Church and Culture
June 2026
: Every No, An Act of Love Over the last half century, the general agreement between Church and culture has broken down. The …
July 2024
: Liberty Celebrating America’s independence is on the calendar this week, which means for most it’ll be a …
March 2024
: Frozen In vitro fertilization is back in the news. The Alabama Supreme Court in recent weeks issued a …
January 2024
: Platitudes A frequent criticism of Christians is that, in times of great sorrow or difficulty, we fall back on …
November 2023
: Breaking Faith It’s challenging to remember the feelings we experienced at the election of Pope Francis. A total …
July 2023
: Free It’s hard to not be grateful when we realize the blessing of being born into this country. For all …
July 2022
: Slow Progress We awake to find ourselves suddenly in a Post-Roe world. The question of abortion is thrown back …
: Worth Celebrating At every point in our Nation’s life, all 246 years, there have been voices predicting its imminent …
June 2022
: The Work Begins For 49 years, our voice on the fundamental issue for society was silenced. A contrived legal theory, …
January 2022
: Applied Bioethics One of the best outcomes from majoring in Philosophy is how it nurtured my sense of curiosity. The …
: Image and Likeness 2021 was supposed to be the year of civility and normalcy. Well, we didn’t get it. Instead, we got …
: All Things New What a lousy two years we’ve had. Disruption, distortion, and distrust maligned what was supposed to …
December 2021
: Creating Evil I rarely go to the movies. In fact, I think the last new movie that I saw in theaters was Mission …
October 2021
: Unglued I was reading my favorite personal finance blog earlier, when I came across a guest post. To my …
: Perfect Heroes Hero is a common word these days. Healthcare workers are heroes for putting themselves and their …
April 2021
: Mercy Divine Mercy Sunday was yesterday. This annual jubilee is a reset available for anyone who wants it. …
: He is Not Here What a Lent! After a year of pandemic and lockdowns, this Spring is starting to feel quite …
January 2021
: Uncertainty Something remarkable happens when you engage in a daily habit of prayer. I’ve written before about …
December 2020
: Time Lost The last week of the year is traditionally a pensive time for me. In an ordinary year, I would wrap …
: Waiting The Fourth Week of Advent is here, and our time of preparation is coming to a close. We’ve spent …
November 2020
: What Did We Learn? America’s political class went into Election Day with a very specific idea of how things were going …
: Off the Reservation This blog has defended Pope Francis. He told us to go out into the Church and the world to make a …
: Election Eve Election day is finally here. What a cycle it’s been! In many respects, this election cycle has been …
September 2020
: The New Evangelization Stumbles Getting to Mass on a weekday is hard for me, and that was before the pandemic. The difficulty is not …
June 2020
: Safety and Stability We live comfortably, but that’s rarely the experience of Catholics. Many, if not most Catholics …
August 2019
: Spiritual Bankruptcy I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on the mass shootings gripping our society. Young men, …
June 2019
: The Scandal Many Catholics in the United States felt in the opening years of the millennium that we had stared …
October 2018
: Jehovah’s Witness There are many things that I’m getting used to now that I live in a house in a neighborhood. Living …
May 2018
: Build Your Parish Community A few years ago, my parents’ parish redesigned their website. I have an interest in these sorts of …
September 2016
: Pro-Life with Credibility The modern pro-life movement has focused on the issue of abortion. It would seem that is an …
August 2016
: Impeach Francis I seldom take the time to read editorials. While the premise is good, the execution scarcely follows …
March 2016
: Divorcing Faith and Work Over the past several decades, the pressure to divorce one’s faith from one’s work has become …
February 2016
: Antonin Scalia: America’s Thomas More “In every interaction you have with people, you can either give them life or take some away.” -Toby …
January 2016
: Broken Promises I’ve been struggling lately to defend my beliefs amid our culture shifts. It’s not that I think that …
December 2015
: Pray for Those Who Persecute You But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you. - Matthew 5:44 Jesus’ …
November 2015
: Vapid Music I’m fairly certain in every generation, as art pushes the boundaries of cultural norms and …
: The Radical Early Christians For perhaps the first time in my life, I’m reading the Acts of the Apostles. Alison gave me the …
: Why Mass Matters I don’t bother to read the surveys that pollsters do of Catholics. It turns into an exercise in, …
October 2015
: Priests Are Superheroes If I were a priest, the standing weekly appointment that I’d most look forward to, and at the same …
: Christian Animosity Towards Catholics During Pope Francis’ recent visit to the United States, I was inundated with news articles, Tweets, …
: Every Election is Important We’re getting deep into the 2016 election, even though it’s more than a year away. The fields for …
: The Art of Compromise We live in a large society, and so the idea that we can have things exactly the way we want them is …
: The Church Isn’t A Democracy The reporting and commenting on the Church these days is insufferable. I skip over most articles, …
September 2015
: Go Read the Documents If you have a question about what the Church teaches, just go read the documents. Start with the …
August 2015
: A Culture that Respects Life We find ourselves, yet again, as Americans doing some serious soul-searching after last week’s …
June 2015
: Celebrate Life One of the great tragedies of our modern era is our misunderstanding of the value of children. For a …
March 2015
: The Rise of Divorce I’ve recently started working on a family genealogy project. In the past, I hadn’t much cared about …
February 2015
: Our Political Role Today we observe President’s Day and I think it’s an excellent time for us to consider our political …
: The Benefit of Catholic Schools Last week, we celebrated Catholic Schools Week. While this post would’ve been much more appropriate …
January 2015
: Why We March Today marks both a sobering anniversary and a special anniversary. Today is the anniversary of the …
December 2014
: Why Big Tech is Wrong I saw an article a few weeks ago that both Apple and Facebook were expanding their employee benefits …
September 2014
: Faith of the Martyrs I have a difficult time imagining a physical persecution of happening in the United States. I have …
: Be Transparently Catholic In the 8th grade, I read the great American Classic, To Kill A Mockingbird. One of the scenes in the …
July 2014
: My First Eucharistic Procession Sharing our faith boldly with those around us can be challenging. You can’t just be chillin by the …
June 2014
: Better Than A Purity Ring Some people believe that in Christian Marriage chastity is no longer a struggle. False. I’ve really …
May 2014
: Why People Delay Marriage The average age of newlyweds is climbing in the United States. More and more young couples are …
April 2014
: Why I Don’t Buy Generic Oreos You can often tell how good something is simple by considering whether or not you would buy a …
March 2014
: Witnessing for Marriage Every day, everywhere that we go, we have the opportunity to show those around us what it means to …
December 2013
: Why Culture Isn’t Prepared for Us Culture only wants boys. Culture tears down men. Culture celebrates immaturity and selfishness. …
October 2013
: 4 Reasons Your Pet is Not A Kid If you follow me on Instagram, you know that I have a cat. I adopted her three years ago and they …
August 2013
: Reflecting Christ’s Love to the World When you get married, you take on two responsibilities. First, you take responsibility for the care …
: Marriage is Not Committed Friendship Marriage is a lot of things. It is painful, it is difficult, it is challenging. It is joyful, it is …
: Love Contracts I recently came across an article about a new trend in marriages. It is called a “love contract.” …
May 2013
: Teaching Healthy Marriage Growing up, I received most of my education from Catholic schools, thanks to the sacrifice of my …
April 2013
: Cohabitation: Not A Test Drive When my wife and I got engaged, we were living in two different cities. She was studying in Detroit …
: Not for the Comfortable Catholics tend to each have their own flare for practicing their faith. Thankfully, my wife and I …