Pope Benedict Speaks Truth to Power
Americans exhausted by adolescent chants of “Pass this bill!” and the rest of the rhetorical detritus of the 2012 pre-campaign might go to the Vatican web site, click on Pope
In Praise of Peter Berger
At the end of his new intellectual memoir, Adventures of an Accidental Sociology: How to Explain the World Without Becoming a Bore (Prometheus Books), Peter L. Berger recounts a telling
Among the “Progressed”
Thomas Merton is usually thought of as a liberal or progressive Catholic, which in many respects he was: he certainly tilted left politically, on civil rights and Vietnam; he wanted
The First—and Last—"European"?
One of the great bits of repartee in The King’s Speech comes as the maverick Australian speech therapist, Lionel Logue, is just getting to know His Royal Highness Prince Albert,
Why Hasn’t Francis Ford Been Beatified?
In a 2010 interview with Catholic World Report, Cardinal Joseph Zen, S.D.B., the emeritus bishop of Hong Kong, wondered aloud about the Catholic Church’s reticence to acknowledge those who had
Michael Novak, Founding Father
CRACOW. Twenty years ago, the American Catholic thinker Michael Novak put his head together with his friend Rocco Buttiglione, a distinguished Italian thinker, to see what might be done about
Joseph Ratzinger's Diamond Jubilee
Sixty years ago today, on June 29, 1951, Cardinal Michael Faulhaber of Munich and Freising laid hands on a 24-year-old deacon named Joseph Ratzinger, ordaining him a priest—an event the
Roger Maris and the Summer of 1961
Five years ago, I made the argument for Hoosiers as the greatest sports movie ever and lamented the absence of great baseball films. Hoosiers is still the gold standard but
A Forty-Something Cardinal?
In recent centuries, the College of Cardinals has not been noted for its boyishness. Indeed, one of the human fascinations of a conclave is that it’s a rare opportunity to
The End of the Bernardin Era
Cardinal Joseph L. Bernardin died on November 14, 1996, after a moving and profoundly Christian battle with pancreatic cancer that edified Americans across the political and religious spectrums. Fourteen years
The Death of Osama bin Laden
The death of Osama bin Laden did not end the war against jihadism, a war bin Laden had declared against the United States in a 1996 fatwa that mandated the
The Beatification of John Paul II
Rome — Two hours before the Mass of beatification for John Paul II began on May 1, I looked up from our NBC platform near the Castel Sant’Angelo and saw
Popular Articles
Navy SEAL, "Martyr of Charity?"
A Golden Dome Opportunity Missed