Manners are not artificial rules for controlling people's lives. They are the commonsense guidelines developed over time by Christian peoples to facilitate the practice of virtue. Courtesy books made this process easier since they helped create good habits early in children's souls before vices could gain a foothold. To the "woke" crowd, teaching civility and [...]
In the name of equality, the exclusively male draft could soon be discarded. Imposing the draft upon all young American women is a logical consequence of a new “woke” armed forces oriented not for war but inclusion and diversity. The American military has always had recourse to the draft in times of emergency. Through this [...]
The quest for tranquility is not found in a world of frenetic intemperance and agitated markets. Tranquility is an interior movement that presupposes a soul at peace. Wisdom is the virtue of seeking the highest cause of things. Only a society that facilitates wisdom can provide peace and order. Marketers typically create excitement around a [...]
Despite the oft-repeated mantra, college is not for everyone. Perhaps it is time to revive the traditional notion of a person’s calling: Young people need to turn to God and pray for His help to find meaning and purpose inside a world that rejects both. For students contemplating college this fall, the time has come [...]
The rigorous practice of virtue is often presented as austere and unattractive. Virtuous people do not seem to enjoy life and suppress the desires that make most people happy, appearing as unpolished individuals who abstain from beautiful and delightful things as the manifestations of a corrupt and sinful world. But is this view accurate? Modern [...]
No one wants these disproportional, ugly windmills. People don’t want their views obstructed. Even in a godless society, the modern cult of ugliness is so unnatural that human nature rebels against it. So why can’t they make beautiful windmills? Why must the industry insist upon these cold, depressing behemoths? A green new world is coming [...]
“Woke” is a doomed word since it expresses a distorted reality. It is based upon Critical Race Theory that frames the debate to favor a class-struggle narrative, dividing humanity into oppressors and oppressed. Like all Marxist lingo, “woke” deepens resentments instead of healing them. If there is any word guaranteed to enhance a conversation or [...]
While painful, suffering can have good consequences and enrich our personal lives. Overcoming adversity can produce in us sentiments of satisfaction and fulfillment. When we confront tragedy with courage and honor, we experience a growth in character that stays with us for life. In Virgil’s Roman epic poem, The Aeneid, there is a famous scene [...]
The role of Harry and Meghan, the former Duke and Duchess of Sussex, was to be the almost fairy-tale models for a world in need of elite leadership. They were called to embody all that is excellent in the British nation so that others might strive to imitate them. But they have utterly failed in [...]
School systems everywhere are alarmed by this squishy generation of hyper-pampered children who are unsure of themselves and unable to confront reality. They are a product of clueless, hyper-pampering parents, who confuse affection with preventing all suffering. There have always been parents who spare the rod and spoil the child. However, today’s hyper-protective parents have [...]
Shame is a product of a society that prioritizes the soul over the body and is a defense mechanism against all that is low, vulgar, and sinful. The loss of shame in today’s world comes from a profound change in values. We used to have a sense of shame that influenced our behavior. Reflecting upon [...]
A confused notion of freedom leaves us with a polarized and fragmented society in which everything is allowed in the name of a concept that we can no longer define or classify. But the interplay of positive and negative freedom, properly understood, allows society to function harmoniously and with the least coercion. In our polarized [...]
Ryszard Legutko’s “The Cunning of Freedom” pierces through the darkness of today’s shallow notions of freedom and exposes the dangers of continuing on the present course. The author indicates a metaphysical path whereby postmodern man might find that truth that will set him free. The Cunning of Freedom: Saving the Self in an Age of [...]
Pierre Cardin destroyed fashion by introducing chaotic, irrational, bizarre, and immodest themes to his clothing lines. He is a product of postmodern thought, which denies all universal narratives and meaning, reducing life to the limitless freedom to create one’s own reality. This is a life without God or restraint that ends up enslaving people to [...]