The Catholic Thing

By Casey ChalkEarlier this year a meta-analysis in Advances in Psychological Science found a correlation between having a heightened sense of self-righteousness and what is called "third-party punishment," meaning punishing someone for a perceived infraction, even when you are not the victim of that infraction. An earlier study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that people...

By Anthony EsolenIn the pilot episode of the old television show The Waltons, the six Walton children have gathered outdoors in the cold and the snow, where a lady from a religious charity is handing out Christmas presents to the littler ones. The presents have been donated by people better off than almost anybody in their mountain village. She gives a present in exchange for a Bible verse. Mary...

By James P. MacGuireIn 1896, Episcopal clergyman John Byron Diman founded St. George's School in Newport, R.I. It became one of the so-called Saint Grottlesex schools, that name being a portmanteau of St. George's, St. Mark's, St. Paul's, Groton, and Middlesex: Protestant prep schools that fairly defined the Gilded AgeBut then the Rev. Diman had a change of heart. He converted to Catholicism and...

By Auguste MeyratWith many members of the Gen Z cohort (b. 1997-2012) coming of age and entering public life, it behooves older generations to understand them better. I can recall the many essays, books, and movies examining my own generation, the millennials (b. 1981-1996), as well as those assessing Generation X (b. 1965 -1980) before that. While they were not always accurate or entirely...

By Michael Pakaluk"We know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good" (Romans 8:28).Disasters must come in this fallen world, and maybe they will come to us. There are relatively few sayings of Jesus which the Holy Spirit saw fit to preserve. But one of these addresses the fact of disasters. About those Galileans whose blood Pilate mixed with their sacrifices, or the 18...

By Francis X. MaierFor three of my 27 years on diocesan staff, I had the attached duty of ecumenical and inter-religious affairs. It was great work. We had good relations with local Protestant and Latter-Day Saint communities; cordial discussions with local rabbis; and personal friendships with local Greek Orthodox and American Jewish Committee leaders.With Islam, the story was different. Over...

By Amy FaheyA little over a year ago, I took my aged father for a specialist visit. The appointment, which I still recall with painful clarity, put me in mind of the Anglo-Saxon poem known simply as "The Ruin." The manuscript is damaged, so what remains is itself a kind of ruin, a meditation on former splendor contrasted with brokenness and fragmentation. It struck me then, as it does now, as a...

By St. Pope John Paul IIThrough work, man must earn his daily bread and contribute to the continual advance of science and technology and, above all, to elevating unceasingly the cultural and moral level of the society within which he lives in community with those who belong to the same family.And work means any activity by man, whether manual or intellectual, whatever its nature or...

By Brad MinerThere was once a monument in Rome called Milliarium Aureum: the Golden Milestone. The Emperor Augustus erected it in the Forum in about 20 B.C. All distances in Ancient Rome were said to be marked from (or to) that spot. There's still a round remnant of it in the Roman Forum.It gave rise to the phrase, "All roads lead to Rome," for the very good reason that they did. The 12th-century...

By Robert Lazu KmitaIn a world where formal pronouns have disappeared from almost every language, and where good manners are not merely rare but actively ridiculed, we are gradually turning into grotesque versions of Shrek. Even the dwarves from Tolkien's tales, as portrayed in films of recent decades, are boorish creatures who grunt and scrape the mud from their boots against the edges of one of...