Catholic Commentary: Miscellaneous

Elizabeth Hanna: Five Habits of the Ideal Teacher
Key qualities in the most effective teachers all relate to humility.

Anthony Esolen: What Rough Beast
There is a strange connection between rationalism and animalism.

Fr. James Schall: Things Not Due to Teaching
The question of what can be taught or what cannot is an intriguing one...

Deal Hudson: Not Your Usual Christmas Gift Recommendations
The things you grab running out of a burning house.

Ralph McInerny: Dead Language
A Roger Knight mystery.

Deal Hudson: The Truth about Virtue and Happiness
Virtues don't tell the whole story about human life.

Ralph McInerny: Dust Abhors a Vacuum
A Roger Knight Mystery

Deal Hudson: How Universities Fool Their Donors
Alumni complaining about the latest anti-Catholic outbreak.

Eve Tushnet: The Survivor's-Guilt Guide to College
It's that time of year again...

John Zmirak: Telling Tales Out of School
"I'm sure that for most of them I was the crown of thorns..."

Benjamin Wiker: Mugged by a Muse - The Poet and the Con
I had learned a lesson, but justice had been served.

Robert Griffin: Grave Matters - Life and Death as a Mortician
Everyone agrees he's a pretty good guy... for a bad guy.

T. Pitt Green: Homecoming - Healing from Abuse
"Like many survivors, I did not forsake faith."

Robert Reilly: Sense and Nonsense A Conversation with Rev. James V. Schall, S.J.
Life of the mind, the future of the West, and lessons learned over a long career.

Michael Healy: When Kung and Von Hildebrand Came to Loyola
Their reception as well as their personal effect on me.

George Sim Johnston: Why Catholics Like Einstein
Science is mankind's great success story since the Renaissance.

Kate Wicker: I Am Woman
I don't have to roar to be heard. My life says it all.

Ralph McInerny: Thinking Backward
Trying to retrace memory is a bittersweet experience.

Todd Aglialoro: The Twelve Days of Christmas - A Documentary Hypothesis
Just how it came about.

David Warren: Consider the Hummingbird
The challenge for the Catholic lies beyond the bird as symbol.

Anthony Esolen: The King's Anguish - Mistranslating the Holy Scriptures
Translators seem to fear pricking their fingers on the bristles of strong prose.

Benjamin Wiker: Alien Ideas
Christianity and the Search for Extraterrestrial Life

Peter Kreeft: Confessions of a Computer Hater
My enemy isn't just IBM or Apple; it's everything digital.

Anthony Esolen: Not to Notre Madame
The small and doggedly faithful Catholic schools need our support.

John Zmirak: Praying with the Kaisers
A bittersweet love note to the Habsburgs.

Fr. Dwight Longenecker: Laughing with Chesterton
The capacity to wake us up with wordplay...

Jeffrey Tucker: The Hidden Hand behind Bad Catholic Music
It's up to you to decide the future course of your parish's liturgy.

Fr. James Schall: Graduation 2009
Every 20 year old needs to be aware of and excited by what is...

Fr. Roger Landry: Unforgettable Memories of the Holy Land
There were plenty of worse places for a Christian to be imprisoned!

Joseph Susanka: Remembering Tom Dillon
We were not ready for him to leave.

Richard Bastien: Is Capitalism Catholic?
Tradition to support regulated free-market economies and to condemn socialism.

John Zmirak: If You Must Drive Drunk, Please Wear a Seatbelt
Chances are you'll get home in one piece.

Michael Baruzzini: Reflections on a Year of Science
Science is a wonderful hobby, but a dangerous god.

Jeffrey Tucker: Sing Like a Catholic
"Both a lack of direction and a lack of any fixed ideals."

David Mills: 15 Tips for Better Preaching
What only you can give us just before we receive our Lord.

Ronald Rychlak: Protecting the Brand
I wish the Catholic Church had protected her brand better.

Fr. Stanley Jaki: The Biblical Basis of Western Science
"Unexcelled source of common sense" and information about the Kingdom of God.

John Zmirak: The Dark Night of the Civilization
Lent rains down on us now like bitter manna from heaven.

Thomas Howard: Harmonizing Athens and Jerusalem
The two regions of high human culture.

Fr. Roger Landry: A Tour in Anticipation of St. Martin
"Come to me, all you who are weary… and I will refresh you."

Jim Moore: Silly Love Songs
Important task at hand -- creating a Catholic musical tradition apart from the Mass.

Deal Hudson: A Catholic College Where the Students Sing (In Latin)
Magdalen College: A place where students encounter Jesus Christ and His love.

Tom Hoopes: The Dark Backward - Demons in the Real World
"The deepest, worst psychological thing I'd ever experienced."

Benjamin Wiker: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin
His heart and head were in complete contradiction.

Deal Hudson: Some Advice for Apostolates in a Time of Recession
Make sure donors know that your apostolate's mission is making a difference.

Jeffrey Tucker: Pay to Pray - The Church's Simony Problem
What possible rationale could there be for charging for the right to publish?

Mike Shaw: Health and Religiosity
One would be hard-pressed to find a better example of foolish scientism.

David Warren: Prophecy
Refers to revelation, not prediction.

Deal Hudson: Joy, Golf, and a Life Well Lived
Joy lifted him beyond the obstacles that discourage most men.

Scott Richert: An Epiphany
Efforts of others, their little acts of charity that would redound to the profit of all.

Joanna Bogle: Britain and the 1950s
The country that seemed to stand so tall, morally and culturally...

Thomas Howard: The Carolina Wren and Others
So exquisite -- they manifest God's handiwork, and hence His glory.

Fr. George Rutler: Richard John Neuhaus, 1936 - 2009
"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray thee Lord my soul to keep..."

David Warren: Resolution
Try to overcome my foolish propensity to argue with fools on their own premises.

John Zmirak: Christmas at the Veterinary Hospital
A blessed, beastly Christmas to one and all.

Simcha Fisher: We Should Be Afraid
There is much to hope for, and we trust God. But...there is much to fear.

Benjamin Wiker: Going Native
"Whoever humbles himself will be exalted."

Thomas Howard: The Good Doctor Donne
A jolting reminder of the exercise of fierce self-examination.

Deal Hudson: Ten Things for Which I'm Grateful This Thanksgiving
Offer thanks for the many blessings God has given us.

Patrick Reilly: New Study Confirms Decline of Catholic Colleges
Now we have national survey data to prove what we have long known.

David Mills: What Does 'Evangelical' Mean?
Catholicism is a profoundly different way... of living the Christian life.

Francis Beckwith: Evangelical and Catholic
Why I resigned as president of the Evangelical Theological Society.

Fr. James Schall: On Words and Symbols
Why the Church talks of being, natural law, and doctrine.

David Mills: Out of Division, a Greater Unity?
Many Episcopalians move closer to the Catholic Church.

Dan Coyne: Why Vegetarians Should Be Allowed to Eat Meat
A satire on Catholics for a Free Choice.

Deal Hudson: Are Your Kids Safe in a Catholic College?
Arm your children with a solid foundation BEFORE they go to college.

Deal Hudson: How To Make Sure "Catholic" Colleges Really Are
It's time to "start expecting them to live up to their name."

Deal Hudson: Money - Making It, Spending It, And Giving It Away
An interview with Frank J. Hanna III...

Jeffrey Tucker: What's Wrong with Failure?
Nothing is ever our fault, much less our most grievous fault.

William Donohue: I'm Catholic, Staunchly Anti-Racist, and Support David Duke
A tongue-in-cheek reply to Nick Cafardi's article.

Todd Flowerday: Standing Up for Chant
Plainsong has a place in the worship of every Catholic parish.

Eric Pavlat: Why Taxation Isn't (Necessarily) Theft
As long as taxes are used justly...

Thomas Woods Jr.: Galileo, Science, and the Smirking Chimp
Knows not a blessed thing about the findings of the past 60 years of historians.

David Mills: Transcending Anglicanism
The whole thing seems to be visibly coming apart.

Fr. Dwight Longenecker: Quo Vadis Canterbury?
The Anglican Communion is splitting up.

Mark Shea: Behold the Spam of God!
You wonder what is going through the minds of people who write such stuff.

Mark Shea: The Delusion of the Familiar
Seeing something often makes it something other than strange and wonderful.

Todd Aglialoro: Lessons Learned From a Catholic College's Summer Bulletin
I'm happy to share some of their highlights with you.

Fr. Dwight Longenecker: Tolkien's 'No' to Narnia
Did Tolkien feel that Lewis was borrowing ideas from him and vulgarizing them?

Susie Lloyd: The Facts of Life
They'll just have to figure it out the way their ancestors did.

Mark Shea: Fisking King David
How the blogosphere would respond to Psalm 51 if David lived today…

Fr. James Schall: Schall at Eighty
Both the peril and the excitement are there, for we are free.

Thomas Howard: A Photo in Transylvania
How on earth do they carry on?

Todd Aglialoro: Good Hymns, Bad Hymns
It can't all be a matter of personal preference, can it?

Marjorie Campbell: Apologies to My Father
Why does this time of year make me contrite?

Sean Dailey: The Lost Art of Catholic Drinking
"From man's sweat and God's love, beer came into the world."

David Warren: On Disdain
The death of an old friend has put me in mind of courage.

Brian Saint-Paul: The Big Jump
Moving crisis magazine entirely online.

Fr. James Schall: The Last 'Nonsense' In Print
"In spite of it all, this 'nonsense' still makes sense, even in print."

David Warren: Paperlessness
If something impresses me as worth remembering, I transcribe it in my own hand.

Timothy O'Donnell: Academic Freedom and the Catholic University
Academic freedom must be nurtured within the confines of what is good and true.


DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in commentaries do not necessarily reflect those of the Mary Foundation. The articles are for informational purposes. Visitors are responsible for making distinctions about what is in accordance with Catholic teaching.