The story you are about to read is one of the real horror endured by Bela Lugosi, and more terrifying than any screen role he played. It was to prove a tragic end for an actor synonymous with the supernatural. When it did come, it was to be an exhausted finale to what by then [...]
Few things reveal the degraded state of “conservatism” in America more than the recent, seven-minute exchange between Bill O’Reilly and George Will. What the two fought about really matters very little. To set the context, suffice it to state the debate had to do with the attempt on Ronald Reagan’s life and how well Mr. [...]
While my memories might verge on the edge of fuzzy nostalgia from time to time, I remember quite clearly what the women and men of the 1970s did, said, and believed in small-town American neighborhoods. In those years, I absolutely loved reading (and researching and writing), but I also loved running, biking, and exploring. I [...]
If every cloud has a silver lining, we can say that the presidential candidacy of Donald Trump has—whatever his detractors may say—serves some useful purposes. Those most critical of Trump speak of his followers as delirious, as if they were in the grip of some dreadful political fever. Nevertheless, a fever can be useful to [...]
Morals are soon endowed with religious sanctions because mystery and supernaturalism lend a weight that can never attach to things empirically known and genetically understood; men are more easily ruled by imagination than by science. — Will and Ariel Durant, The Story of Civilization, Volume 1.56 […]
During the 1950s, the twin pillars of worldwide anti-communism were Dwight Eisenhower’s America and the Roman Catholic Church of Pope Pius XII. During the 1980s, the last decade of the Cold War, Ronald Reagan and the Polish pope, John Paul II, were the pillars of resistance. When Pope Francis arrived in Washington on Tuesday afternoon, the [...]
Things are getting worse. There’s no doubt about it. In the midst of the sodomy of Gomorrah, the very fabric of the family has been ripped to shreds and is being trod triumphantly underfoot by those who wear their own Pride with pride. This ascendant Pride is seeking to trample the humble under foot, rubbing [...]
Every mid-term election, citizens of our republic are given the opportunity to judge whether each candidate’s rhetoric reflects our fundamental principles. To be sure, there are some irreconcilable differences among us, but, if as good citizens of a republic, we get our bearings by what we share, we will all the better be able to deliberate [...]
Ask yourself an odd question: “How conservative is my refrigerator?” Or, ask this of your car, your television, your tablet. Ask this of any number of things around the house. At first pass, this might sound unusual, if not ridiculous, because we generally don’t think of things as having behaviors or expressing particular ideas or [...]
In a recent essay* for the Christian Post, “The Christian Right: A New Hope for the Republican Party,” Napp Nazworth argues that Christian political conservatism offers the best resource for expanding the party’s base among non-whites. Citing the demography deficit within the Republican Party, Nazworth argues “social conservatives are most attuned to the sympathies of [...]
Is dating on the verge of extinction? In an article featured in their latest September magazine, Vanity Fair addresses* the fearful world of Tinder—and the toll it’s taking on traditional sorts of courtship: Hookup culture, which has been percolating for about a hundred years, has collided with dating apps, which have acted like a wayward [...]
Theologically we have passed from Christian orthodoxy, via heresy, to hedonism. Such “change” is merely the falling into error. As such, Geoffrey Chaucer sees reality whereas most of our contemporaries do not. Reality has not changed, nor is it subject to so-called “democracy” any more than it is subject to time. Plus ça change, plus [...]
“Religious man was born to be saved, psychological man is born to be pleased.” “The rules of health indicate activity; psychological man can exploit older cultural precepts, ritual struggle no less than play therapy, in order to maintain the dynamism of his culture. Of course, the newest Adam cannot be expected to limit himself to [...]
The movie mogul Sam Goldwyn once rightly growled through his cigar to a screenwriter, “If you want to send a message use a telegram.” Didacticism in storytelling is always a disaster because the audience sniffs out a sermon and switches off. They do so not because they disagree with the point of the sermon, but [...]