Now, a full year into his pontificate, Pope Francis continues to be a kind of papal Rorschach blot onto which Catholics of all points of view, as well as politicians and pundits, project their aspirations and fears for the Catholic Church and its place in the 21st-century scheme of things. http://www.eppc.org/publications/pope-franciss-first-year/ Read more

Samuel Gregg It’s important to talk about liberty, but not in isolation. Our language should reflect the truth that reason, justice, equality, and virtue make freedom possible. http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2014/03/12401/?utm_source=The+Witherspoon+Institute&utm_campaign=9a17093b9a-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_15ce6af37b-9a17093b9a-84107317 Read more

History shows that the public has gotten more tolerant of political deception, but it does not tell us what was happening in the culture that would lead to such tolerance. We must ask ourselves: what was going on in the lives of ordinary Americans that would foster this decline in seriousness about truth-telling? http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2014/03/12414/?utm_source=The+Witherspoon+Institute&utm_campaign=0ab13581bc-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_15ce6af37b-0ab13581bc-84107317 Read more

Had enough of the never-ending “war on women” — which, in reality, never began? Same here. So let’s talk instead about a different kind of siege that does happen to exist, and that hasn’t gotten nearly the attention it deserves: the ongoing, systematic assault on society’s winners by today’s progressivism. These “winners” aren’t the fabled economic “1 percent.” I mean instead the unknown number of men and women among us who ought to be recognized as the alpha humans, and... Read more

Birth control is a touchy subject that Evangelicals find extremely difficult to discuss. But as the President’s health care mandate officially launches and its oppressive contraception enforcements are questioned, some Evangelicals are reconsidering their embrace of oral contraception, or what is commonly referred to as the Pill. http://juicyecumenism.com/2014/01/09/a-womans-response-to-the-evangelical-unease-over-contraception/ Read more

Whereas Erdogan may frequently indulge in Islamist political rhetoric, it is Gulen that has tried to make actual contributions as an Islamic intellectual and develop a genuinely modern school of Islam that reconciles the religion with liberal democracy, scientific rationalism, ecumenism, and free enterprise. Regardless of who wins the battle for Turkey’s political future, it is vital that Gulen’s religious legacy be preserved. http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/140941/victor-gaetan/the-muslim-martin-luther Read more

Nine years, almost to the day, after Roman legionaries destroyed God’s house in Jerusalem, God destroyed the luxurious watering holes of the Roman elite. Was this God’s revenge? http://members.bib-arch.org/publication.asp?Volume=36&ArticleID=6&Issue=4 Read more

What is the deeper message behind the keruvim—are they simply decorative sculptures, purely for aesthetic purposes, or is there more to it than meets the eye? http://mosaicmagazine.com/picks/2014/02/childs-play/?utm_source=Mosaic+Daily+Email&utm_campaign=b29acebf8b-2014_2_21&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_0b0517b2ab-b29acebf8b-41159925 Read more

It was the scientific skeptics who bucked the ‘consensus’ and said the Earth was round. http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303945704579391611041331266# Read more

Beneath the surface of this rising tide of ‘freedom and equality’ lies something very close to the brave new world of Aldous Huxley’s dystopian imagination. http://thefederalist.com/2014/02/19/the-brave-new-world-of-same-sex-marriage/#.UwT7Y_fKsJ4.email Read more