First Thoughts

Congratulating Wesleyan

Far from being criticized, Wesleyan University should be congratulated for revealing the ethical assumptions and the practical destination of the politics of sexual identity.
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Canadian Doctors’ Religious Freedom Under Threat

Wesley J. Smith’s article “The Coming of Medical Martyrdom” highlights a troubling trend in Canada that would see physician’s religious rights sacrificed. But it’s not just in Saskatchewan this is happening.
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In Bondage to Pornography

Scientific research has disturbing implications for building ethics on the principle of consent.
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First Links—2.20.15

Richard John Neuhaus: A Life in the Public Square
Russell E. Saltzman, Aleteia

Forty for 40: A Literary Reader for Lent
Nick Ripatrazone, The Millions

11 Beautiful Churches of Eastern Europe
Editors, Church Pop

The Courts and the Impossibility of Autonomy

If individual autonomy is the jealous god it has proven itself to be, no rights of conscience or religious freedom will be permitted to stand in its way over the long term. But when does a person actually possess this autonomy to which he is said to have a right? Continue Reading »

First Links — 2.19.15

College, Poetry, and Purpose
Frank Bruni, The New York Times

Landfall
Gabriel Olearnik, Dappled Things

Jailhouse Feminism
Mary Eberstadt, National Review

The Jon Stewart Effect

One of the memorable media events of the 2000s took place when Jon Stewart appeared as a guest on Crossfire in October 2004 and scolded Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson for staging mock debates and phony polarities: “It’s hurting America,” he moaned, as the hosts fumbled for a response. Continue Reading »

First Links — 2.18.15

Digitizing the Humanities
Armand Marie Leroi, The New York Times

Lenten Homilies: A Single Author Anthology
Sandro Magister, Espresso Online

Soft Atheism
Matthew Engelke, Public Books

A Theology of Martyrdom

ISIS has beheaded twenty-one Egyptian Christians in Libya. What should the Church do? How do we respond? How should we think about their sacrifice? Why does God let this kind of thing happen? It’s days like this that we need a theology of martyrdom. Continue Reading »

Picturing Mary, Seeing Satan

Washington, D.C.’s National Museum of Women in the Arts has since December hosted an exhibit focused on the Virgin Mary. 
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