I mentioned the annual Erasmus Lecture. This year’s lecture on Monday, October 17, was given by Dr. Timothy George, Dean of Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Alabama. His topic was the men who shaped modern evangelicalism, and it is an understatement to say his lecture was well received . . . . Continue Reading »
I called it quits at midnight but have considerable sympathy for the Astros fans who stayed into the early hours of the morning to see the White Sox win in the longest game of world series history. In response to protests received, my favoring the Sox has to do with a soft spot for Chicago, and a . . . . Continue Reading »
I will be in Minneapolis this Friday, October 28, to give the annual Paul Holmer Lecture at the University of Minnesota. That’s at 7 pm at the MacLaurin Institute of the university. Friday at noon I’ll be saying Mass in the St. Thomas More Chapel at the University of St. Thomas Law . . . . Continue Reading »
The famously cool George Will goes unhinged in his Sunday tirade against the nomination of Harriet Miers. Among his wild and sweated swings against all who disagree with him, there is this: “Miers’s advocates tried the incense defense: Miers is pious. But that is irrelevant to her . . . . Continue Reading »
Recriminations abound. At Immaculate Conception down on First Avenue and 14th Street, where I say Mass regularly, I was this morning required to adjudicate a near-violent dispute between a young black man and an elderly Irish regular at daily Mass. Did or did not George Steinbrenner betray the . . . . Continue Reading »
“True enough, but he made the trains run on time.” We are all familiar with that defense of the dictatorial buffoonery of Benito Mussolini, who hardly belongs to the A Team of twentieth-century monsters such as Hitler and Stalin. As many scholars have since noted, he, in fact, did not . . . . Continue Reading »
“The Lion of Muenster,” Clemens August von Galen, was beatified at St. Peter’s on Sunday. Departing from the practice of John Paul the Great, Pope Benedict did not preside at the beatification ceremony but showed up at the end to hail the “heroic courage” of Cardinal . . . . Continue Reading »
“I’ve been looking for something not to like,” a reader writes, “and now I’ve found it. You’re a Yankee fan.” I’m surprised he had to look so hard. But it’s true, the season is over. I’ll admit, however, that there’s a twinge of . . . . Continue Reading »
In the current issue of the Weekly Standard , Joseph Epstein has a scintillating analysis of the celebrity cult to which much of our society is in thrall. The article put me in mind of a lecture many years ago by Paul Tillich, a towering figure of the time, at the University of Chicago. In an . . . . Continue Reading »
The battle of the polls goes on and on: Pro-life up, pro-life down, pro-choice down, pro-choice up. Some of us have been following the survey research on attitudes toward abortion for decades. The striking thing is how steady the data are. A small minority thinks abortion should be legal for any . . . . Continue Reading »