Church | Crisis Magazine | Page 2

April 16, 2013

Veritatis Splendor: The Encyclical that Mattered

by Samuel Gregg

There are papal encyclicals, and then there are papal encyclicals. Some escape public attention almost from the moment they’re promulgated. Others continue reverberating inside the Church decades after they appear. But there’s also a third type of encyclical: those which…

April 15, 2013

Scandal at St. John’s University: Corruption, Apostasy, and Death

by Anne Hendershott

Barraged by headlines like the New York Post’s “St. John’s Dean of Mean, Cecilia Chang, Commits Suicide,” most New Yorkers remain bewildered by the facts surrounding a sordid story of money, power and status seeking at St. John’s University. Last…

April 11, 2013

Our First Right: Religious Liberty

by Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.

Editor’s note: The following remarks by Archbishop Charles Chaput were submitted to the United States Commission on Civil Rights and published March 25, 2013 on Public Discourse. My remarks today are purely my own. But they’re shaped by twenty-five years…

April 9, 2013

Despite Appearances, “Reform” Has Not Come

by Regis Martin

How blessedly instructive it has been, following the installation of the first pope from the Americas, Pope Francis, to witness the world’s sheer unaffected delight in this man. His warmth and simplicity have endeared him everywhere. Indeed, he has disarmed…

April 5, 2013

How Environmentalism Harms the Poor

by Rev. James V. Schall, S.J.

The book of Genesis was written in part to counteract a theory later known as Manicheanism. It held that a god of good created spirit and a god of evil created matter. In this view, the more spiritual we are,…

April 4, 2013

The “New” Tone of U.S. Bishops Sounds Very Familiar

by George Neumayr

In a frank interview with the Wall Street Journal last year, Cardinal Timothy Dolan conceded that the post-Vatican II Church in America has “gotten gun-shy” on hot-button moral issues. The Church’s encyclical on artificial birth control, Humanae Vitae, “brought such…

April 3, 2013

The Reform We Need

by Randall B. Smith

Amidst of all the joys of a new pope and my continuing wonder at the smooth transition effected by cardinals who pray deeply and follow a centuries-old tradition, there was one deep sorrow about the papal transition: being forced to…

April 1, 2013

What Have Those Pesky Christians Ever Done for Us?

The Monty Python film, Life of Brian, has a scene in it where Reg, the leader of a group of Jewish rebels, asks what the Romans have ever done for the Jewish people. The assembled group chip in with ideas…

March 26, 2013

Reading the Papal Tea Leaves

by George Neumayr

Hans Kung, the dissenting European theologian, said he was “overwhelmed by joy,” in a radio interview after the elevation of Pope Francis. “There is hope in this man,” gushed Kung, who predicted that Pope Francis will conform to the progressive…

March 22, 2013

Was the Pope Inspired by Chesterton’s St. Francis?

by Dr. William Oddie

I came upon the following passage in the course of a web search yesterday: “On 28 May 1995 the lead article in the Sunday Telegraph’s Review section was headlined ‘A Saint among journalists?’ The article was prompted by a letter…

March 20, 2013

The Black-and-White Pope

by Donald S. Prudlo

A few days ago we all had a shocking surprise as a Latin American, Jesuit archbishop emerged onto the loggia of St. Peter’s to the general joy of the Catholic world. The rejoicing was widespread, but not universal, with some…

March 19, 2013

The Dorothy Day Few of Us Know

by Stephen Beale

She lamented the encroachment of the state and the perils of the welfare system. She once compared abortion to genocide and the U.S. government to Nazi Germany. She cheered on income tax resisters, dismissed the benefits of the minimum wage,…

March 18, 2013

Press Ignorance Points to Deeper Problems

by Anthony Esolen

In The Idea of a University, Cardinal Newman writes, “Men whose minds are possessed with some one object, take exaggerated views of its importance, are feverish in the pursuit of it, make it the measure of things which are utterly…

March 15, 2013

Pope Francis—The Journey Begins

by Sean Fitzpatrick

As the newly elected pope, Jorge Mario Bergoglio’s papacy has already been historical. His is a part of the world no other pontiff has hailed from. His is an order no other pontiff has claimed. His is a name no…

March 14, 2013

Pope Francis Knows What Must Be Done

by Scott P. Richert

Annuntio vobis gaudium magnum; habemus Papam: Eminentissimum ac Reverendissimum Dominum, Dominum Georgium Marium Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae Cardinalem Bergoglio qui sibi nomen imposuit Franciscum. The stunned silence in the second or two after the announcement from the central balcony of Saint…

March 13, 2013

Sede Vacante 2013: Between Tradition and Novelty

by Rev. Dr. Athanasius McVay

The vacancy of the Sancta Sedes Apostolica, the Holy Apostolic See of Rome, is known as the sede vacante, the Latin ablative absolute of sedes vacans, meaning “when the see is vacant.” The Roman See (diocese) is called Apostolic because,…

March 12, 2013

The Transfiguration of the Church

by Rev. George W. Rutler

Years ago, an Oxford don, not rare as an eccentric but singular in his way of being one, kept in his rooms a small menagerie including a mongoose to whom he fed mice for tea, and an eagle that flew…

March 11, 2013

Press Coverage on the Eve of the Conclave

by Donald S. Prudlo

So the date is set. Tuesday, the 12th of March, the Cardinals will process into the conclave intoning Veni Sancte Spiritus, while the rest of us—personally or digitally—will get the “extra omnes.” Out we go, leaving it up to the…

March 7, 2013

The Modern Sexual “Martyr”

According to Christianity, we are made for communion. Created in the image of a God who is Divine Communion, we are made to give ourselves to and for others. Without Eve, for instance, Adam could not enter into the communio…

March 6, 2013

The Orwellian World of Catholic Higher Education

by Anne Hendershott

In 1990, Pope John Paul II released Ex Corde Ecclesiae, the papal document defining the centrality of Catholic higher education. Its title translated as “from the heart of the Church,” the document called for Catholic colleges to be faithful to…

March 5, 2013

Catholicism, True Reform and the Next Pope

by Samuel Gregg

Given the contempt with which some people regard Catholicism these days, it’s extraordinary just how badly the very same individuals want everyone else to hear their views of the Church’s future. Plainly there’s something about this 2000 year-old faith that…

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