On February 1, I joined perhaps a thousand other mourners in St. Aloysius Church in Washington for the funeral of the Reverend Robert F. Drinan, S.J. Among those eulogizing Fr. Drinan, who represented Massachusetts in Congress from 1971 to 1981, was Sen. Edward Kennedy. He was one of several . . . . Continue Reading »
Herewith a couple of items from a forthcoming installment of "The Public Square" in First Things , plus Mark Sargent’s important article on the distortion of the quest for justice. Odium theologicum ¯the ill-feeling and nasty polemics to which theological controversy can give . . . . Continue Reading »
Last Friday, the Philadelphia Inquirer published the Tony Auth cartoon below.Apparently referring to the fact that the five Supreme Court justices who voted last week in Gonzales v. Carhart to uphold the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 are all Catholics, Mr. Auth’s point seems to be . . . . Continue Reading »
I don’t think many would dispute that Philip Rieff was one of the most perceptive and creative intellectuals of the second half of the twentieth century. His justly famous 1959 Freud: The Mind of the Moralist has never gone out of print, and rightly so, because it remains the definitive . . . . Continue Reading »
Sooner or later, every teacher hears the same old joke about the philosophy student and his dad. The dad asks, “Son, what are you going to do with that goofy degree?” And the son says, “I’m going to open a philosophy shop and make big money selling ideas.” I smile every time I hear it, . . . . Continue Reading »
On April 15, 1947, Jackie Robinson became the first black man to play major-league baseball, as the Dodgers beat the Boston Braves 5-3 over in Brooklyn. The sixtieth anniversary of that event was a little over a week ago, when fitting commemorations were held in ballparks across the continent.We . . . . Continue Reading »
I’m not convinced that this week’s Supreme Court decision on partial-birth abortion is as good as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg says it is , but I certainly hope she is right. She says it is alarming; it reflects manifest hostility to the unlimited abortion license imposed by Roe ; it . . . . Continue Reading »
We will, I imagine, be talking about the Supreme Court’s decision in Gonzales v. Carhart for a long time: sorting out the implications, reading the tea leaves, following the press coverage. Earlier today Michael Uhlmann did a nice job , here on the First Things website, of placing the . . . . Continue Reading »
Concerning yesterday’s decision in Gonzales v. Carhart , a few preliminary observations based on a very quick reading:The Supreme Court’s abortion jurisprudence remains a singular embarrassment. That fact is well known by, and infuriating to, Roe ‘s sophisticated supporters and . . . . Continue Reading »
Another month, another issue of First Things . Just a typical production of the magazine¯this and that, jammed together randomly in the vain hope that some lucky synergy will make it all work. I’m fairly sure none of it is worth your time.Well, except maybe for R.R. Reno’s essay, . . . . Continue Reading »
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