In his op-ed piece last Sunday in USA Today , Edward O. Wilson makes a sweeping pronouncement: “The two world views—science-based explanations and faith-based religion—cannot be reconciled.” I agree: one cannot reconcile them, because they do not need to be reconciled. They . . . . Continue Reading »
The current issue of the Weekly Standard carries an essay about the curious role Catholicism is playing in American public discourse these days. I thought I was relatively downbeat about the overall condition of Catholicism¯the nomination of Samuel Alito to be the fifth Catholic on the Supreme . . . . Continue Reading »
The village atheist usually challenges believers in Providence to answer a couple of devastating questions. One of them is: "Well, if two opposing armies pray to the same God, how can Providence be faithful to both if it answers one, but not the other?" It was to such a village atheist . . . . Continue Reading »
Well, at least Edward O. Wilson is trying. In an op-ed Sunday morning in USA Today , Harvard’s famed entomologist called for a ceasefire in the evolution wars: "American civilization was born of both religion and the science-based Enlightenment. Science will go on expanding its way, and . . . . Continue Reading »
The other day I wrote about “Church-haunted” Quebec being a little like Flannery O’Connor’s “Christ-haunted” South. The occasion was a report that unconsecrated communion hosts had become a favorite munchie for couch potatoes. Now it turns out that the report, . . . . Continue Reading »
Ross Douthat of the Atlantic has been filling in as a guest editor on Andrew Sullivan’s blog. Here are wise words on confronting the lacrimae rerum that attend our journey through this shadowed vale: In a year of war, tsunami and hurricane, what just happened in the West Virginia mine might . . . . Continue Reading »
The "Christmas wars" of the last several months—When does the season, whatever it is called, begin?—occasioned commentaries beyond numbering. Some wise things were said, but among the dumbest of the dumb things said, and said repeatedly, was that the whole thing was made up by . . . . Continue Reading »
Milton Himmelfarb passed away this week in his eighty-eighth year. A contributor to F IRST T HINGS and many other magazines, particularly Commentary , he was a longtime veteran of the American Jewish Committee. An editor of Jewish yearbooks, author of The Jews of Modernity (1973), a Reagan . . . . Continue Reading »
This weekend, the Wall Street Journal ran an interesting story about Joshua Hochschild, an assistant professor of medieval philosophy, who was recently fired from the evangelical Wheaton College for his conversion to Catholicism. It’s well known among journalists that one of the most strictly . . . . Continue Reading »
( The following was delivered upon the occasion of Prof. George’s acceptance of the Philip Merrill Award bestowed by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. ) So tonight we celebrate ACTA and the great cause of higher education reform for which it fights. Buy why does it fight? Why do we . . . . Continue Reading »
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