The Vatican presented something important today, 8 June, at a press conference: the Preparatory Document for the upcoming 2019 Pan-Amazon Synod in which there is now talk about giving women some “type of official ministry” and of making “courageous” and inculturated proposals with regard to the Church’s “inclusive ministerial action.” One of the leading organiziers…
“A dictatorship requires three things: a man, an idea, and a following ready to live for the man and the idea, and if necessary to die for them. If the man is lacking, it is hopeless; if the idea is lacking, it is impossible; if the following is missing, the dictatorship is only a bad…
By the night of Friday, 25 May, one already knew the outcome from the exit polls. The margin of victory for abortion was too huge for there to be any doubt. The result, while disheartening, was not surprising – any truly faithful Catholic living in modern Ireland could see that the storm clouds have been…
I usually steer myself away from political topics here. Partially because it’s a bit outside our normal wheelhouse, partially because I’m just sick to death, after over a decade of living in the DC Metro area and being a political conservative with a microphone, of talking about any of it. But the religious liberty issue…
All around us, the signs are there. The ship is going down. Institutions of all stripes are corrupted at all levels, and almost all of these institutions are polarizing themselves against any burning embers left over from Christendom. For centuries, scheming men in their sects have secretly and ritualistically crushed the papal tiara and the…
Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s famous adage, “Save the Liturgy, Save the World,” nicely sums up the way God’s presence and grace are conveyed through the sacraments and how our disposition to receive the graces they provide is enhanced by well performed ritual. A liturgy filled with beautiful physical things helps us, body-soul composites that we are, to…
Shortly after my wife and I were married in 1998, we were able to spend some time in Venice. Visiting the churches there was a particular delight, as there was so much to discover. I recall especially the church of St. George with its spacious choir and sanctuary, and Santa Maria dei Miracoli with its…
Today we’re trying out a new video format. Called the “1P5 Minute” it’s a short, informative breakdown on a big story we’re currently working on. (Would love for it to be an actual minute, but I just couldn’t cut any more info out and tell the whole story.) Today we tackle the rather complex issues…
It is a story that reads like a passage from The Dictator Pope: Pope Francis recently accepted the age-related resignation of Héctor Aguer, the Archbishop of La Plata, Argentina — the capital city of the Buenos Aires province — and will replace him with his close confidant and ghostwriter, Archbishop Víctor Manuel “Tucho” Fernández. Not…
When the story first broke in April that the CDF had, with the pope’s explicit blessing, rejected the German Bishops’ intercommunion handout, people weren’t sure what to think. Nobody had seen the communication, and it was very intentionally kept under wraps by the Vatican. At the time, I issued a cautionary note about thinking that…
A few days ago, Archbishop Luis Ladaria, the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), restated the Church’s infallible teaching about the ordaining of female priests in the Catholic Church. The statement was followed by many speculations. For example, some people ask whether this Ladaria text really corresponds to Pope Francis’…
