As I recently mentioned in an email to colleagues, I know that I have the liturgical sensibilities of a mouse. The Liturgy has never been, for me, something that I thought I was supposed to enjoy. When I consider the laws of the Church, I notice that one of those laws is to attend Mass on Sundays...

I confess to an occasional secret chuckle over President Trump’s more outrageous statements—like the one about annexing Canada to the United States (which Canadians, at least, ought not to think funny). But I suppose a good Catholic ought not even to smile at the deliberately bizarre...

As a great many people have observed, under Pope Francis, the concept of synodality morphed into a constant and universal input process, with apparently everybody welcome. That approach was excessively institutionalized and bureaucratized, remarkably costly, and largely a waste of time as it...

I suspect most of my readers are aware of the tremendously positive impact Fr. Joseph Fessio, SJ has had on the Catholic publishing and academic landscapes both here and abroad. His achievements are showcased through his work in creating the St. Ignatius Institute and in serving as Chancellor for...

A new height in pontifical fuzziness was reached by Pope Francis on, of all dates, Friday the 13th (see our news story All faiths lead to God, Pope tells youth in Singapore). It is a great sorrow to many Catholics that we must endure such a pontificate. Just stop and think about the numbers of...

In the last few days we have seen two instances of high-ranking Church leaders either refusing to speak clearly or deliberately speaking unclearly about the fundamental principles of Catholic faith and morals. Phil Lawler has already commented on the recent failure by Pope Francis to speak truth...

Pope Leo offered a striking message to the Knights of Malta on the Solemnity of Saint John the Baptist, who is the Order’s patron. The Pope expressed what is already becoming a hallmark of his pontificate, that is, an emphasis on the central and foundational duty of the followers of Christ...

It’s amazing how out of touch with current reality we can become as we age. I’ve mentioned before Hilaire Belloc’s interesting thesis that people in their sixties tend to still fight the battles in which they were engaged in their twenties and thirties, even though current...

When Fr. Jerry Pokorsky wrote that “It is far more costly for the laity to live Gospel truths” than for priests, he made a reasonable if not always accurate point (see the second-last paragraph in his most recent homiletic essay, Bonds of Blood). He pointed out that “espousing...

Have you noticed the more recent developments in post-secondary Catholic education in the United States? This is no longer a matter of looking back to the 1970s when Thomas Aquinas College in California, Magdalen College and Thomas More College of the Liberal Arts in New Hampshire, and Christendom...