Woe to You…

Last updated on: April 12, 2011 at 2:09 pm By Morning's Minion

It’s really hard to find a more hypocritical position that the National Right to Life Committee on health care. Peruse their website for a few minutes. The only mention of the recent budget debate is the proposed defunding of Planned Parenthood. Nothing on plans to privatize Medicare by forcing people to pay far more for their coverage (in fact, costs would increase overall, even as the publicly-funded part shrinks). Nothing on the plan to cut a trillion dollars from Medicaid, the basic health safety... Read more

View of success

Last updated on: April 12, 2011 at 1:45 pm By M.Z.

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Allow me to start with a question: Do you correlate success with virtue? In other words, when you see a person with a nice home in the suburbs do think that is probably a person of good character? Similarly, when you see a rough looking person, do you presume the person has bad character? This is not a post about condemning stereotypes. I’m also not going to claim right or wrong answers here. Some of the underlying issues due have... Read more

Don’t End Up In Hell’s Kitchen: Don’t Follow The Ways of Mammon

Last updated on: April 12, 2011 at 6:49 am By Henry Karlson

The thoughts of the rich of this world are: to keep what they have gained, and to sweat in gaining more; and therefore seldom or never is true contrition is found among them. They despise it, being entirely set on transitory things. While they are set so ardently on the sweetness of temporal things, they forget contrition, the life of the soul, and so incur death. Natural History says that deer are hunted in this way. Two men go, and... Read more

My debut EP: “Freedom for Love”

Last updated on: April 11, 2011 at 12:59 pm By Sam Rocha

I’ve been working on this little project since last summer and I am happy to announce that it is finally complete. I originally conceived of this title during my ongoing writing here at VN. The freedom-from/freedom-for distinction is, of course, an old hat in Catholic circles, but I found it very descriptive of music—especially jazz. The five tracks build a narrative of love songs I wrote during my final year and a half at Franciscan and end with a free,... Read more

A Study Of “On The Character of Men And the Virtuous Life”: Part XIV

Last updated on: April 11, 2011 at 8:29 am By Henry Karlson

The text, once again, brings up the issue of freedom. We must not allow ourselves to be enslaved by “sensual pleasures,” but rather, we must use our intellect to discern what is good and, through self-control, follow that good.[1] When our soul is found in harmony with our intellect, then the soul is capable of overcoming the impulses of the flesh.[2] We must be satisfied with what we are given, to find peace where we are at, otherwise we will... Read more

Catholic Moral Theology

Last updated on: April 10, 2011 at 8:42 pm By Tim Muldoon

This is a shout-out to a smart bunch of young Catholic moral theologians who have recently started catholicmoraltheology.com. I know several in this group and know that they are rooted in faith and sincerely devoted to the big questions facing both the Church and the society. All are credentialed and represent the next wave of moral theologians in the U.S. So after you read Vox Nova check out their blog. For starters, consider Thomas Bushlack’s comments on the US Bishop’s... Read more

Did This Just Happen?

Last updated on: May 3, 2017 at 7:02 pm By Brett Salkeld

When I went to bed last night, I heard that the Democrats and Republicans had reached a deal. I searched, without success, to find out if Planned Parenthood had, in fact, been defunded. This morning I read that “Planned Parenthood defunding was traded for a higher number of cuts.” I did not read this over at the National Catholic Reporter or Commonweal or America, those places in the blogosphere that, along with Vox Nova, might have predicted this move. No. ... Read more

Open for Business?

Last updated on: April 8, 2011 at 11:21 pm By Sam Rocha

CNN reports that Obama has declared that “The government will be open for business.” I can guess at what Obama means by saying that. I also think that the idea of the government being open for business is very descriptive of what politics is most often about: business, the blessed (capitalist) economy; the system that requires consumers more than persons, the homoeconomicus. (more…) Read more

Qualification for Knowing Best Interests

Last updated on: April 8, 2011 at 1:45 pm By M.Z.

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While this post isn’t free from issues, I figured I would excerpt briefly from it. With online communities, there can be a bit of a Stockholm syndrome. From The Back Pew, on the exhortation from the Archbishop of Santa Fe: (more…) Read more