I reviewed Michael Brennan Dougherty's epistolary memoir, My Father Left Me Ireland, for The American Interest. Dougherty's rage is directed at the eunuchizing modern mindset that sees us as most free when we can be stripped of all the ties we have to others. A father can leave his children, provided the financial pain is assuaged by child support or governmental… Read More
Fear and the Benedict Option
Any sort of retreat will also attract people who are tempted to hate the part of the world they are withdrawing from. Any group gathering in a BenOp spirit should expect to attract people at varying levels of weariness, anger, fear, and despair. Even a legitimate righteous anger can curdle into contempt or despair. To… Read More
Hope of Heaven in Hadestown
I reviewed Hadestown, the 2019 Best Musical, for The American Interest. Hermes, the messenger-god who serves as narrator, warns us that “When the gods are having a fight, everybody else better hold on tight.” The world that Orpheus and Eurydice inhabit is wounded and weakened by the faltering love between Hades and Persephone. (This production does not… Read More
Pro-Life Outreach to Pro-Choice Workers
I travelled to Texas to interview Abby Johnson, a former Planned Parenthood Clinic director who founded And Then There Were None, a ministry to help abortion workers leave their jobs. “Unplanned,” the recently released film adapted from Abby Johnson’s memoir of leaving Planned Parenthood and becoming a pro-life activist, is really just a prequel.When Johnson quit her job in 2009,… Read More
Reaching Out to Atheists with Bishop Barron
I joined Bishop Robert Barron in Santa Barbara to talk about strategies for having productive disagreements about hard topics. (My part of the video below starts at 15:30). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIY4AP3PbX4 After my talk, I joined Bishop Barron for a discussion that was taped for Word on Fire Institute members. Read More
Books I Plan to Read in 2019
Last year was not a very good year for my "Books to Read in 2018" list, with five of my fifteen books unread. On the other hand, I got to read Middlemarch (for the first time) and Kristin Lavransdatter (second time) with online book groups. And those big, shared books made it hard to find the right… Read More
Kristin Lavransdatter, Motorcycles, and Docility to Reality
I've been reading Sigrid Undset's Kristin Lavransdatter in concert with a group of folks who have all committed to "Kristin by Christmas!" One passage I particularly loved comes when Kristin goes to stay and be schooled at a convent. Abbess Groa welcomes Kristin with these words: I have heard good things of you, and you… Read More
The Cruel Warning Signs of Abuse
I've written an essay for the Catholic News Agency, on abuse inside and outside the Catholic Church. McCarrick, Han, and Ronnell all carried out parts of their abuse in the open. Their campaigns of control and cruelty may not have always created the trail of evidence needed to convict them of a crime, but there… Read More
Pope Gregory the Great, on the temptations of administrators
The Office of Readings offered a homily by St. Gregory the Great for his feast day on September 3rd. I was grateful to read it, especially because it was a good prompting to pray for priests and bishops who find themselves torn between their worldly, administrative duties and the radical promise they have made to… Read More
Living as Foreigners in the Kingdom of Truth
I've been reading* Henri Nouwen's The Inner Voice of Love: A Journey through Anguish to Freedom, one to two meditations a day. Today's meditation, on death to self, struck me with a doubled meaning—one relevant to the apocalypse-as-unveiling that the Church is going through at present. You have an idea of what the new country looks… Read More