Why Intellectual Work Matters

By |2023-08-30T17:51:58-05:00June 4th, 2023|Categories: Compassion, Culture, Education, Essential, Great Books, Liberal Arts, Liberal Learning, St. John's College, Timeless Essays|

Intellectual life provides an escape in that it is beyond “straitened circumstances,” but the escape is again a flight into realities beyond oneself: animal behavior, astronomy, and the mechanics of the inner life. The intellect has no limit to its subject matter: It reaches greedily for the whole of everything. In 2001 I was a [...]

To Faithfully Follow ‘Roe’: How ‘Roe v. Wade’ Now Protects Human Life

By |2020-05-21T00:18:43-05:00May 20th, 2020|Categories: Abortion, American Republic, Compassion, Constitution|

As a majority of states have rejected the application of capital punishment in certain cases, United States law has moved toward mercy, away from cruelty. Consensus about human dignity and the inception of human life now calls for a similar move at the beginning of life. Just Mercy In his book Just Mercy, attorney Bryan [...]

The Unexamined Life

By |2021-04-22T17:41:41-05:00December 15th, 2019|Categories: Civilization, Community, Compassion, Culture, George Stanciu, Philosophy, Senior Contributors, Socrates|

Twenty-four centuries after his death, the words of Socrates can still unsettle an attentive listener. However, before we can understand his most famous dictum, we must clear away who we are not to grasp who we are—something only done when we are grounded in the fundamental relationships that are universal to humankind. Probably, the most [...]

The Divine Plan: How John Paul II & Ronald Reagan Promoted Peace

By |2020-05-18T08:24:23-05:00September 10th, 2019|Categories: Christianity, Compassion, Culture, Ronald Reagan, St. John Paul II|

Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II defeated their enemies at every turn. But they also sat down and talked, prayed for them and prayed with them. They studied them thoroughly, reaching out lovingly to win them over. They acted in the example of Jesus Christ, defeating mass murderers without bullets. In doing so, they [...]

Why Charles Dickens Makes Me Cry

By |2019-03-13T17:00:52-05:00March 13th, 2019|Categories: Books, Charles Dickens, Christine Norvell, Compassion, Literature, Senior Contributors|

I have read A Tale of Two Cities at least eight times now. Each time, I cry. Yes, each time. Why, I wonder, does Charles Dickens’ writing have this effect on me? I surprised myself today. As I was discussing the end of A Tale of Two Cities with my high-school juniors, we reviewed how Sydney [...]

True Love: Passionate Reason versus Romantic Feeling

By |2019-09-28T09:49:44-05:00February 13th, 2019|Categories: Caritas in Veritate, Christian Living, Christianity, Community, Compassion, Heroism, Joseph Pearce, Love, Senior Contributors, StAR, Wisdom|

Oh, love to some is like a cloud, To some as strong as steel, For some a way of living, For some a way to feel, And some say love is holding on And some say letting go, And some say love is everything And some say they don’t know.   John Denver (Perhaps Love) [...]

Reductio ad Machinam: Human Identity in the Age of Machines

By |2019-08-01T23:57:35-05:00December 9th, 2018|Categories: Character, Charity, Community, Compassion, Conservatism, Culture, Imagination, Modernity|

"Technique has penetrated the deepest recesses of the human being. The machine tends not only to create a new human environment, but also to modify man's very essence…. He must adapt himself, as though the world were new, to a universe for which he was not created. He was made to go six kilometers an [...]

The Steam Bath Gathering

By |2018-12-07T09:24:27-06:00December 6th, 2018|Categories: Community, Compassion, Happiness, Hope, Wisdom|

How is it possible to feel happy and sad at the same time? Recently I tasted that bittersweetness as I walked the campus of a college I attended almost 30 years ago. The landmarks of warm memories were still there: majestic buildings, the elegant gym, the cozy dining hall. Then I came to a place [...]

Meeting a Lost Soul in the Skies

By |2018-10-04T16:19:00-05:00October 4th, 2018|Categories: Compassion, Responsibility, Virtue|

On airplanes my druthers is to mind my own business. I don’t want to be rude, but I much prefer reading to chatting. And that’s precisely what I did for almost the entirety of a recent flight. Nothing out of the ordinary here. It’s my usual pattern. And it generally works, especially if one avoids small talk right [...]

Victim Privilege, Cultural Appropriation, & the New Enslavement

By |2020-06-23T00:04:56-05:00February 9th, 2018|Categories: Compassion, Culture, Equality, Joseph Mussomeli|

One must have a closed heart not to see that some minorities still are mistreated, that some women are still abused, and that some members of the gay community are harassed. But one must have closed eyes not to see how some have used the victim card for personal gain. When I first heard Meghan [...]

Pope Francis and the Caring Society

By |2022-12-31T08:48:42-06:00September 30th, 2017|Categories: Adam Smith, Books, Catholicism, Christianity, Civil Society, Compassion, Louis Markos, Pope Benedict XVI, Pope Francis, St. John Paul II, Virtue|

I’ve not been fully sure what to “make” of Pope Francis. He is clearly a man of God with a deep love for the poor and an even deeper personal humility. But how is one to respond to his pronouncements on economic and environmental issues? Pope Francis and the Caring Society, ed. Robert M. Whaples (Independent [...]

Houston’s Heart and Harvey’s Heroes

By |2020-03-27T15:43:12-05:00September 13th, 2017|Categories: Christianity, Civil Society, Community, Compassion, Religion|

The floodwaters of Hurricane Harvey washed away the dividing lines of race, religion, and class, revealing character and the basic decency at the core of what it means to be human. What makes Houston’s heart beat most truly is faith in God… Hurricane Harvey revealed the huge heart of Houston through the biggest natural disaster [...]

Seeing the Face of Jesus Many Times: What I Found in the Flood

By |2020-03-14T23:41:40-05:00September 5th, 2017|Categories: Civil Society, Compassion, Stephen M. Klugewicz|

Our experience escaping the hurricane taught me that as God's children, all men are truly brothers. I saw the face of Jesus many times in the faces of our rescuers: people of widely differing life experiences, and of various colors and faiths. You millions, I embrace you. This kiss is for all the world! Brothers, [...]

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