What sort of thing is the internet? It’s not exactly a physical thing, but it was made by human hands. It is a real thing, but not something I can touch. It is something man-made but difficult to nail down because it is unlike just about everything else. Asking ‘what sort of a thing’ something [...]
Literature is important because it takes us beyond the facts to the truth. It shows us who we are as human beings and as human persons. We could go even further by insisting that literature is not merely important but necessary. Without literature or, more specifically, without the ability to see literarily, we will be [...]
After the Nazis invaded and occupied France during the Second World War, the Free French, or the French government-in-exile, invited Simone Weil—a political philosopher, Platonist, and mystic—to write a report detailing how to rebuild France once the Nazis took their leave.[1] This, of course, presupposed that the Nazis would eventually depart French soil. In response, [...]
It’s incredible how much the weather affects us. Toward the end of their protracted journey to the Promised Land after their miraculous escape from Egypt, Moses gathers all the Israelites together and tells them that life in Canaan is going to be different from life in Egypt. One of the differences will be how their [...]
In his lifetime, Edgar Allan Poe’s renown lay primarily in his reputation as the foremost critic of the day. As a critic, he complained that four or five cliques controlled American literature by controlling the larger portion of the critical journals. Edgar Allan Poe secured a permanent place among world authors as father of the [...]
The book of Revelation says that the martyrs “have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (7:14). The first letter of John states that “if we walk in the light as he is in the light, then we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of his Son [...]
The reader who demands that his own moral code shall not be infringed upon, or his feelings lacerated by any unpleasant happenings in any book he reads, does not want to be made a better man as the result of reading it. How to Read a Novel, by Caroline Gordon (Cluny Media, 250 pages) T.S. [...]
UFOs are supposed to be the stuff of conspiracy theories and fringe documentaries. And yet many high-ranking government officials believe some of the most explosive claims about UFOs to be true. How would this potential reality affect the conservative worldview? On December 13, 2023 Majority Leader Chuck Schumer took to the Senate floor to deliver [...]
Jonathan Edwards helped to invent a new America, committed to a national covenant and an unprecedented spiritual egalitarianism. In 1930, the historian Henry Bamford Parkes critically assessed the legacy of America’s most famous Puritan intellectual, Jonathan Edwards. According to Parkes, “it is hardly a hyperbole to say that, if Edwards had never lived, there would [...]
Rod Dreher wants us to see into the life of things—to see the creator hidden in the creation, to see the grandeur of God and sense the “deep down things.” But the trouble with the appeal of mysticism is the perennial danger of gnosticism. Living in Wonder: Finding Mystery and Meaning in a Secular Age, [...]
Wilhelm Röpke developed what was called “humane economics,” which placed the dignity of the human person at the core of economic thought, theory, and practice. Wilhelm Röpke In August 1938, as the world teetered on the brink of a second World War, only twenty years after the ending of the previous global conflagration, a [...]
For the Progressives, checks and balances were merely a hindrance to efficient government. How could it be wrong to act in accordance with the spirit of history? As “experts” replaced statesman, the whole idea of “the consent of the governed” became less important, even a stumbling block for the plans of Progressive reformers. Recently, Wyoming [...]
As I peruse conservative cultural commentary, I am troubled by a lack of awareness and appreciation for 20th-century art music. The music of a composer like Franco Margola has much to teach us about how modernity can connect with tradition and the values of civilization. Italy, like all countries in Western civilization, has had its [...]
Saint Thérèse was a realist. In her childhood, she often took the smallest things to heart, to the point of shedding tears. This aspect of her childhood seems to have left its mark on her spiritual doctrine of the Little Way. It shows how humility and profound “littleness” lead the soul to embrace God profoundly. [...]