A sub-category of News.
Reading Michael Lewis’ fascinating journalistic portrait of the disgraced cryptocurrency wizard Samuel Bankman-Fried, I was surprised to find a discussion of the ethics of abortion. It was taken from a blog the man wrote in his sophomore year at college. Bankman-Fried’s parents are described as utilitarians who “continually wrestled with the tension, in American law……
I was watching an interview recently with a very successful divorce lawyer giving advice on marriage (which in some ways was insightful, believe it or not; in other ways, not so much). The interviewer asked him if he thought marriage will change in the next twenty years, to which he responded, This insight also relates…
You don’t see it as much anymore, but many good Catholic Examinations of Conscience used to refer to a “fear of Hell” as an acceptable, albeit imperfect, means of contrition when confessing one’s sins. Perhaps it’s our modern desensitization to the reality of Hell and the demonic, or the failure of Church leadership to adequately…
Two vignettes: Both matters came to mind recently while reading “The Ethicist.” In case you don’t know, “The Ethicist” is a New York Times help column written by Kwame Appiah, who teaches ethics at New York University. The ethical dilemmas his correspondents pose are hardly those of my childhood, which focused on whether to bring…
Exactly 750 years ago on this date—December 6, 1273—Friar Thomas Aquinas received his supreme mystical experience that led to what Josef Pieper called “the silence of St. Thomas.” I maintain that more than coincidence unites this divine crowning of Thomas’s life with the devotional cultus of St. Nicholas, whose feast has always been celebrated in…
“There are decades in which nothing happens, and there are weeks in which decades happen.” I don’t often quote Lenin, but I feel like decades of change have happened in the Catholic Church over the past several weeks. When historians look back on our time, they will undoubtedly see it as one of upheaval and…
Above: Antwerp, Belgium. Photo credit. Johan Josef Bonny has been the bishop of Antwerp in Belgium since 2009. He has made problematic individual statements in contradiction to the Church’s teaching about various ethical questions including sexual ethics, the blessing of same-sex couples, and most recently euthanasia. Regarding the latter, he stated this past September “Euthanasia is…
The vehemence of the arguments against playing Christmas music before Christmas intrigues me. I don’t disagree with the arguments, but the sheer emotionalism that so often accompanies them makes me wonder. I’ve concluded that the passion that surrounds this issue reveals a certain fear. We know the importance of Advent, but are we afraid that…
Recently, I came across an article in Becker’s Hospital Review celebrating the newest crop of “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion officers” in health systems across the country. Among other vital tasks to the health of the nation, these newly deputized C-suite denizens are “instituting training sessions” and “improving hiring practices” in order to “uplift diverse populations”…
Above: one of the televised sessions of Vatican II. The liturgical reform document, Sacrosanctum Concilium, was promulgated sixty years ago today on December 4th, 1963. Introduction Turning 60 can be traumatic: all of a sudden retirement looms on the horizon, less than optimal physical fitness or even the prospect of bad heath beckons—if it has…
