Catholic Church

Where Do We Go From Here?

 “The laws of our land are catching up to the fundamental truth that millions of Americans hold in our hearts: when all Americans are treated as equal, no matter who they are or whom they love, we are all more free.”  —President Barack Obama, June 26, 2013  “I will tell you that I don’t believe … Read more

How the Church Would Rule the World

In his 1911 preface to Dawn of All, Robert Hughes Benson proposes: to sketch—again in parable—the kind of developments, about sixty years hence which, I think, may reasonably be expected should the opposite process begin, and ancient thought (which has stood the test of centuries, and is, in a very remarkable manner, being “rediscovered” by … Read more

For Greater Glory…For Christ the King

Imagine needing the grace of the confessional yet unable to find a priest.  Imagine being unable to find a priest to baptize your baby or to witness your marriage.  Imagine a country without confirmations or ordinations.    Imagine longing to receive Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, but having no Mass at which to assist.  Indeed, … Read more

We Hold These Truths

Whenever the topic of personal liberty is debated, it is unfortunate that the liberty to do evil is often what is at stake. On one side there are libertines, or those who are at best morally indifferent, arguing that morally offensive behavior ought to be legal and even socially acceptable; on the other side there … 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

Yes, Congresswoman Pelosi, We’re Serious

America anxiously awaits the Supreme Court’s decision on Obamacare. At the core of the decision is a simple question: Is the “individual mandate” in Obamacare constitutional? And thus, is Obamacare constitutional? Several times during the debate and deliberation, my mind harkened back to the words of former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Remarking on … Read more

John Senior: In Piam Memoriam

How the time does pass . . . it was on April 8, 1999—already thirteen years ago—that Professor John Senior returned to our Father’s House. Since then, we have been all the more orphaned and greater has been our yearning for Paradise. By what right should I, a Frenchman, be writing today about this eminent … Read more

The Man Who Saved the Original Papers of San Juan de la Cruz

It was March 1936. A series of anti-clerical riots swept through Toledo. Churches were burnt and priests and monks were attacked in the streets. During these disturbances, several Carmelite monks, disguised in lay clothes, sought shelter in the home of the British poet, Roy Campbell, who had moved to the city with his wife, Mary, … Read more

How to Develop a Prayer Life that Transforms

On Ash Wednesday a wise priest said, “For Heaven’s sake, don’t give up anything for Lent, if you’re just thinking of chocolate, coffee, alcohol, or facebook. Turn your heart to God! Free yourself of the aggravation, anger, jealousy, and hatred that separates you from him. But how, you may ask? Through prayer, daily prayer.” Lent … Read more

Responding to the New York Times

If you haven’t heard yet, the New York Times recently published a full-page “advertisement” by the “Freedom From Religion Foundation” (FFRF) viciously attacking the Catholic Church. Even some not typically inclined to rush to the Church’s defense have noted the particularly mean-spirited and bigoted nature of the propaganda piece. What has followed in the wake … Read more

Time to Quit the New York Times

I am thinking about quitting the New York Times. Ever since I took my present job six years ago I have been frequenting the website of what is generally regarded as the leading paper of record in the United States and, frankly, I find it sadly predictable. A Timesheadline on any topic that matters to … Read more

SPECIAL REPORT: Fr. Marcel Guarnizo Defends Himself Against Accusers

Many Crisis readers are concerned at the reports that have begun to emerge regarding Fr. Marcel Guarnizo’s denial of Communion to the alleged lesbian Barbara Johnson and the subsequent loss of his priestly faculties upon the authority of Cardinal Wuerl and communicated through a letter by Bishop Knestout, the Vicar General of the Archdiocese of … Read more

Addressing Ms. Fluke

I recently had a chance to take a careful look at the testimony of Sandra Fluke before the House Democrats. What I saw disturbed me greatly, and not simply because I am a Catholic who strenuously opposes Obama’s assault on religious liberty. There are a number of other assumptions at work in the thinking of … Read more

Rick Santorum and the Kingship of Christ, Part Three

At this moment in history, in the United States of America, invoking the “separation of church and state” may seem an attractive option for those confronting the spectacle of an over-reaching government.  Yet holding or defending it is not a defense of Catholic teaching, nor does it have an “honorable history within the Church” as … Read more

Do Catholics and Muslims Worship the Same God?

It certainly seems as if we worship the same God. After all, we call God by the same name. Arabic-speaking Christians, including Eastern Catholics such as Maronites and Melkites, use the word “Allah” for the God of the Bible. But are they the same God? The question is not answered by simple linguistic identity, as … Read more

Obama’s Catholic Church Gambit: Lessons from American Communists

A fascinating theory has been advanced by Dick Morris, which, in turn, is being considered by Rush Limbaugh and other leading conservatives.  Morris speculates that the Obama HHS mandate on contraception, sterilization, and abortifacients is a fight with the Catholic Church that Team Obama wants — and with the focus based narrowly on contraception, not … Read more

Obama vs. Catholics

  The Brian Williams MSNBC debate in Florida was not only dreadfully boring — I never thought I could ever long for commercials — it was pathetic. Freed of the fear of triggering an avalanche of applause against loaded questions, Williams and his co-moderators couldn’t bring themselves to utter one single question asking the Republican … Read more

Converts and the Symphony of Truth

Why do adults become Catholics? There are as many reasons for “converting” as there are converts. Evelyn Waugh became a Catholic with, by his own admission, “little emotion but clear conviction”: this was the truth; one ought to adhere to it.  Cardinal Avery Dulles wrote that his journey into the Catholic Church began when, as … Read more

A Prophetic Novel of the End Times

For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. (Eph., 6-12) And yet in spite of this universal world which we see, there is another world, quite as farspreading, quite as close … Read more

Render Unto Caesar

This essay first appeared at Insidecatholic.com (now Crisis) August 26, 2008. It is part of today’s symposium of lay Catholic opinion on immigration. For other contributions see this piece by Mark and Louise Zwick, this one by Christopher Manion, and this news report from Zenit. For Deal Hudson’s view, see this article in The American … Read more

Item added to cart.
0 items - $0.00

Orthodox. Faithful. Free.

Signup to receive new Crisis articles daily

Email subscribe stack
Share to...