The Narthex

Stephen Doran’s new book, To Die Well: A Catholic Neurosurgeon’s Guide to the End of Life, is a gem that pulls off several achievements simultaneously. It’s readable while tackling the major issues of bioethics around death and dying while situating the whole discussion in a spiritual context, recognizing that death…

Within the Octave of Christmas, a Feast of Life, a New York Times (A1, Dec. 28) headline read, “Assisted Death for the Mentally Ill Divides Canada.” This March will bring the Government’s decision. No mention in the Times, of course, of killing. Instead the piece speaks of a “practice,” a…

Tomorrow, December 28, is the Feast of the Holy Innocents, Martyrs. I make that explicit because in the past few years there has been something like an ecclesiastical version of bait-and-switch in some quarters to change the focus of the feast. Today’s feast is about children: baby boys aged two…

Regular readers know I am a harsh critic of cremation and of the Church’s misconceived 1963 decision to tolerate it. I have repeatedly argued that that 1963 rescission of the prohibition on cremation allowed the camel to poke its nose under the tent, upending the latter. The most cursory survey…

As we mark the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, I present two thoughts on why Our Lady under the title of the “Immaculate Conception” is the fitting patroness for the United States. First, we Americans continue to fail to reckon with the reality of “conception.” Notwithstanding the reversal of Roe…

In a recent post here, I reminisced about the “Committee of Ten Million,” Gil Durand’s 1973 lay initiative to amass ten million petition signatures to be delivered publicly to Congress demanding a Human Life Amendment. Ten million signatures in 1973 would have been about five percent of the U.S. population,…

If you are reading this on Friday, December 1, you have until midnight to act on a pro-life matter. On October 2, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services published a proposed rule to change regulations on what can be funded under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)…

As we marked Thanksgiving last week, my memories reached back 50 years to Thanksgiving 1973. I remember the day well: sunny but chilly. The memory is an opportunity for me to salute a man I never met, Gil Durand. (I think it’s Durand. It might be Durant. He doesn’t come…

As Buckeyes head to the polls Tuesday to vote on Issue 1, an extreme amendment to the State Constitution that would -- among other things like surrogacy, artificial reproduction, and state subsidy of abortion -- ensconce abortion-on-demand through birth, they might want to remember Kermit Gosnell. Kermit Gosnell is somebody…

David Hackney is a Cleveland medical professor who is pushing Issue 1, the proposed Ohio state constitutional amendment to legalize abortion through birth, on the ballot tomorrow, November 7. He penned an article in the November 5 New York Times defending the amendment. He claims the State of Ohio is promoting…

I’m blessed to have the Rev. Paul Scalia as a pastor, in part because he inspires me with lines of theological thought I hadn’t considered. He did that last Sunday, with his reflections on the Gospel of the Vineyard Owner who pays all his workers a day’s wage. Fr. Scalia…

In a surprise development, nominal Catholic California Governor Gavin Newsom recently vetoed legislation that instructed California courts to take a parent’s “gender affirming” views into account when making custody or visitation decisions. No one should think, however, that the Governor has concluded that the chemical castration and/or physical genital mutilation…

"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…

"Les extremes se touchent" means the extremes touch each other, they overlap. People say the Church’s teachings about sex and life are extreme, but the truly extreme, truly contradictory response comes from its opponents. That sex can give life and foster a unique spousal relationship is not some esoteric Catholic…

Pro-abortionists in Ohio are pulling all stops to pass a state constitutional amendment by ballot referendum this November to ensconce abortion in the Buckeye State. The amendment is particularly aggressive because, in addition to wiping out all prenatal protections through birth (notwithstanding window-dressing language about "viability" that is promptly eviscerated…