Culture
Fr. John Kiley makes an excellent point in an RI Catholic column that is, for some reason, not online: And it is not just television that demeans men. Catholics would be surprised how often a priest goes to another parish to celebrate Mass only to find all the male pronouns penciled out of the Sacramentary…
If you’re of a mind to direct your thoughts away from the particulars of the day — shootings and bombs and recession and government expansion — David Goldman’s essay on the use of rhythm and expectation to imbue a sense of the sacred into music is worth your time. There is a point, though, where…
In the June/July issue of First Things, Mary Eberstadt suggested commonality between pro-lifers and vegetarians that (she thinks) justifies closer affiliation. Think what you may about the thesis, on which I’m not sold, a subsequent letter from a gentleman named Gerald Lame brings us back to dualism: So Eberstadt’s “moral traditionalists” are really animist-vitalists. And…
Professor Stephen Mathis has come across my post responding to his op-ed, and he comments, in part: I think the ultimate problem with devaluing people or their organs is problematic precisely because it makes them vulnerable to more powerful folks. But I do disagree that disallowing a price tag on organs makes them worthless: I…
Not to go all social conservative on you, but I have to believe that there are (or should be) more pressing issues for the head of a civil liberties organization than protecting an industry set on selling the sexual objectification of children. But there goes the ACLU’s Steven Brown: Legislation passed last week to make…
While by no means condoning his behavior, some commenters decline to judge the lifestyle of George Holland, which Marc described on Thursday. Writes Joe: I don’t know – it seems the guy was genuinely liked by these women [with whom he fathered children] – they probably wouldn’t all get on the same page to fabricate…
The ProJo’s follow-up to the story about the murder of accused woman-beater and “serial father” George Holland only adds to the frustration earlier expressed. On Wednesday afternoon, the five other mothers and Holland’s relatives gathered at an apartment on Hymer Street to talk about his life. They said Holland had been characterized unfairly in The…
…at stories like this, about the Providence woman who stabbed the father of her son to death. The short version is that 14 years ago a 15 year old boy was statutorily raped by a woman 10 years his senior. She bore him the first of many children by multiple baby-mamas. Two weeks after the…
A comment from Joe Bernstein, to yesterday’s post on assisted suicide, points us toward a deeper conversation: I am pro-life on the issue of abortion, but on this I believe that if someone with all their mental faculties intact makes a decision to commit suicide due to a hopeless, painful, or tortuous medical situation it…
What to make of the story of the teacher who accidentally stapled a student’s head? A Superior Court judge has upheld the firing of a Smithfield social studies teacher for stapling a student’s scalp during a classroom stunt three years ago. Judge Daniel A. Procaccini ruled that the Smithfield School Committee, the state education commissioner…
