Susan Ciancio is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and has worked as a writer and editor for nearly 19 years; 13 of those years have been in the pro-life sector. Currently, she is the editor of American Life League’s Celebrate Life Magazine—the nation’s premier Catholic pro-life magazine. She is also the executive editor of ALL’s Culture of Life Studies Program—a pre-K-12 Catholic pro-life education organization. While it’s a predictable story, this new film, starring Woody Harrelson, teaches an important lesson: people with developmental or intellectual disabilities are human beings who have the same dignity as those without a disability. We …
Category: Current Issues
Answering Six Objections from the SSPX
Andrew Bartel is a lay Dominican of the Province of the Most Holy Name of Jesus. He lives with his wife and their three children in Montana, where he works as a glazier. He is also pursuing a degree in English and Philosophy. Bishop Athanasius Schneider has recently praised Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre as “a prophet of our time”; here are six common arguments that have been made by Bishop Schneider and other defenders of the SSPX, each followed by a brief rebuttal. Bishop Athanasius Schneider has recently thrown down the glove in an interview with LifeSiteNews, claiming that those of us who …
A somber anniversary
George Weigel is a Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he holds the William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies. He is the author of over twenty books, including Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II (1999), The End and the Beginning: Pope John Paul II—The Victory of Freedom, the Last Years, the Legacy (2010), and The Irony of Modern Catholic History: How the Church Rediscovered Itself and Challenged the Modern World to Reform. His most recent books are The Next Pope: The Office of Peter and a Church in Mission (2020), Not Forgotten: Elegies for, and Reminiscences of, a Diverse …
Bavaria’s ‘Spiritual Heart’ Is Still Pumping in Altötting
Jonathan Liedl is a senior editor for the Register. His background includes state Catholic conference work, three years of seminary formation, and tutoring at a university Christian study center. Liedl holds a B.A. in Political Science and Arabic Studies (Univ. of Notre Dame), an M.A. in Catholic Studies (Univ. of St. Thomas), and is currently completing an M.A. in Theology at the Saint Paul Seminary. He lives in Minnesota’s Twin Cities. Follow him on Twitter at @JLLiedl. Known as the ‘Lourdes of Germany,’ the Marian shrine is not just a symbol of the region’s Catholic past but is also at …
New Congressional Family Caucus Is Good News for the Nation
Russell Shaw is a veteran journalist and author of more than 20 books. He was secretary for public affairs of the U.S. bishops’ conference from 1969 to 1987 and director of information of the Knights of Columbus from 1987 to 1997. He has BA and MA degrees from Georgetown University and an honorary doctorate from The Catholic University of America. These have not been healthy years for marriage in America. This new entity seeks to change that. There’s a glimmer of hope for the embattled natural family emanating suddenly from a source that lately has been anything but family-friendly — …
Veronica’s Image and the True Mission of Jesus
Donald DeMarco, Ph.D., is a Senior Fellow of Human Life International. He is a professor emeritus at St. Jerome’s University in Waterloo, Ontario, an adjunct professor at Holy Apostles College in Cromwell, Connecticut, and a regular columnist for St. Austin Review. His latest works, How to Remain Sane in a World That is Going Mad; Poetry that Enters the Mind and Warms the Heart; and How to Flourish in a Fallen World are available through Amazon.com. Some of his recent writings may be found at Human Life International’s Truth and Charity Forum. He is the 2015 Catholic Civil Rights League recipient of the prestigious …
Naaman, the Nazarenes, and the Germans
George Weigel is the distinguished senior fellow and William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington. COMMENTARY: As the Scriptural Syrian found out, and the German bishops haven’t yet, pride is a supreme obstacle to faith in God. To vary Oscar Wilde, the Church’s liturgical life often imitates art by being strikingly appropriate to a particular moment. That was certainly true on Monday of the Third Week of Lent, 2023 — a day when the Scriptures of the Eucharistic liturgy invite us to ponder the greatest of the capital sins, pride, through …
The Ruinous Rhetoric of ‘Synodal Interpretation’
Robert Royal is editor-in-chief of The Catholic Thing and president of the Faith & Reason Institute in Washington, D.C. His most recent books are Columbus and the Crisis of the West and A Deeper Vision: The Catholic Intellectual Tradition in the Twentieth Century. Long, long ago, on a planet far, far away, I organized a conference on religion and the public square in a city on the Potomac that I increasingly find hard to recognize. There were sessions on Catholicism, Protestantism, and Judaism. During the last, a rabbi who was also a lawyer working at the White House was challenged by a trio of Jewish …
Can the Eucharist save civilization?
R. Jared Staudt PhD, serves as Director of Content for Exodus 90 and as an instructor for the lay division of St. John Vianney Seminary. He is the author of How the Eucharist Can Save Civilization (TAN), Restoring Humanity: Essays on the Evangelization of Culture (Divine Providence Press), and The Beer Option (Angelico Press), as well as editor of Renewing Catholic Schools: How to Regain a Catholic Vision in a Secular Age (Catholic Education Press). He and his wife Anne have six children and he is a Benedictine oblate. Our revival will be successful if Jesus’s sacramental presence in the Church truly does become the source and summit of …
Seal of Confession under attack? Delaware, Vermont bills draw Catholic criticism
By Kevin J. Jones for CNA Denver, Colo., Mar 9, 2023 / 09:30 am (CNA). Two state legislatures are considering ending any legal protections for a priest who learns about sexual abuse in the confessional. In response, Catholic leaders warned that the laws are unconstitutional, put priests in legal jeopardy, and endanger confidentiality with penitents. Delaware’s House Bill 74 is among the proposals to end clergy protections in mandatory sexual abuse reporting laws. “This act abrogates the privilege between priest and penitent in a sacramental confession relating to child abuse and neglect,” says the bill summary on the Delaware General …