The Narthex

A big lie is that Catholics oppress women by, for example, not allowing them to be ordained priests or deacons, by not giving them (enough) positions of power in the Vatican, by keeping them “barefoot and pregnant” by opposing contraception and abortion, and by holding marriage up as a realizable…

In his classic How to Read a Book, Mortimer Adler, citing Francis Bacon, tells us that “some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.” Yes, but which books and in what order? Of the making of books there is --…

It is serendipitous coincidence that the Gospel of Our Lord’s conversation with Nicodemus, “the man who came to Jesus at night” (John 3:2), occurred this year on the same Sunday that Daylight Savings Time began -- and within ten days of the beginning of spring. (Spring this year begins the…

The story of the three Magi from the East following the star to Jerusalem is told during the Christmas season (Matt. 2:1-18). It is not like the heart-warming aspects of Christ’s birth, with an angel speaking to shepherds and angels singing. Rather, it is a story that ends with weeping…

Donald DeMarco, over at Crisis (linked below), asks whether Pope Francis has a “fixation” with ecological issues. A cursory look at environmentalism and climate fundamentalism suggests these "isms" have in many cases acquired all the attributes of a secular religion. To what degree have even sincerely religious people allowed environmental…

Oren Cass's First Things Lecture in Washington, D.C., on March 4 addressed the topic “Constructing Conservatism in the Secular Age.” The talk’s core argument was that American conservatism’s reliance on religious faith to make its central values arguments collides with the growing secularization of U.S. culture, causing it to lose…

Most Sundays, the Church prescribes one Gospel to be read. This Sunday, the priest has a choice of two. That’s because, while the Sunday Gospels normally rotate over three years, there is an exception on the Third, Fourth, and Fifth Sundays of Lent. Lent is the season during which catechumens…

“The lady doth protest too much, methinks” is a Shakespeare line about a Hamlet character whose overacting makes one believe she is hellbent on concealing the truth of things. That line comes to mind on reading a featured editorial at Vatican News (Feb. 27): “Fiducia supplicans: Non-Liturgical blessings and Pope…

Trying to figure something out? Something really important? More often than not, Aristotle was doing just that. He usually began by noting the insights of the wise on the problem at hand. Noticing that they were often at odds, he next tried to figure out what was promising in each…

Ex ore infantium comes from Psalm 8:3, “from the mouths of babes and infants.” I was reminded of that phrase recently while watching a perhaps unfairly neglected movie from 1965, “The Battle of the Villa Fiorita.” The film, starring Maureen O’Hara and Rossano Brazzi, is based on a book by…

Harvard’s president, Claudine Gay, became its ex-president through the confluence of two factors, neither one of which seemed sufficient to remove her from office but, together, generated sufficient public (and, apparently, internal private donor) criticism to render her continued incumbency untenable. As you may remember, Gay was criticized for her…

Modern western Christians often like to persuade themselves that there is no real and personal Devil, but wishful thinking of that kind wouldn't wash with our Church Fathers and doesn't square with Gospel accounts of the Gadarene swine or of Jesus's own temptations in the wilderness. C.S. Lewis in his…

I have noticed an Ash Wednesday phenomenon in recent years in Washington. It even preceded COVID. Various clergymen set up tables outside Metro subway stations, offering ashes-on-demand. Last Wednesday morning, for example, there was something of an ecumenical duel outside one station. On the north side of the entrance were…

Change is a constant, with mixed results. But so, too, is a grim stasis, a permanent condition in this Vale of Tears. With regard to change, the players surely change. In St. Augustine’s time, the Roman Empire still held sway, though invaders from the North stormed its borders and sought…

The Church offers two formulae as options to be used during imposition of ashes, the sign of penance. The older formula is “Remember, man, that you are dust and to dust you will return.” The newer one is actually not new at all, because it repeats the first public words…