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All Catholic commentary from August 2026
Popes of the Theotokos
Both of the popes featured in this installment are remembered for honoring the Blessed Virgin Mary. Most of our time will be spent on the first, St. Celestine, who is important chiefly for his involvement in the Council of Ephesus, which confirmed the title of Mary as Mother of God.
Popes of the Theotokos
Both of the popes featured in this installment are remembered for honoring the Blessed Virgin Mary. Most of our time will be spent on the first, St. Celestine, who is important chiefly for his involvement in the Council of Ephesus, which confirmed the title of Mary as Mother of God.
The Holiness of Hunger
The Incarnation guarantees that no technology can substitute for sacramental personal encounters at Mass and around parishes, or even for the taste and touch of bread.
Ceuto: the failure of liberal immigration rhetoric
In Europe and in the US today, liberal welfare policies offer incentives for young people who can realize short-term benefits. Those benefits are not for the families they leave behind, not for the impoverished societies they desert, and certainly not for the new communities they exploit. In other words, not for the common good.
“Shrinking” vocations: the McGrath report on seminary reform, pt. 2
No doubt many young men are earnest and sincere in their desire to pursue Holy Orders to serve the Church. But if they are addicted to pornography and need a twelve-step program to get out of this habit so that they can begin to focus on their studies, their prayer, their personal habits, and their pastoral experiences, they need to be excluded from the seminary formation program altogether.
Florida’s upside-down dispute over religious freedom
Uthmeier is objecting to the mandatory requirement of vaccines. On that question the teaching of the Catholic Church is clear, and it supports the attorney general.
Hiroshima and the Feast of the Transfiguration
There can be no doubt that good ends (winning the war with fewer casualties) were invoked to justify profoundly evil means: the deliberate destruction of cities together with their civilian populations.
The new Science, Reason, and Faith Catholic Study Bible
Fr. Spitzer does not deny the miraculous. Rather, he insists upon it only when it is a genuine requirement of the text. In some cases a rare natural phenomenon may well be adequate to explain the meaning. In other words, what we see at times is a cautious interpretation of an ancient text which permits a greater understanding of when a natural phenomenon may be at work, or when science or history can shed additional light, or when the text simply will not accommodate a non-miraculous explanation.
An unconvincing defense of the Florida bishops
Attorney General Uthmeier, representing the State of Florida, argues that for the common good, the Catholic bishops should defer to the government’s judgment that the legitimate conscience rights of parents take precedence over the public-health concerns of Catholic school administrators. His argument is firmly based in Catholic Church teaching.
5.40 St. Francis de Sales: The Gentleman Doctor
What St. Peter Canisius and St. Lawrence of Brindisi did for Germany, St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622) did for Switzerland. Born just three years after John Calvin died, St. Francis de Sales found the Catholics of Geneva a persecuted minority, but by the time he was finished there, the region was mostly Catholic again.
Should the archbishop excommunicate the governor?
In all likelihood, Archbishop Henning—along with the other bishops of Massachusetts—will choose not to take disciplinary action, just as previous prelates have declined to discipline pro-abortion Catholic politicians for decades.
New Latin resources for Catholics
In recent years, Latin educators have been producing new reading materials for beginner and intermediate students. One such recent book offers well-written stories of the saints in classical Latin.
The Devil’s Clickbait
Those big data centers know our every move, our every text and phone conversation, and every click we make. So does God. Every sin known to man is just one or two clicks away.
On life in the midst of indifference to Christ
It is extremely rare (really, to the point of non-existence) for Catholic bishops or priests to publicly rebuke or ecclesiastically discipline Catholic politicians who promote clearly immoral policies. It is just as rare to hear direct Catholic teaching from the pulpit on the most pressing moral issues of our time, or even on the difference between what we might call worldly and Christian habits.
St. Leo the Great vs. Manichaean Pedophiles
This is the first of several installments about Pope St. Leo the Great, a profoundly important figure in the development of the papacy, canon law, Christology, and more - not to mention that he saved Rome from being sacked by Attila the Hun. We begin with his local activities as bishop of Rome and metropolitan of the Roman Province, including fighting Manichaeism, and correcting abuses of the sacraments of Holy Orders, Baptism, and Penance.
St. Leo the Great vs. Manichaean Pedophiles
This is the first of several installments about Pope St. Leo the Great, a profoundly important figure in the development of the papacy, canon law, Christology, and more - not to mention that he saved Rome from being sacked by Attila the Hun. We begin with his local activities as bishop of Rome and metropolitan of the Roman Province, including fighting Manichaeism, and correcting abuses of the sacraments of Holy Orders, Baptism, and Penance.
How can lay Catholics spur bishops into action?
Again and again, for 40 years or more, I have been involved in the same conversation. What will it take to prompt our bishops into decisive action? I don't know.
What I saw in Israel—Part 1
If you are over a certain age and hail from a blue state, there is a feeling you get when visiting, say, Ron DeSantis’s Florida. You know the one. “Oh my goodness, people are happy here. They’re vibrant. They’re young! The America I remember from the 1980s, it’s still out there somewhere!” Tel Aviv and Jerusalem have a very similar vibe.
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