The Narthex

On November 5, the American people decisively elected Donald Trump as president. They put the Senate in Republican control and left the House of Representatives in Republican hands. The message of the election was an end to “business as usual.” Did that message reach Congressional Democrats? No. In the past…

The Human Shield Dilemma I’ve long argued that the Church, and particularly the current pontificate, are derelict in not conducting serious discussions about just war theory and contemporary warfare (including the use of human shields and urban warfare). Failure to address these issues suggests what George Weigel has highlighted: a…

Have you ever been to a Town Hall gathering? Not I. City Hall, yes, and there to fight its folly. But now, lo and behold, I’ve been invited to a Town Hall event and even asked to contribute. Here on the Left Coast, where California Dreamin’ is always in play,…

Things sometimes appear in social media seemingly out of nowhere, though one suspects they surface as “click-bait” created to generate readers’ reactions. That’s what I thought on Sunday when my X.com feed resurfaced a talk by National Public Radio chief executive Katherine Maher (her talk is linked below). The video…

World Vasectomy Day Nov 21-22 is the 12th Annual "World Vasectomy Day," an annual "celebration" during which vans prowl some neighborhoods offering male sterilization. Since 2022 the act has been designated a sign of male "ally-ship" with post-Dobbs women by "taking responsibility" for fertility. Such euphemistic claptrap has become so normalized…

The Bald and the Unbeautiful Head shaving has been among the jejune reactions of some frenzied women to Kamala Harris’s implosion. Social media is full of these virtue signalers demonstrating why haircuts should only be done by trained professionals. I’m surprised Biden’s FDA has not demanded warning disclaimers on these…

Social media is beset by hysterical women and soy boys having collective hissy-fits and meltdowns that their country has “betrayed” them by electing Donald Trump. A certain Schadenfreude has led to re-postings of breakdowns, and to normal people asking whether they're real. Alas, they are real. They're real and they…

A respected, and now suspected, newspaper once pledged to give subscribers “All the news that’s fit to print.” Today, that same paper violates its pledge both by commission and omission. Time for a new slogan? Here’s a suggestion: “All the propaganda that will fit.” And yet I read the rag,…

The District of Columbia and other jurisdictions have passed laws to re-name Columbus Day Indigenous Peoples’ Day or Native Americans Day. In 2021, President Biden proclaimed Indigenous Peoples’ Day to be celebrated on the same day as Columbus Day. (Given my surname, you might suppose that I favor this development.…

Tim Walz has been called out several times over the accuracy of his claims, most recently about his alleged presence in communist China during the Tiananmen demonstrations of June 1989. During the October 1 Vice Presidential debate, “Knucklehead” Tim walked back his earlier claims to being an eyewitness to history,…

If I were to run the Big City Standard Zoo, it would become a whole lot smaller. Snakes and turtles, birds and bugs would stay. But there’d be no mammals except for “rescues,” and they’d be temporary guests only. Pleased with my zoological reform, I’m emboldened to think big. What…

We need to change the subject in discussions about retirement from the economic (in)solvency of Social Security to the meaning and significance of retirement. My thoughts on this were sparked by a new book by Teresa Ghilarducci titled Work, Retire, Repeat. Her argument is that many people are working past…

An almost perpetual cultural cringe is a feature of what passes as intellectual life in the West nowadays. If we are “white” we have much to be ashamed of; if we're elderly males as well we are almost beyond the pale. So in commenting on any current events that touch…

In Part 1, linked below, I looked at the Catholic Church’s criteria for just war and just conduct of war. Here I turn to the loss of civilian lives and physical destruction, and address the issue of Israel’s conduct of the war. Hamas alleges a large number of deaths among…

Freedom Versus Self-Will Continuing my way through Roman Brandstaetter's superb literary corpus, I ran into a collection of short meditations he penned, inspired by his positive encounter with Franciscanism. He spoke of a writer, sitting at his desk, who noticed a bee walking along his window pane. Caringly, he opened…