The Narthex
High Hopes, High Stakes
A teen group called reLOVE helps at-risk teen mothers
By James Hanink | December 18th 2018 3:43 PMAlways and everywhere we have high hopes, and they reflect the Birth of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! In our time and place we have particular hopes because of special people -- ordinary people doing ordinary things in extraordinary ways. Last week I met one of them, thanks to…
READ FULL BLOG POSTUnspeakable Crimes
We have neither the eyes to see nor the language with which to condemn
By James Hanink | December 4th 2018 4:22 PMMost crimes are petty. Shop lifting, for instance, spikes over the holiday season. Maybe crimes of passion do so as well. They’re the result of “affairs,” formerly spoken of as adultery and fornication. Some crimes are heinous, and they make the front page. Last week a serial killer confessed to…
READ FULL BLOG POSTGene Editing and the Brave New World
A scientific development from China marks one more step
By Rob Agnelli (Archive) | November 30th 2018 9:45 PMIn his prescient dystopic novel Brave New World, Aldous Huxley foretells a time when children are mass produced in a laboratory using what he calls the Bokanovsky Process. This process ensures the stability of Huxley’s World State because it genetically conditions the children into each of five social castes. While…
READ FULL BLOG POSTForbidden Fruit
All are tempted to partake of delicious pleasure without consequence
By Richard DellOrfano | November 26th 2018 6:59 PMThe archetypical image of the forbidden fruit in Genesis is the apple. Neither a Delicious nor a Gala nor a Fuji―just a plain apple. East Indians see the forbidden fruit as a banana. What actually hangs from The Tree of Life is the temptation to partake of delicious pleasure without…
READ FULL BLOG POSTJust Punishment and the Death Penalty
A hermeneutic of continuity or a hermeneutic of rupture
By Rob Agnelli (Archive) | November 15th 2018 6:51 PMIn a 2014 address to representatives of the International Association of Penal Law, Pope Francis announced his crusade for abolishing capital punishment world-wide. His march would continue until August of this year when he ordered a revision to Catechism paragraph 2267 deeming the death penalty “inadmissible.” While a change to…
READ FULL BLOG POSTWhat to Say When I Die
The spirit of the traditional Día de Los Muertos
By James Hanink | November 7th 2018 4:36 PMWhen I die, I’ll have plenty to say. But, gentle reader, you’ll not hear it. Friends, neighbors, and writers of obituaries will, no doubt, have something to say. Fortunately, with my not being an old soldier, no one will comment that “he just faded away.” Most of us, it seems,…
READ FULL BLOG POSTBuying Happiness
The Church insists that human beings don’t reproduce but procreate
By Rob Agnelli (Archive) | October 31st 2018 3:39 PMA lesbian couple in Texas has become the first such couple to give birth to a baby that they both carried. Using a technique dubbed Reciprocal Effortless IVF, one of the women had several of her eggs fertilized while she acted as an incubator using a device called INVOCell. After…
READ FULL BLOG POSTMargaret Sanger Versus Gandhi
He foresaw frightful results from widespread use of birth control
By Richard DellOrfano | October 23rd 2018 4:56 PMMargaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, met with Mahatma Gandhi to gain his support for her promotion of birth control devices versus using self-control of sexual desire. She was sorely disappointed, as he predicted rampant licentiousness would result from widespread use of such devices. In 1934, an Indian…
READ FULL BLOG POSTPostcards for Africa
Attacking a sound-bite straw man only masks the real evil
By Rob Agnelli (Archive) | October 19th 2018 6:35 PMIn a presentation at the Gates Foundation's “Goalkeepers” last month, French President Emmanuel Macron made comments that appeared to be critical of large families: “One of the critical issues of African demography is that this is not chosen fertility... I always say: ‘Present me the woman who decided, being perfectly…
READ FULL BLOG POSTResponsible Parenthood
The Church was out-hustled by Margaret Sanger and her progeny
By Rob Agnelli (Archive) | October 16th 2018 4:29 PMWhen Margaret Sanger attempted to attack the Church’s opposition to contraception, she did so mainly through anecdotal evidence of the thousands of mothers suffering under the burden of too many children. She even went so far as to collect the stories of these women and bind them in a book…
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