Commentary
O Come, O Come, Emmanuel—the O Antiphons!
Through these successive antiphons, the Church expresses its yearning for the coming of the Savior by praising Christ as the wisdom of God, the lord and ruler of Israel, the root of Jesse, the key of David, the Dayspring, the king of nations, and Emmanuel—the name prophesied by Isaiah (7:14), which means “God is with us”, and which St. Matthew applies to Christ in his gospel (1:23).
The Expectation
For me at least, the “Expectation” evokes strong feelings that every parent knows: the anticipation, the excitement, the anxiety, the impatience that have been building for nine months, coming to a crescendo in the final days before the birth.
What the rededication of Notre Dame (should have) taught us
Yet on the day when the cathedral was rededicated, and the attention of the world was focused on this building that speaks of the hunger for transcendence, the ceremony failed to capitalize on this unique “teachable moment.” When the secular world paused, listening to hear the echoes of an ancient faith, the ceremony spoke only in modern language.
Synodality today: The power of God or the wisdom of men?
The Church needs to be far less concerned about convoluted structures and exploratory methods in a never-ending effort to appear more “consultative” and “open”. People will learn to manipulate the new structures just as they have manipulated the old. The New Evangelization cannot be accomplished through processes and procedures. Instead, the Church must become once again missionary, and probably never more missionary than in the places where she once thought she was already established.
187—The Roman Rite, ad orientem worship, and liturgical tradition—Fr. Uwe Michael Lang
Fr. Uwe Michael Lang discusses the history of the Roman Rite, the value of ad orientem worship, problems with liturgical antiquarianism and more.
The Artificial Jesus
Disembodied Artificial Jesus is never negative or scary. Are you tired of homilies at Mass? No worries. Plug in Artificial Jesus. Need heartfelt counseling from an expert? Talk to Artificial Jesus.
Dawn Eden Goldstein wants to sue EWTN: thoughts on the Catholic New Left
No one needed the Catholic Old Left and good riddance to them. But the Catholic New Left? I think we garden variety Catholic conservatives, guys like me, I think we need them.
Reasons for our hope? We do have that obligation.
I might believe anything, for good reasons, for bad reasons, or for no particular reason at all. And certainly the actual supernatural gift of faith is gratuitous, along with the hope and love that go with it. We cannot claim it on our own. Therefore, it is not always the case that we are aware of actual “reasons” or “justifications” for our faith, and we may receive that gift without benefit of the reasons or justifications argued by others. Nonetheless, reasons for our hope are not irrelevant.
Pelosi’s canonical gambit
The logical conclusion… is that Pelosi did not file a canonical appeal anticipating a positive result. She filed the appeal so that she would be able to answer questions from reporters who weren’t keen to press the details.
The ‘obscure provision’ of Canon 915
The implication here is that everyday Catholics are familiar with the provisions of canon law. So that presumably they could rattle off the first 914 canons in the code without any difficulty, but when asked to continue, would bog down. “Canon 915? Oh, gosh; that’s obscure.”
St. Boethius: Church Father and Medieval Scholar
St. Severinus Boethius was a man with one foot in the ancient world and one foot in the middle ages. He is another one of our lesser-known fathers who were anything but forgotten among the medieval scholastics. In this episode, Dr. Papandrea introduces another enigmatic but highly influential Church father.
My panel on Catholic cinema at Notre Dame’s Fall Conference
A talk I gave at Notre Dame’s 2024 Fall Conference/the Catholic Imagination Conference this year has been uploaded to YouTube by the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture. My talk was part of a larger panel together with Nathan Douglas and Andrew Petiprin, titled 30 Years of the Vatican...
Is Pope Francis fighting youthful battles all over again?
Which recent Pope has done most to clarify the Church’s grasp of the natural moral law (answer: the personalist philosopher St. John Paul II) and which has done most to confuse that grasp (answer: Francis). We might also ask which recent pope has done most to spark a genuine renewal of Catholic theology (answer: the ressourcement theologian Benedict XVI) and which has done most to encourage theologians in re-shaping Divine Revelation to justify contemporary sexual morals (answer: Francis).
Prepare the Way of the Lord with a Good Confession
Adam blamed Eve, and Eve blamed the serpent, but the blame-game gambit didn’t work. They were guilty as charged.
Setting the record straight on Governor Grandma
In this week of big national and international happenings, I want to talk about a small thing, a local thing. I want to talk about it because I think it has a lot to do with our present situation on the national level. And because it is a cautionary tale for Catholics like, well, me, who are excited about the new possibilities in the political arena.
Time! How long should the homily be? How long for Mass?
In this “efficiency mode”, my own preference is to hear something from the priest after the Gospel, but it upsets my precious schedule if the homily is longer than a few minutes. And if it goes to fifteen or twenty minutes….well, let’s just say that the last time my watch broke, I decided not to replace it, mostly for spiritual reasons.
Wishing you a restless Advent
If the parties are all held before Christmas— earlier and earlier, as hosts try to avoid the rush— then both the decorations and the party-goers are wilting by the time Christmas Day arrives. So the premature celebrations that nearly erase Advent also sap the joyous energy from the Christmas season.
186—Is there ever enough of Mary? w/ Fr. Charles Anthony Mary, F.I.
De Maria numquam satis: Of Mary never enough. Is this saying of Bernard, echoed by many other saints, a mere overflow of sentimental piety, or can it be sustained as a rational approach to theology? Fr. Charles Anthony Mary, a Franciscan Friar of the Immaculate, draws from the Franciscan tradition to make the case for Mary-Maxing, culminating in the cutting-edge (and controversial) Mariology of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe.
A high court case that challenges the rule of law
In the end, therefore, the most important question before the Supreme Court is not whether sex-change operations are proper medical care, nor whether minors should be protected, nor even whether the Constitution allows state regulations of these treatments. The real issue is whether legal decisions must be guided by evidence and logic.
Perseverance—and thick skin!—required for apostolic work
What is important is not that this or that proposed work should succeed or fail, but that more people are drawn to Christ and the Church, and that more people in the Church ask what they can do to strengthen their own faith and the faith of others.
Safeguarding the Republican Right-to-Life Agenda
The unfortunate revised stance of the GOP threatens the historical (but always tenuous) pro-life position of the Republican Party. Mainstream Republican pro-life support was always a response to organized pro-life advocacy. So the upcoming months are crucial.
St. Henry Walpole—Upon the Death of M. Edmund Campion
"You thought perhaps when learned Campion dies, / His pen must cease, his sugared tongue be still; / But you forgot how loud his death it cries / How far beyond the sound of tongue and quill."
Fr. Carlos Martins, Sir Alec Guinness, and what has been lost
Those are the two issues at which Fr. Martins is at the center this week. Where stands the Church, 22 years after the first wave of clergy sex abuse scandals. And what are we to make of celebrity exorcists (or at least, of this one). In this column, I will address the first of those two.
Who Was Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite?
Whenever you see “Pseudo-“ in front of a name like this, it means we don’t really know who the person was. This Church father wrote under the name of Dionysius the Areopagite, a convert of St. Paul mentioned in the book of Acts. But the documents attributed to him were written hundreds of years later. Nevertheless, this unknown pseudonymous author was hugely influential for some of the most important fathers and doctors of the Church.
What to make of the ongoing preoccupation with Synodality
A true Christian constantly re-examines his or her habits. The goal is to never obscure Christ, ignore Christ or take Christ for granted. Bishops and pastors will have to take even “synodality” with a grain of salt, for no mere process assures good outcomes. When consultation and collaboration become ends in themselves, they will always be used by those who do not accept this or that Catholic teaching, and so will at times get in the way of decisive and effective action.
Anatomy of a Compromised Conscience
Did Pilate himself convert to the Catholic faith, as some traditions hold? We don’t know. But we remember Pontius Pilate by name every time we recite the Creed.
Fear all around me
That someone— or the software he had remotely installed on my car’s computer— thought I should know that winter weather was on its way. Thank you, my solicitous friend, but actually I knew that already
Joseph Bottum’s An Anxious Age never got the Catholic attention it deserved
With the 2025 Jubilee almost upon us, I am remembering the Great Jubilee of 2000. What a time of excitement in our Church. Of hope for its future and for the future of the world. Looking back from the perspective of 25 years later, I can’t help but wonder: What the heck happened? All that hoopla about a “New Evangelization” of the West and how the Third Millennium would be a “New Springtime” of Faith. Where did it all go?
The Simplicity of Advent
How to keep Advent simply and intentionally, by carving out time for family and building one's family story in liturgical living.
St. John Henry Newman—Reverence, a Belief in God’s Presence
"They are the class of feelings we should have—yes, have in an intense degree—if we literally had the sight of Almighty God; therefore they are the class of feelings which we shall have, if we realize His presence."
The curious background of the Pope’s ‘fixer’
Personnel is policy. The Vatican’s professed desire for transparency and accountability count for little if the institutional secrets and the confidential finances are consigned to a prelate whose track record suggests that he sees no evil.
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