Matthew Schmitz

Wikihow has published a useful guide listing three ways to stop a wedding. What they don’t tell you is that it ain’t even over when it’s over. Here are two more ways to fight a wedding after the ceremony ends. Method 4 of 3: Seek Annulment 1.Weddings can be voided . . . . Continue Reading »

Whereas you, the Federalist, brainchild of one Ben Domenech, of Virginia, were denounced in 2014, to this Holy Office, for holding as true a false doctrine taught by a majority, namely, that marriage is possessed of an immovable definition, that it consists of two persons, and of opposite sex; also, . . . . Continue Reading »

Many have been hoping that the Church under Pope Francis will allow divorced and remarried Catholics to receive communion. Some argue for a change in Church teaching; many more urge the need for a “pastoral” response that leaves doctrine intact. In an interview today, Cardinal Gerhard . . . . Continue Reading »

Created by Ben D. . . . . Continue Reading »

President Obama issued a statement today to mark the forty-first anniversary of Roe v. Wade. A mere paragraph long, it contains enough euphemism, evasion, and outright falsehood to serve simultaneously as a model of dissimulation and concision.1. “We” — The statement begins by . . . . Continue Reading »

Isaac Chotiner hasn’t spent much time talking to religious folks, and he hasn’t read David Bentley Hart’s The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss, but he does think the book’s picture of God differs vastly from that of most believers:I cannot speak for . . . . Continue Reading »

Why are dissenting Catholics so pleased with Pope Francis when there’s little likelihood he’ll change Catholic doctrine? Damon Linker (why do I recognize that name?) takes up the question, and his answer is a good one: To most Catholics it simply doesn’t matter what the Church . . . . Continue Reading »

“There’s a danger, however, in losing the sense of discrimination. In that sense for me to work at a press that had a Catholic element in its tradition but is not a Catholic press, such as FSG, was a good challenge. I still had to convince other people who didn’t give a hoot about . . . . Continue Reading »

How did we come to wish each other  not a happy, not a joyful, not a peaceful, but a merry Christmas?  The greeting dates back to at least 1565, in which year the author of the  Hereford Municipal Manuscript  wrote “And thus I comytt you to god, who send you a mery Christmas . . . . Continue Reading »

One of the popular indicators of the supposed war on Christmas is the use of the abbreviation  Xmas . The well motivated, if grating, “Don’t take Christ out of Christmas” alludes not so subtly to the abbreviation. The former Anglican bishop of Blackburn, Alan Chesters,  . . . . Continue Reading »