This morning I had one of those startling moments when time folds back on itself, as I remembered a convergence of events that all took place in this sunny week of June, albeit in different years. Think of it as snapshots next to each other, D-Day, juxtaposed with the wedding of a French count at [...]
J.R.R. Tolkien wrote that he "ever loved that noble northern spirit," rooted in the myths and culture of Scandinavia, Germany and England, "and tried to present in its true light.” Indeed, he raised the noble north to the level of Athens and Rome, creating, in "The Lord of the Rings," an epic that stands alongside [...]
Franz Joseph Haydn composed the Mass in Time of War, his tenth setting of the Roman Catholic Mass in 1796, in the city of Eisenstadt, Austria, where he was the composer-in-residence-for Prince Esterhazy. At the time of its writing in August and its premier in December, French Revolutionary were winning victories in Italy and Germany [...]
If you are allergic to emotion, this may not be the film for you. But if your heart yearns for good to triumph over evil, for beauty to emerge from squalor, and for the vindication of strong heroes who can fight, shoot, and pray, Les Misérables will be an exhilarating experience. Putting this story before [...]
Christian schools must not follow their secular counterparts in their educational approach. They must surround their students with the noble, the beautiful, and the true in all areas of the curriculum and the academic environment, encouraging them to become like what they see. In the cultural wasteland of the ’70s, where peace and love had [...]
Howard Pyle’s historical tale illustrates G.K. Chesterton’s claim that fairy tales tell us that “dragons can be killed.” Young Otto is not himself a dragonslayer, but he is an image of the child who can withstand the assault of hatred and brutality without taking on those characteristics himself. Sometimes known as the “Father of American [...]
The mid-twentieth-century opera, “The Trial at Rouen,” tells the story of the final days of St. Joan of Arc, her imprisonment, and trial for heresy. Composer Norman Dello Joio employs themes of conscience, belief, and spiritual motivation; he makes us think about the consequences of institutional corruption and the power of individuals to rise above [...]
The theological study, “The Ascension of Christ,” shows us why the ascension is an important and necessary mystery of Christianity: It is the link between Christ’s resurrection and his second coming. It marked a new beginning, opened a new era, and drove the future course of history. The Ascension of Christ: Recovering a Neglected Doctrine, [...]
In the end, America’s greatness does not lie in its ability to exist as an ideal in the minds of men, but in its success as a lived experience and its character as a nation forged in a history steeped in order, justice, and freedom, for which it is rightfully esteemed. The “miracle at Philadelphia,” [...]
If young people do not have a conscious philosophy, the philosophy of relativism is the default. And if relativism is a noxious gas and our young people are the canaries, then it is only a matter of time until our whole society succumbs to the effects of those fumes. Walker Percy once wrote that novelists [...]
Art has the twin functions of reflecting a culture and shaping it. The problem that contemporary artists face is a difficult one: how to express meaning to a world that has become culturally over-stimulated by the spectacular, the hyper-sexualized, and the dumbed-down by inanity, and which has increasingly become antagonistic to manifestations of Christianity. “We [...]
"The 'contact' between seen and unseen is not a secret formula but a person," says artist Martin Earle. "The ultimate justification for Christian art is that the infinite God has taken the initiative, revealing Himself in a finite form. This is the form we encounter sacramentally in the Mass, and it is the form sacred [...]
Rest in peace, Michael Tilson Thomas. From those of us in the San Francisco Bay Area (and well beyond) who so enjoyed your years as music director, conductor, and the glorious face of the San Francisco Symphony, know that you will never be forgotten. I hate deaths. At the risk of stating the obvious, they [...]
Just what is Christian education? Is it Protestant education, is it evangelical Christian education, or does it also encompass Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox viewpoints? More than sixty years ago, A.W. Tozer wrote: There is, unfortunately, a feeling in some quarters today that there is something innately wrong about learning, and that to be spiritual [...]