Over the past week, German Cardinal Reinhard Marx has once again fueled discussion of the possibility of ordaining to the priesthood those who are called “viri probati”, i.e., married men who lead a virtuous life. Several reports have now been published in Germany which relate what Cardinal Marx himself just said at the assembly of…
Over the weekend, as I browsed my social media timelines, I found myself scrolling past what appeared to be a proliferation of sexual misconduct stories in the worlds of both politics and entertainment. In response to these stories, I also saw not a small amount of gloating, for lack of a better word, coming from…
Yesterday, 9 November, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, the former Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, gave yet another interview, in which he continues to try to explain his own position with regard to the current debate about Pope Francis’ post-synodal exhortation, Amoris Laetitia. With his new statement, he contradicts the claims of…
Image: Left: Fr. Thomas Weinandy, OFM Cap. (CNS); top right: Fr. James Martin, S.J. (Wikipedia); bottom right: Msgr. John Strynkowski (YouTube) Fr. Thomas Weinandy, OFM Cap., is owed a debt of gratitude for his courage and forthrightness in making public his letter to Pope Francis respectfully criticizing and encouraging the Holy Father to fulfill his principal charge: to…
Image: Antonio Escobar y Mendoza, a prominent casuist of the 17th century. One might think casuistry is dead and buried, that the controversies of the 17th century should be over once and for all. Rarely do any of our contemporaries still read the Lettres Provinciales (Provincial Letters) and the authors whom Pascal (1623-1662) attacks therein.…
Many of our readers might already be aware that in spite of his own exhortations in favor of open-hearted dialogue, Pope Francis himself was responsible for steering some of the discussions during the two family synods, especially with regard to the question of divorced and “remarried” couples. The most prominent example of these kinds of…
“My Lord and my God, from this moment I accept at Thy hands, with resignation and cheerfulness, the kind of death it may please Thee to send me, with all its pains and anguish.” Despite the countless daydreams I’ve indulged in throughout my sanguine life, it struck me a few days ago that I have…
All photos courtesy of Ruth Durkin. On the Feast of the Christ the King, the center of the faithful Catholic world was briefly focused on the Drake Hotel in Chicago, IL, as over 200 members of the Catholic Art Guild, their supporters, and patrons met for their first annual “Conference on Beauty and the restoration…
St. Thomas Aquinas wrote that servile fear is of the kind that a servant feels before his master — essentially, a fear of punishment. “Accordingly, ” St. Thomas writes, “if a man turn to God and adhere to Him, through fear of punishment, it will be servile fear; but if it be on account of fear of committing a fault, it will…
As Professor Claudio Pierantoni recently stated, there is an ongoing debate between himself and Professor Josef Seifert on one side and Professor Rocco Buttiglione on the other as pertains to the apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia. Buttiglione, who is known as an early defender of the exhortation, has also publicly criticized the recent Filial Correction of Pope Francis.…
So it’s Guy Fawkes Day. Thanks to the Gunpowder Plot to blow up Parliament, English Protestants have had a Catholic boogeyman to focus their hate on for centuries. Fawkes would have been the Osama bin Laden of Catholics, had he succeeded. I wouldn’t doubt it, in fact, if it were actually Divine Providence that prevented…
