I have an awkward confession to make. When I hear American Catholics cheerlead the New Evangelization, I’m sorry to say, I become very skeptical very quickly. As they unpack their bold vision for evangelical reform, I start feeling a lot like Mugatu, who, in an exasperated breakdown at the end of the 2001 film Zoolander, famously exclaimed, “I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!” Continue Reading »
Since Jack Kevorkian first made headlines in 1990, the media have touted assisted suicide by the dying and severely disabled in positive, sometimes even glowing, terms. Continue Reading »
J Paul Grayson, a sociology professor at York University in Toronto, received a request from a male student asking to be excused from participating in a group assignment, in which the student would have been obliged to converse with female students. Grayson said no to the student but decided to use . . . . Continue Reading »
Speaking at a party retreat, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor told his colleagues that the party had spent too much time talking about the concerns of business owners and entrepreneurs and not enough about the concerns of that majority who were not (and in many cases did not want to be) business . . . . Continue Reading »
Papal approbation being no bad thing, I was delighted to learn that Pope Francis, in a homily a few weeks ago, had suggested that his congregants learn the date of their baptisms and celebrate it—which is precisely what I have been proposing to audiences around the country this past year, when . . . . Continue Reading »
Is God more like a rock or the idea of a rock? If you had to choose one or the other, which would it be? On its face, the answer seems obvious. Rocks represent matter at its most obdurate state, while ideas transcend matter altogether. Ideas are the proper activity of the intellect. They live in . . . . Continue Reading »
On my coffee table, I have a book of classic rock posters—from The Who, to Led Zeppelin, to Nirvana, Metallica, and the Grateful Dead. The book was given to me by a brother bishop who knows that, in my earlier years, I listened to many of those bands.I’m a Catholic bishop, entrusted with . . . . Continue Reading »
The recent death of Phil Everly reminds us of the artistic legacy the Everly Brothers left behind. Don and Phil were born in 1937 and 1939 respectively, to a musical family with working-class roots. Their father, Ike, was a coalminer in Kentucky who dreamed of providing for his family through . . . . Continue Reading »
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