As we start a new chapter of life after our move from Minnesota to Texas, I have a new goal for us. From now on, we are to switch our minimalism from Money to Things. No more acceptance of free things that will make our house less free. Henceforth and forevermore, we are no more [...]
Every bishop, priest, and pastor should read "Endgame" for the sake of the Church and the country. Much evangelization assumes things taught in families that don’t exist. This book shows the way to family—and renewed faith. Endgame: The Church’s Strategic Move to Save Faith and Family in America, by John Van Epp and J. P. [...]
In almost every single shooter case, a true Christian father is missing. By his example and counsel, the Christian father directs the boy to channel his energies and emotions into manly pursuits and virtuous action. Indeed, the devoted father provides society with a balanced young man who will defend society from attacks. Across the country, [...]
Andrew Nelson Lytle—novelist, dramatist, essayist, and professor of literature—extolled the order of the family, which by the 1930s he thought all but spent, precisely because it was rooted in the very concept of divine order that the modern world had decried and rejected. As patriarchy deteriorated, as acceptance of divine supremacy vanished, the family languished, [...]
The true secret of Sir Percival in "The Woman in White" is both compelling and rich in significance—if we have the sensitivity as readers to perceive it. “He’s obviously a werewolf.” That was the unanimous opinion of the university students with whom I attended a performance of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s adaptation of The Woman in [...]
Watanabe Sadao never made art for popes and presidents. He made art for the humble Christian home. His simple style was not an affectation, but a true expression of his Christian faith. Like his father’s hymns, Watanabe’s prints were for living a Christian day, not for achieving artistic glory. Anyone who lived through the last [...]
It is up to our “little platoons” to restore the respect for work that alone can restore health to an economic order. It is a long road, but a good start on going down the that road is to read carefully our historians and poets. M. Stanton Evans once said, in defense of free markets: [...]
The Left wants the de-conversion of our children. This is why it’s time to brainwash our children. By brainwash I mean cleanse the brains of our young adults, who are in the prime of formation, with Philosophy, Morality, and an authentic spirituality that gives them the opportunity to encounter the Person of Jesus Christ. I’ll [...]
The pursuit of women’s equality and happiness is often assumed to be closely tied to choosing work. But would it really be so bad if many mothers—who have the financial means—decide to work part-time or stay home with their children full-time once the COVID restrictions are lifted? One of the details of George Weigel’s biography [...]
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 [...]
We love God, follow the reason implicit in sexual nature, and consider having children the greatest privilege bestowed on us, the greatest of gifts. Each child is a huge promise, a new world aborning, and I cannot imagine a financial anxiety so serious that it would make anyone think otherwise. In one of the customs [...]
Ancestry.com and 23andMe are brilliant modern genealogical tools. They are connected to various databases around the world, including the National Archives, and can fill in gaps of genealogical history. But genealogy is more than a collection of digitized documents and records; it is listening to stories at the dinner table, digging through dusty scrapbooks, and [...]
In our time of fatherlessness, underachieving boys, social fraying, and the collapse of marriage, helping boys to become men needs to be done. We owe it to them in justice, or else we will not have healthy families, parishes, neighborhoods, and towns. Many years ago, in an article for Touchstone called, “A Requiem for Friendship,” [...]
Just as the advent of the Savior at Christmastime did not eliminate the consequences of human sin and foolishness but opened a new way forward, so too the vision of Jack Campbell in “The Family Man” does not change his wasted last thirteen years but opens up the possibility of a very different future for [...]