They find him guilty of being Catholic. In Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò’s recent letter to Donald Trump, he writes, “just as there is a deep state, there is also a deep church that betrays its duties and forswears its proper commitments before God.” Naturally, the deep church resented the letter. But it particularly didn’t like […]
The riots have exposed the depth of America’s civilizational crisis. Yet where are the supposed religious leaders of that civilization to decry it? They are difficult to find. To the extent that clergy have been visible at all in the crisis, they emerged not to stop the mob but to join it. Their statements rest […]
Wherein the hierarchy defers to the state. Donald Trump wants to open up churches more than some church leaders do. No sooner had he proposed that churches be deemed “essential” services than some church leaders began criticizing him. At CNN, Father Edward Beck quickly penned a column saying “Mr. President, we don’t need to open […]
The Bible is replete with stories of people who suffer chastisements for placing strange Gods before the true God. But for Pope Francis, who this last week participated in a “multi-faith” prayer event, the chastisement of coronavirus could lift if we all just pray to the strange Gods of our choice. “I would like to […]
When Pope Francis grants an interview, he makes news by subverting Church teaching. When Pope Benedict XVI gives one, he makes news by upholding it. Therein lies the two popes problem about which the media can’t keep complaining. This last week it ran stories pitting the two against each other after a new book about […]
Fretting over the fate of Judas wouldn’t seem a high priority for a pope. But it is a subject that gnaws at Pope Francis. In 2014, the Religion News Service ran an article entitled “Pope Francis: Judas Wasn’t So Bad.” It quoted from a sermon in which he said all of Jesus Christ’s disciples were […]
Thousands of prisoners have been released from jails since the coronavirus crisis hit. “In Los Angeles County, Sheriff Alex Villanueva has embarked on what appears to be the largest U.S. effort to release inmates, freeing 1,700 people this month, or about 10 percent of the population of one of the nation’s largest jail systems,” reports […]
The other day I received a call from someone asking me if I knew that the press spokesman for the Paulist Fathers is in a gay marriage. I checked it out and sure enough the caller was right. Paul Snatchko has served as director of marketing and communications for the Paulist Fathers for over four […]
Observe his deeds, not his words. The latest papal controversy touches on the pope’s meeting last year with James Martin, the leading proponent of LGBT causes in the Church. According to the Catholic News Agency, Pope Francis told a group of American bishops recently that he felt “used” by Martin: During a private meeting with […]
His exhortation about the Amazon synod raises more questions than it answers. Typical of a Jesuit,” said Archbishop Bruno Forte in 2016, as he reflected on the deviously indirect style of Pope Francis. Forte, a close aide to Pope Francis, recalled that the pope didn’t want to spell out his support for Communion for the […]