Comments on: Greatest American Catholic Intellectuals

By: American Catholic intellectuals are pathetic! « Throne and Altar

American Catholic intellectuals are pathetic! « Throne and Altar — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 00:44:18 +0000

[...] this the best we’ve got? The Catholic Hall of Fame’s Greatest American Catholic intellectuals, [...]

By: Athenian Stranger

Athenian Stranger — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 20:41:25 +0000

Fr Romanus Cessario, OP for being the lynchpin of what is loosely known as Ressourcement Thomism and introducing Fribourg Thomism to North American Catholics. As well, he was a student of the late Fr Servais Pinckaers, OP and helped to introduce his thought — in English translation — to a North American audience.

By: sallyr

sallyr — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 01:33:54 +0000

Russell Hittinger is one of the most original and prolific Catholic intellectuals in the United States. Certainly at least the equal of several on the list.

By: DP

DP — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 00:40:37 +0000

For what it’s worth, Thomas Merton was born in France

By: Jo Ann Donegan

Jo Ann Donegan — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 23:36:02 +0000

Thomas Merton

By: Maria Horvath

Maria Horvath — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 12:24:15 +0000

I nominate Alice von Hildebrand, for the work she has done in her own right as a philosopher (take a look at her wonderful book “The Privilege of Being a Woman,” the perfect gift for a young woman just entering adulthood), and for the work she is doing to remind us of the genius of her late husband, the philosopher Dietrich von Hildebrand.

By: Greatest American Catholic Intellectuals

Greatest American Catholic Intellectuals — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 04:30:56 +0000

[...] I’d hesitate to subtract any names from the list, but would be tempted to add at least two: the prolific and profound Peter Augustine Lawler and the always interesting Michael Novak. [more] [...]

By: Pat

Pat — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 00:11:36 +0000

In Australian academic circles the term “catholic intellectual” would be considered an oxymoron – in the same category as “military intelligence”. I can’t imagine how much lower “American Catholic Intellectuals” would be assessed.
I agree with Liam’s flowery assessment of the bias in the list.
It reads more like a list of Greatest American Catholic Dogmatists – with maybe one or two exceptions like John Courtney Murray and Richard John Neuhaus (despite the Canadian connection!)

By: Craig Payne

Craig Payne — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 19:28:16 +0000

Not to raise this thorny issue again, but I do think, despite his at-times-grievous flaws, Joseph Sobran will be remembered eventually for his brilliance, not his crankiness. He is about as close as we have gotten to an American Chesterton.

By: David DePerro

David DePerro — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 16:14:09 +0000

Wendell Berry is the greatest exponent of Catholic subsidiarity and Chestertonian Distributism of the last half century. He has written it, fought for it, and he has lived it (once he left NYC for home in Kentucky!). Of course, the fact that he is a Baptist is not a mark against him, but against us as Catholics who have not successfully identified or resisted the Capitalist or Socialist/Communist temptations in economics and public life. Where is the Catholic Wendell Berry?