By Thomas Merton. ONE of the most disturbing facts that came out in the Eichmann trial was that a psychiatrist examined him and pronounced him perfectly sane. I do not doubt it at all, and that is precisely why I find it disturbing. If all the Nazis had been psychotics, as some of their leaders… Read More A Devout Meditation in Memory of Adolf Eichmann
By historian William Thomas Walsh “Of the external foes of the Church, Mohammedanism was one of the most dangerous and long enduring. Ideologically it was not external, but one of the great heresies, containing as it did many Christian elements, mingled with some borrowed from Judaism, and much gross and carnal materialism foreign to both;… Read More What the Critics of the Crusades Forget or Ignore
So-called ‘Liberals’ have a philosophical problem in this country and beyond. On the one hand they heartily indulge and enjoy the sexual anarchy granted by the succeeding regimes since the 1950’s and 1960’s; on the other hand they tend to deplore the lawlessness of American foreign policy / imperialism / warmaking. They do not see… Read More When the State is Ultimate
“It is vanity to desire a long life, and to have little care for a good life.” — Thomas a Kempis Tolkien mourned the decline of the Shire* i.e., …the real shire of his youth which he ever remembered and sought to salvage to the extent that he could. The Shire: the simplicity and beauty… Read More Tolkien’s Battle for the Shire. And for Us All.
American University Speech, delivered just months before he was gunned down in Dallas, remains more relevant and challenging than ever. Many believe it was this speech which sealed his fate.. “What kind of peace do I mean? What kind of peace do we seek? Not a Pax Americana enforced on the world by American weapons… Read More JFK American University Speech More Relevant Than Ever.
Victor Gaetan is senior international correspondent for the National Catholic Register 8/21. The closer we look at decisions to deploy a second atomic weapon against Japan on August 9, [1945…] the more morally audacious the tactic appears. Step outside the American explanatory cloud—we bombed military installations to force unconditional imperial surrender—defining public understanding to see:… Read More Nagasaki Was A Strike Against Japan And The Catholic Church
Foreign Affairs: “…When Americans think of global war, they typically think of World War II—or the part of the war that began with Japan’s strike on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. After that attack, and Adolf Hitler’s subsequent declaration of war against the United States, the conflict was a single, all-encompassing struggle between rival alliances on… Read More How Today’s Regional Conflicts Resemble the Ones That Produced World War II
Be it near or still a ways off, Jesus the Lord said regarding the last times, “And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed; for this must take place, but the end is not yet. 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there… Read More Does God send wars as a punishment for sin?
Note: To tell you the truth I don’t think much of the “Catholic Worker Movement” these days. Even Dorothy Day herself was becoming somewhat discouraged by the naivete and moral incoherence of not a few of her admirers near the end of her life. Her own pain and understanding of the Gospel had made her… Read More Dorothy Day and Taxes in a Nuclear Age
Charles Lewis. Review of The Priest Barracks: Dachau 1938-1945 by By Guillaume Zeller. National Catholic Register . Updated. “On July 20, 1933, six months after Hitler rose to power, Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, and the German vice chancellor, Franz von Papen, signed a concordat — a sort of peace treaty between the… Read More Enduring Faith Amid Horror: The Priests of Dachau
National Review: “Billions of dollars of aid have flown into Gaza while it has been under Hamas’s control, but instead of going to help alleviate the suffering of its people, the money has been diverted by Hamas to fund its terror operations. The group has dug up water pipes to repurpose them as rockets to… Read More Hamas Is to Blame for Gaza’s Problems
“The left has really let us down.’ Why many American Jews feel abandoned Like many American Jews, Jonah Goldman sides politically with the left, including its push for the rights of Palestinians. During college, he was active in J Street, the liberal Jewish advocacy group that opposes the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and lobbies… Read More ‘The left has really let us down.’ Why many American Jews feel abandoned.
Medea Benjamin Russia’s brutal February 2022 invasion of Ukraine has attracted widespread condemnation across the West. Government and media circles present the conflict as a simple dichotomy between an evil empire and an innocent victim. In this concise, accessible and highly informative primer, Medea Benjamin and Nicolas Davies insist the picture is more complicated. Yes,… Read More War in Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict
Top European officials are furious with Joe Biden’s administration and now accuse the Americans of making a fortune from the war, while EU countries suffer. “The fact is, if you look at it soberly, the country that is most profiting from this war is the U.S. because they are selling more gas and at higher… Read More Europe accuses US of profiting from war
James 4:2: “you have not, because you ask not.“ The great Doctor of the Church, Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, wrote, “The absolute necessity of prayer is taught throughout the Holy Scriptures, and by all the holy Fathers; while, on the other hand, I see that Christians are very careless in their practice of this great… Read More “Those who pray will be saved, those who do not will be lost”
By Pieter Vree, New Oxford Review “… NATO is a “done deal,” but Ukraine’s membership isn’t. Though the United States is “obliged” to defend NATO states, we are not required to defend non-NATO states such as Ukraine. With all due respect to Joseph Kerwin and A. James McAdams, calling Putin the next Hitler is facile… Read More So Many Hitler’s!
By Christian Oliver For Mail online.13 Dec 2022. The Pope has warned of ‘omens of even greater destruction and desolation’. The pontiff said even more dire times for humanity are set to come in the future. He was speaking at a Mass commem- orating the appearance of Mary in 1531 The Pope has offered a harrowing vision of… Read More Pope warns ‘omens of greater destruction and desolation’ for mankind
U.S. Policy & “West’s False Narrative” Stoking Tensions with Russia, China”. Biden. Pelosi visit to Taiwan… “…U S. is driving us all to the hegemonic precipice with enthusiasm”. Jeffrey Sachs, whose new article is headlined “The West’s False Narrative About Russia and China.” Sachs says the bipartisan U.S. approach to foreign policy is “unaccountably dangerous… Read More Sachs: U.S. “Driving World to Precipice”
Thomas Reeves, the author of “America’s Bishop,” a biography of Fulton J. Sheen, tells of Sheen’s concerns regarding what he saw as the accelerated secularization occuring during WWII. Reeves mentions in particular the bishop’s 1944 book Seven Pillars of Peace where the subject is treated. This secularization involved the breakdown of the family which Sheen… Read More Bishop Sheen, Rosie the Riveter, and the War’s Greatest Casualty
Statement on the Ukraine conflict – A Call to Peace and End to War. Los Angeles Catholic Worker. “We are anti-war. We believe war is a moral failure stemming from our unwillingness to actively work for peace. From the individual to the collective national level, the prioritizing of shortsighted self-interest has created this crisis. Victims… Read More The Russia – Ukraine Tragedy
Breaking Points: Matt Stoller…. Thank, Joe: — March 8. “CBS, MSNBC Thirst for War With Russia“
“From free speech to “spheres of influence” to our passion for endless war, we’ve become the doublethinkers 1984 predicted…A healthy person should be able to be horrified by what’s happening in Russia and also see a warning about the degradation that ensues from using “pre-emptive” force, or from trying to control discontent by erasing expressions… Read More Orwell Was Right –Matt Taibbi
Msgr. Timothy Verdon, the director of the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, told CNA “The images of suffering that the Pietà always implies I think will deeply touch people. I think that visitors will be moved to see these works,” he said. The image of the Pietà evokes “the personal suffering of mothers who hold their… Read More How Michelangelo’s 3 Pietàs speak to a suffering world
And on why he sees the United States as primarily responsible for what Ukraine and the world is going through today When it comes to Liberal Democratic Internationalism enforced on others by every means, says John Mearsheimer, the difference between Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. has traditionally been no more than tweedledum and tweedledee.… Read More Mearsheimer on the False Promise of Liberal Hegemony
John Waters, Ireland: ‘The biggest lie is that Russia is intent upon rebuilding the Soviet Union. Instead, Putin is building a new civilisation, based on Christianity, tradition, nationhood and family…‘ — view of John Waters, Ireland, Substack Putin is said to have liberated the Russian Orthodox Church. Solzhenitsyn thought well of him mostly, if not… Read More Vlad the Perplexing
… very reasonably. — America dropped 26,171 bombs in 2016 alone. What a bloody end to Obama’s reign — The Guardian “What does the administration have to show for eight years of fighting on so many fronts? Terrorism has spread, no wars have been “won” and the Middle East is consumed by more chaos and… Read More What Concerns Millions
Cardinal Ottaviani, head of the Holy Office under Pope Pius XII and John XXIII, wrote in 1947: “The extent of the damage done to national assets by aerial warfare, and the dreadful weapons that have been introduced of late, is so great that it leaves both vanquished and victor the poorer for years after. Innocent… Read More “No Conceivable…Justification”. Aerial warfare’s “dreadful weapons”.
Catechism of the Catholic Church Avoiding war 2307 The fifth commandment forbids the intentional destruction of human life. Because of the evils and injustices that accompany all war, the Church insistently urges everyone to prayer and to action so that the divine Goodness may free us from the ancient bondage of war. 105 2308 All citizens… Read More Traditional Just War Teaching
Social Justice, War, and Housing: Have children! Have many children! Have as many as you can. This is God’s way. Be fruitful, not voluntarily barren (save for specially graced vocations which bear other kinds of fruits for the Body of Christ). Yes, certainly, but today the dilemma for many is how many children can one… Read More Family, Eternity — and Catholic Social Justice
Catholic Critique 