People are worried about me. One reader writes: You don’t give enough credit to the system we have in America. It is the closest thing to idealistic conditions as humanly possible (City of God, Augustine). That’s bad enough, of course. But in addition to my failure to identify America with the City of God, I … Read more
American politicians, unlike European ones, not only can but must play the Jesus card when they are faltering. Accordingly, Obama has done so, and just as accordingly, earnest Christians are now mulling over the “Is he really a Christian?” question that always arises whenever any polarizing public figure says he or she believes in Jesus. … Read more
There may be 30 million “recovering Catholics” (as they often call themselves) out there, across America, north of the Rio Grande — this according to a study cited by the Boston archdiocese. Perhaps 10 percent of the adult population of the United States count among our own lost sheep. It was part of their “market … Read more
A few years back, Russell Shaw wrote a terrific book called To Hunt, To Shoot, To Entertain: Clericalism and the Catholic Laity. It took its title from an amazing remark by a 19th-century English monsignor who loftily declared, “What is the province of the laity? To hunt, to shoot, to entertain. These matters they understand, … Read more