The Narthex

As undergraduates at St. Mary’s College in Orchard Lake, Michigan, we were required as part of our core curriculum to take a course in art and/or music, and “Introduction to Humanities” fulfilled the requirement. I’ll admit that, as a 19-year-old, I wasn’t excited about the class and it didn’t help…

May 18 would have been Karol Wojtyła’s 103rd birthday. In the 18 years since his death, a whole generation has grown up not knowing St. John Paul II. It’s not accidental that there’s a new character assassination effort to stain his reputation and minimize his contributions to the Church. Monika…

Australia faces a possible constitutional change later this year when we shall be asked to approve The Voice, a modification to our foundational document that will not only formally recognize the first occupiers of our continent but establish a special body to represent their interests. Regardless of what position one…

One-time NOR blogger Dominick Sansone makes an apt and educative historical comparison in a recent article ("Weak Interventionism," The American Conservative, March 28) about America's proxy war in Ukraine. He first dispenses with the oft-repeated “appeasement” comparison between interwar Germany and present-day Russia, which has been the kneejerk reaction of…

The first few decades of Gothic Revival master Augustus Pugin's life were filled with activity and strain, and there would be more obstacles and tribulations. Pugin had periods of blindness. His second wife died. (He remarried. His third wife not only cared for his six children by his two previous…

Augustus Welby Pugin is in the news these days in the United Kingdom because he designed Big Ben, icon for the British nation, whose scaffolding has now come down after two years and will reopen this spring. Pugin (1812-1852; his French name is pronounced “PEW-jin”) was THE Gothic Revivalist. A…

Let us familiarize ourselves with the titles accorded these Cappadocian bishops we have studied: Basil, Gregory, and Gregory of Nyssa. St. Gregory of Nyssa is considered the philosopher and mystic; he wrote less than the other two but perhaps more deeply. An ecumenical council in 787 pronounced him “Father of…

Following the council of 381, Gregory returned to Nazianzus. For Lent, he gave up speaking! (Newman, Historical Sketches, p. 86) In his autobiographical poem, Gregory used some harsh words to describe his relationship with Basil. Yet, at the same time that he wrote the poem, he delivered a funeral oration…

Until Gregory’s father’s death in 374, Gregory stayed in Nazianzus. Despite the rupture between Gregory and Basil, Basil attended Gregory’s father’s funeral. (Gregory’s father had always supported making Basil a bishop; see Funeral Orations, p. 154.) Gregory, his father’s auxiliary bishop, did not want to succeed his father. Because nothing…

Gregory refused to go to the appointed town in Basil’s jurisdiction, becoming, in his words, “a fugitive.” At first, Gregory’s father tried to persuade him to be an active bishop of Sasima, then, when the father’s health declined, the father, himself a bishop, asked Gregory to become his auxiliary (Concerning…

The reason Gregory had left Basil after his visit to Basil’s monastery was related to Gregory’s family. Gregory’s father, now in his 80’s, had become ill and had asked his son to return home. During Christmastime, 362, Gregory was ordained a priest. Immediately Gregory thought he’d made a mistake and…

Basil either returned directly home from Athens and then toured the principal monasteries of the Eastern Roman Empire in Egypt, Palestine, and Syria or toured the monasteries before coming home (it’s unclear from my review of sources). At some point in these travels Basil’s older sister, St. Macrina, upbraided Basil…

In my last post I related how Gregory spared Basil "hazing" on beginning school in Athens. The second thing Gregory did for Basil when they were students was as follows: Some of their childhood friends now at the school asked Basil questions. At first, Gregory joined in the discussion hoping…

The Church annually celebrates the feast days of St. Basil of Caesarea and St. Gregory of Nazianzus on January 1 in the East and January 2 in the West. Their story of great affection, and estrangement, follows below. But first let me say that Pope St. John Paul II often…

Esteemed statesman Henry Kissinger makes an important point in his essay "How to avoid another world war" (The Spectator, Dec. 17). He describes how Europe's leaders "sleepwalked" into the first world war. With hindsight we see the effect of the "new" technology of the early 20th century, but men of…