February: a President and a Pope
The reigns of Ronald Reagan and Pope Benedict XVI resemble one another because both presided over periods of “Restoration” and were followed by a further fall.
A Storm Is Coming When Benedict Dies
Benedict is like the oldest living member of the family, a relic from another era who represents a lost generation in a time where all the sons of the family view the past as the greatest enemy.
Joseph Ratzinger and the New Liturgical Movement
The struggle to define and to understand active participation is a fruit of two different conceptions of the liturgy. Joseph Ratzinger constantly affirmed the view that the liturgy is the the work of God and not a product of man.
How to Red-Pill a Bishop
“If you think that your priests and bishops are not saints, then be one for them.” — Robert Cardinal Sarah I know that many of our readers were irate over USCCB president Archbishop José Gomez’s statement on the 2020 election. Many of you were angry that he referred to Joe Biden as the second Catholic … Read more
Donald Trump and the Politics of Charity
“We are a working-class party now. That’s the future.” — Senator Josh Hawley I’ve held off on writing a post-election column, hoping against hope that the votes would be counted quickly and fairly. I suppose that was naïve. At this rate—and regardless of who “wins” in the end—half of the American people will feel cheated … Read more
The Promise of a Post-Covid Church
In 1969, long before he became Pope Benedict XVI, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger made a prediction about the post–Vatican II Catholic Church. Instead of a growing and dynamic Church reaching all cultures, he envisioned a smaller and less influential Church: “She will become small and will have to start afresh more or less from the beginning. … Read more
More Than Ever, We Need Benedict XVI
The world—and to an extent the Church, at least since the 1960s—has been preoccupied with the person and his or her comfort. Pope Benedict XVI, for a short time, represented a break from this way of thinking. He gently demanded the individual reorient himself to God. Instead of taking the easy way of the world … Read more
Why Holy Week Is Holy
When a lady complained to the great short story writer that her works “left a bad taste” in her mouth, Flannery O’Connor replied that what she wrote was not meant to be eaten. For the conventional palate, those often-macabre stories can be distasteful, but Miss O’Connor deliberately wanted to avoid the sentimentalism of much pious … Read more
Celibacy Is a Gift to Priests—and the Laity
Few books have caused so much controversy even before they were published than did From the Depths of Our Hearts, a new defense of clerical celibacy in the Roman Church by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI and Robert Cardinal Sarah. On January 14, Benedict’s private secretary, Archbishop Georg Gänswein, told the Italian news agency ANSA that, … Read more
Francis vs. the Deep Church
Does the Vatican have a General Directorate for Personnel? This is, perhaps, the most boring question ever posed by a writer in Crisis Magazine. And yet, as we fumble for an answer, we also come a little closer to understanding one of the most confounding papacies in 2,000 years of Christian history. Last Friday, the … Read more
Out of the Ruins: Walker Percy Explains
Editor’s note: in this fascinating interview with Crisis Magazine, the acclaimed novelist Walker Percy discusses the vocations crisis, abortion, Vatican II, popes, and (of course) literature. The interview originally appeared in the July 1989 print edition of Crisis. It has been edited for brevity. CRISIS: There is tremendous intellectual opposition in the Church to Pope … Read more
SSPX: Back to the Bad Old Days?
“Tomorrow I’m leaving for Mexico,” Bishop Bernard Fellay tells me, “and then on to Cuba.” I balk. “What’s in Cuba?” The question seems to confuse him. “The faithful,” he explains. “They need Confirmation, too.” What’s the SSPX presence in Cuba like? “Small,” he tells me, “and mostly underground. They’re still badly persecuted by the communists.” … Read more
Benedict’s Essay Is an Implicit Rebuke of Amoris Laetitia
The turbulence surrounding the sex abuse debacle in the Catholic Church was recently addressed in Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI’s April essay “The Church and the Scandal of Sex Abuse.” Pope Emeritus Benedict’s thoughtful meditation has been justly praised for unveiling one of the root causes of this protracted calamity. Critics of the letter, primarily close … Read more
Grandfather Knows Best: Pope Benedict on Clergy Sexual Abuse
The White House announced on March 28 that the month of April is designated as National Child Abuse Prevention Month. On its official website, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops explains: “Every April, child and youth serving organizations, including Catholic dioceses, parishes, and schools, participate in National Child Abuse Prevention Month to highlight the … Read more
Benedict XVI: God’s Revolutionary
“Revolution” – it’s a word that conjures up images of winter palaces being stormed and the leveling of Bastilles. But if a true revolutionary is someone who regularly turns conventional thinking upside-down, then one of the world’s most prominent status-quo challengers may well be a quietly-spoken Catholic theologian who turns 85 today. While regularly derided … Read more
Cardinal Dolan and the New Evangelization
The irrepressibly effervescent personality of Cardinal Timothy Dolan may tempt some to think of the archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops as the latest in a line of glad-handing Irish-American prelates, long on blarney and short on depth. Succumbing to that temptation would be a very serious mistake. … Read more
Papal Opposition to Death Penalty Continues with Benedict XVI
As part of Crisis’ symposium on capital punishment, we reprint the following news reports. Other contributions this issue include this column by Abp. Charles Chaput, and this essay by Christopher Ferrara of The Latin Mass Magazine. ROME, OCT. 4, 2010 (Zenit.org). – The director of the Vatican press office says he is against recourse to … Read more
Dissenting Catholics’ Modernity Problem
Judging from the hundreds of thousands of Germans who attended and watched Pope Benedict XVI’s September trip to his homeland (not to mention the tsunami of commentaries sparked by his Bundestag address), the pope’s visit was — once again — a success. And, once again, it was also an occasion for self-identified dissenting Catholics to … Read more
An Out-of-Touch Pope?
Disappointment has been a common reaction from “progressive” sources inside and outside Germany in response to Pope Benedict’s September visit to his homeland. These disappointed progressives say they hoped Benedict would speak a good word for changes that they want in the Church, and he didn’t. Here, then, was an opportunity lost. “A number of … Read more
9/11, Benedict XVI and Regensburg
In the flood of commentary surrounding the 10th anniversary of 9/11, I found but one reference to a related anniversary of considerable importance: the fifth anniversary of Pope Benedict XVI’s Regensburg Lecture. That lecture, given the day after the fifth anniversary of 9/11 at the pope’s old university in Germany, identified the two key challenges … Read more