Will the Synod Change Doctrine?
Church leaders are insisting the upcoming Synod on Synodality will not change doctrine. That may be true, but it could do something even worse.
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
The Troubling Kinship of Bishop Barron and Father Martin
Bishop Robert Barron and Father James Martin are the two most dominant figures in American Catholicism today. Bishop Barron is the affable producer of popular videos on Catholicism through his Word on Fire ministry; Father Martin is a media darling and a Vatican favorite for his outreach to gay Catholics. As just one indicator of … Read more
Bishop Barron’s Pitiful (But Honest) Response to a Church in Crisis
Across the developed world, ignorant mobs and anarchists are tearing down statues of saints, defacing church monuments, and setting the churches on fire. Not to mention that in the developing world many Christians continue to suffer martyrdom by the thousands at the hands of secular and religious extremists. This has caused many people to finally … Read more
Hell Is Real—and It Isn’t Empty
Bishop Robert Barron, the auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles and a pioneer of online evangelism, is hardly prone to controversy. Yet the telegenic prelate stirred something of a firestorm back in June that continues to spill ink today. In fact, it isn’t a new debate at all. Commenting on the Gospel reading for June 25 … Read more
What Should We Make of Bishop Barron?
In a recent essay in this magazine, I gave a basic, and somewhat oversimplified, taxonomy of priests and prelates in the Church. In this article, this has been slightly revised and expanded: Type A are the Zeitgeist Puppets. In America, Cardinal Cupich and Fr. Martin come to mind; across the Atlantic on the continent, no … Read more
We Have a Better Story
There was a time when it was nigh impossible not to believe in God—not because of man’s irrational superstitions, as atheist popularizers tell it, but because of nature’s rational design. To early thinkers, the intelligibility of nature pointed to an ineluctable fact: a prime, non-contingent source of reality (i.e., the uncaused Cause, the One, Apeiron, … Read more
The Internet: Blessing or Curse?
Auxiliary Bishop of Los Angeles Robert Barron recently gave a pair of quite interesting talks at Google and Facebook. Now approaching 30 million views, Bishop Barron’s Word on Fire is the most influential Catholic evangelization ministry online. Bishop Barron is the ideal teacher, and this for two reasons: mastery of his subject and a genuine … Read more
Evangelizing the Secular Mind
Recently, a colleague inquired about how I successfully teach philosophy at a professional-minded college. As my colleague recognized, it is difficult to teach the liberal arts at a school where students embrace monetary practical values and goals. Through his query, I was reminded about how Catholics can evangelize with rhetorical mindfulness. Specifically, Catholics can begin … Read more
Sed Contra, Bishop Barron
Bishop Robert Barron’s work is the gold standard for Catholic evangelization. I met him while he was the theologian-in-residence at the North American College in Rome during my deacon year (2006-2007). He gave some outstanding conferences during his stay. I have read many but not all of his books and have seen quite a few of his videos. His … Read more
Vanquishing the Vikings … But on TV?
“After remaining quiescent for centuries in the narrow confines of the lands around the Baltic, the peoples of the North suddenly poured forth in a wave of conquering expansion… They had attacked Constantinople and Pisa and North Persia and Moslem Spain, while their settlements and conquests embraced Greenland and Iceland and Russia, as well as … Read more
Friday Free-for-All: New Year Edition
Happy New Year, IC readers! We’ve been taking it slow here over the holidays, and today will be no different — but we’ll be back with a vengeance in 2011. Below are a few last links from Oh-Ten, and feel free to add more in the comments — along with any resolutions, reflections, or hopes … Read more