Over the weekend, Inside Catholic ran a little piece I once wrote called “Some Advice for Moderate Muslims“. Basically, I made the point that one of the things that makes the Catholic faith stronger is its capacity for self-criticism (summed up in the penitential rite). One reader took the umbrage at this in order to complain about John Paul II’s apologies screwing up the work of apologists: Why on Earth should Muslims follow our exampleMarch 20th, 2010 | 10:23amFirst of... Read more

to the Holy Father’s letter to the Irish Church about the abuse scandal. I empathize with him a lot–and think that he’s probably not going to get what he wants. As John Allen pointed out last week, the thing that continually baffles most people is, well, the sort of thing that baffled Rod Dreher once upon a time: namely, why doesn’t the Pope go around lopping off episcopal heads with “the stroke of a pen”. The irony, particularly in Dreher’s... Read more

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is that Catholics pray to saints. Read more

I’m afraid I’m not among those who agree that our health care system is working juuuuust great and needs no fixing at all. Case in point, this brave and desperate letter from a friend whose husband has been stricken with a debilitating neural disease: I hope this note finds you well and that spring has turned the corner in your world! Winter hasn’t retired here. We had 12 inches of snow on our back deck yesterday. It’s all the way... Read more

has been found! He bears the name of a great poet! Read more

are weighing in on the whole health care thingie. Me: I’m not stunned that a politician acted like a politician and sold his alleged principles down the river. I have a notoriously low view of politicians and their actual interest in doing the right thing and I do not look to them for salvation. So my sense of betrayal is low since I never expected much. Others, filled with a much stronger faith in the healing and redeeming power of... Read more

has nothing but pity from me. Scion of the deeply evil Fred Phelps, he is now, quite understandably, an atheist. But he’s quite an uncomfortable one and is still, quite obviously, a deeply wounded soul in search of Christ. And, by the way, when will the press finally do a tiny bit of research and discover the fact that Fred Phelps and his evil cult do not consider themselves to be Christian? Read more

…is the rational way out of the violence of that is solely caused by religion. Read more

A reader writes: Hi Dark Lord, Will you ask your readers to pray for the Catholic Church here in Denmark? A politician wants to “force” (?) priests to report sexual abuse of children, even if it is something they learn of in the confessional. People here have little to no knowledge or understanding of the Church or Her sacraments (it’s a Lutheran country) and regardless of how it plays out legislatively, it’s going to make for some grim press. Thank... Read more