But more to the point, Hutchens’s lengthy central quotation from... Read more

This is the day when Episcopalians and Methodists celebrate a 20th-century Roman Catholic feast by singing a hymn (All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name) written by a particularly obnoxious Baptist (Edward Perronet–ex-Methodist and all-out dissenter who launched vicious attacks on John Wesley). In other words, a truly ecumenical occasion. The feast of Christ the King, celebrated on the last Sunday of the liturgical year, was first proclaimed by Pope Pius XI in 1925. In the shadow of growing totalitarianism,... Read more

There’s a discussion going on over at Pontifications regarding the relative merits of Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The good Fr. Kimel, host of Pontifications, has finally (after many clear hints) delivered himself definitively of the view that lay Episcopalians should get out without further ado (“Fly, you fools!”). To help us make up our minds where to go, he’s invited two ex-Episcopalians, one currently an Orthodox priest and the other a Catholic priest, to explain their respective choices. The Orthodox priest.... Read more

since I last posted. I’ve been very busy with a number of projects: an article for _Christian History_ on Wibrandis Rosenblatt (wife of no fewer than three Protestant Reformers, though not at the same time); a paper for Sixteenth Century Studies Conference on Martin Bucer’s concept of heresy; the fourth chapter of my dissertation; a talk on Anglican hymns which I gave at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Philadelphia; and my two Western Civ classes at William Paterson University. I’ve... Read more