The Narthex

Bishop Robert McManus of Worcester, Massachusetts, has mandated that Catholic schools in his diocese use a child’s legal name, not substitutes a student, driven by gender ideology, might want. Congratulations to him for providing episcopal leadership! [To see McManus's policy, click here.] But, some may ask, doesn’t that harm…

A New Thack(eray) on the Dumbing Down of Reading and Culture In a recent Facebook post, Joe Bottum commented on a 1915 lecture in which the speaker threw around multiple literary allusions to William Makepeace Thackeray’s characters as if they were obvious to everyone. Truth is, a lot of them…

The Church celebrates the Solemnity of the Assumption, when the Blessed Virgin Mary, “at the end of her earthly life,” was taken body and soul into heaven. The feast is a logical extension of the Resurrection: the latter’s transfiguring power is intended to reach every one of Christ’s followers, of…

"Listen to Him" In both last Sunday's Second Reading (from II Peter) and Gospel, we are exhorted (in the Gospel by no less than God the Father) to "listen to" Jesus. Peter, James, and John "listen" to that message from the bright cloud that overshines Mount Tabor; it would be…

Treasures and Pearls Last Sunday's Gospel wrapped up three weeks of Matthew 13, the chapter replete with various parables about the Kingdom of Heaven. It's only natural, therefore, that most preaching focused on the Kingdom as the buried treasure or the pearl of great price. So when my pastor, Fr.…

Eyes (and Minds) Voting with Feet Most mornings I have a 20 minute wait at my bus stop. The shelter has one of those electronic ad boards, so I get to see a limited loop of what advertisers want to sell. It’s often a telling commentary on the world today,…

Your Catholic SAT Although many colleges have moved away from standardized tests like the SAT, in the name of “equity” and abandonment of academic standards, I believe they have value. One of the components of the SAT used to be a reading comprehension test. It tests for how closely one…

In mid-May 1944, still in the midst of World War II, Bishop Walsh undertook a 10-week journey on a Liberty ship, arriving in Calcutta on August 2. A couple of weeks later, after dealing with colic and diarrhea, he took a transport plane for 9.5 hours to Chungking (now Chongqing).…

Arizona Governor Undermines Law Enforcement  The New York Times reports that Arizona Democrat Governor Katie Hobbs apparently doesn’t feel any obligation to abide by her constitutional oath faithfully to execute Arizona’s laws. In the wake of Dobbs, Arizona’s legislature enacted protective pro-life legislation that mirrors the Mississippi law upheld in…

Jesus once asked His Apostles whether any of them would hand a stone to a child seeking bread (Mt 7:9). I’m worried some of their successors might hand the child neither stone nor bread. In a July 6 interview on Portuguese State Television, cardinal-designate Americo Aguiar, organizer of World Youth…

“You are not in the flesh; on the contrary, you are in the spirit, if only the Spirit of God dwells in you.” -- Romans 8:9 Before we forget Sunday’s readings, some reflections on the Second. A reform and, arguably, achievement of Vatican II was an expanded Lectionary, including the…

Recently Pope Francis issued an Apostolic Letter on the French thinker Blaise Pascal (1623–1662). It comes on the Fourth Centenary of his birth. Francis chose a haunting title: On the Sublimity and Misery of Man (Sublimitas et Miseria Hominis). Most of Francis’s discussion centers on Pascal’s Pensées. Don’t expect to…

In the wake of the first anniversary of the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade, partisans of abortion-on-demand continue to assert their “right to privacy” and trot out numerous other bogeymen of what an “out-of-control Supreme Court” might yet do to “human rights.” In light of this obsession with protecting…

A recent documentary by cultural commentator Matt Walsh asks the question of the age in its title: “What Is a Woman?” In the documentary [link to trailer here], Walsh poses this question to a range of people, from gender activists and self-styled gender experts to average men and women.…

The significance of the outcome of the Fourth Global Anglican Future Convention (GAFCON IV) held last April in Kigali, Rwanda, is coming into ever sharper relief. That an overwhelming portion of Anglicanism, especially in the “Global South,” has been pushed to the point that it no longer recognizes its communion…