Two years ago this month Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected pope. I want to talk here about faith and to do so in the context of this anniversary. Before I turn to my subject there are some other things I want … Continue reading
Category: Articles
The Farsightedness and Omissions of a Professed “Superfluous Man”: The Intellectual Journey of Albert Jay Nock
It is now nearly forty-five years ago that Albert Jay Nock’s intellectual autobiography was first recommended to me by a well-respected and graciously well-mannered “Epicurean Conservative” Professor at the University; and I was at once arrested by its title: The … Continue reading
Begone Satan! I Will Lay Down My Life in Obedience to My Father
Sunday’s Gospel for the first week of Lent recounts the three temptations of Our Lord near the end of His forty day solitary fast in the desert. He is in the company of “the beasts” (Mark 1:13). The Old Serpent … Continue reading
A Raging Bull in the China Shop
Are some stories too harrowing or too intense to be turned into movies? Well, yes there are. Word comes to us that Shusaku Endo’s novel Silence is being turned into a motion picture. Endo’s story of a priest whose mind and … Continue reading
The Fast Path and the Slow Path of Subversion: Roberto de Mattei’s Recent Strategic Insights
To understand how faithful Islam still tries, by faster and slower means, to instil and instal itself in Europe today — and in the secular West in general — will enhance the weakened Cultural Immune System of the Catholic Faith; … Continue reading
Decline and Fall…and Rise?
When Austria was defeated by Prussia in a war in 1866 and political power and cultural dominance within greater Germany shifted from Vienna to Berlin, the people of Vienna tried to mask their true feeling of loss by acting gaily, … Continue reading
Why Saint Benedict Center Insists on a Philosophical ‘Platform’
(The following two articles, written by Larry Koralewski, a long-time student of Brother Francis, will be the first of a number of installments to come, most of which will deal with the Saint Benedict Center courses on Philosophy.) Why Saint … Continue reading
Fortitude, Proportion, and Innocence: Discerning Perceptions from Hilaire Belloc’s The Silence of the Sea (1940)
While I was last evening and this morning reading aloud to our six-year-old daughter the full 1836 text of “The Little Mermaid,” by Hans Christian Andersen, I came to think of Hilaire Belloc as well as of Caryll Houselander and … Continue reading
Restoration or Desecration?
On the Feast of All Saints, 1983, I worshipped at Mass in the Sistine Chapel with Pope St. John Paul II on the altar. Msgr. Alfons Stickler, the Austrian-born Vatican Librarian and champion of the Tridentine Mass and of Latin … Continue reading
Moi Aussi, Je Ne Suis Pas Charlie
Honore de Balzac, the great nineteenth-century French novelist whose chief work is the series of short stories and novels collectively known as The Human Comedy, wrote that “when the Revolution cut off the head of the King, it cut off … Continue reading
Francis Fukuyama: “The End of History?”
Through the alertness of a friend and through his informative recent note to me, I soon discovered many more things about Francis Fukuyama’s quite unexpected latest book, which is entitled Political Order and Political Decay: From the Industrial Revolution to … Continue reading
Alzheimer’s
A couple of months ago folks were in a dither about Ebola, especially folks who see themselves as the center of the universe, and in our day (or any other) that is too many. Now, there is nothing wrong with … Continue reading
Hilaire Belloc’s Sense of Destiny and Living Memory of a Woman and Child
With a friend’s recent gift to me of his just re-published 1936 anthology of Hilaire Belloc’s essays, I had with gratitude the welcome occasion to re-read — and even to read aloud to my wife again in the evening — … Continue reading
Paying For What We Expect
Rich men find pleasure in owning yachts, race horses and sports teams. Pleasure is piled upon pleasure when a rich man can sell a team for many millions of dollars more than he paid knowing he is able to keep … Continue reading
“That’s Not Santa, That’s Your Dad”
My siblings and I were so blessed to have parents who gave their five children the most beautiful and happy Christmases. The first thing that went up in our house was the Nativity scene with all the characters in place … Continue reading
