Author: Raymond Kowalski

Is the American Church a Prison for the Mind?
The American Catholic is comfortable. This is a person who has remained in the Church despite all of the reasons others have found for leaving; a person who feels good inside after Mass; a person who is glad that the …

If You Had All the Time in the World, How Would You Attack the Church?
The recent Open Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church, accusing Pope Francis of heresy, precipitated a large number of commentaries. A common response was to cite ecclesiastical law for the proposition that “no one judges the pope” and …

‘Competing Visions’ of How to Be Catholic? Or Just Schism?
We heard recently from two disparate Catholic authors who surprisingly agree about the current condition of the Catholic Church. One of the authors is Ross Douthat, self-described conservative Catholic and author of To Change the Church (subtitled “Pope Francis and …

The Consequences of Belief in Jesus Christ
On March 28, 2019, the Catholic News Agency reported on a lecture given the previous day by Archbishop Charles Chaput to seminarians at the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio. During his address, Archbishop Chaput said, “Do we really believe …

The Church of Nothing Special
In December 2018, Bishop Robert Barron was asked a question by Ben Shapiro. Mr. Shapiro professed to be an observant, practicing Jew. He asked Bishop Barron whether, in the view of the Catholic Church, he is, accordingly, damned. Citing the …

Go to the Grotto of Sanity
When the day comes where you bury your head in your hands and say, “This cannot be right,” start your search for the nearest Latin Mass. I am talking here about Mass in the “extraordinary form,” the Tridentine Mass, the …

Fantastic Priests and How to Find Them
Pope St. Pius X foresaw it. Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen saw the signs of its imminent arrival. Michael Davies experienced it and documented its early attacks on the liturgy. Ross Douthat has chronicled its continued progress. Elizabeth Yore has put …

New Church, New Faith, New Pope
In 2013 Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor told Paul Vallely of The Independent, “Four years of Bergoglio would be enough to change things.” In a story published in March 2017, LifeSiteNews quoted from a speech given by former cardinal Theodore McCarrick that …

Reminder for Suffering Catholics: Satan Plays the Long Game
Satan plays a long game. We know from the Gospel of Luke that Satan intended to sift like wheat Peter and the apostles. Writing recently in National Review, Fr. Benedict Kiely has called the Church’s present trial the “summer of …

Every Man for Himself
I recently saw the movie Darkest Hour. It is the story of Winston Churchill’s first days as Britain’s prime minister, just nine months into the Second World War. It is late May, 1940, and the Nazis have pushed into France, …