On March 13, 2013, I stood among the thousands gathered in Saint Peter’s Square who witnessed the moment when Jorge Bergoglio, the Jesuit cardinal archbishop of Buenos Aires, walked out onto the balcony following his election as the 265th successor…
I just saw a typical protest march in some Arab country on the news. I think it was Jordan, but it could have been Tunisia; I tend to get them all mixed up. I was late to the report, so…
As humanity descends into digital madness, the air crackles with strange prophecies. We’re told “godlike” artificial intelligence will soon arrive. Techno-cultists assure us that artificial intelligence will solve the world’s problems, such as writer’s block and climate change. AI may…
Recently in my humanities class at Thales College, we read selections from Pascal’s Pensées, including that famous and mysterious assertion of his that the heart has its reasons whereof the head knows not. I explained to the students that by…
In June 2022, the Supreme Court decided three blockbuster constitutional cases. The ones you have surely heard about are Dobbs and Bruen, which, respectively, reversed Roe v. Wade and dramatically expanded Second Amendment gun rights. The third was an establishment…
The Cathedral of Christ the Light in Oakland, California, is astonishing. From the outside, it appears as though a spaceship decided to land on the banks of Lake Merritt, while the interior reminds the visitor of an upside-down boat. Maple-stained…
In the 1950s and 1960s, 98 percent of Americans believed in God. Now, according to Gallup, just 74 percent do. This would seem to represent the advancement of the forces of reason over the forces of faith — except Americans…
“Hello, I am Freya. I make a deal with demons for my rituals and spells, so all my spells come true.” So proclaims the introduction to an Etsy shop that sells “Special Black Magic” for the price of $135.52 —…
