Political Thought
Bishop Thomas Tobin makes a fortuitous juxtaposition in a recent edition of his “Without a Doubt” column (emphasis added): Therefore I’m looking for candidates who will explain their stance on the dignity of human life and how that translates into action. I want candidates to address the value of marriage and family, and explain to…
In an essay in the current issue of The RI Catholic, I attempt to link my conversion from nihilism to Catholicism with the impossibility of truly separating church and state by way of introducing my heretofore monthly column in the publication: Faith-filled or faithless, no such existential philosophies can be sopped off the skin like…
I don’t usually associate ProJo lifestyle columnist with hefty political writing (that’s not a slam at Patinkin–I generally enjoy his columns–but politics isn’t his usual “beat”), so I was impressed with his Saturday column in which he writes about his first-hand observations on the failures of communism. Much of the 20th century was a contest…
Roger Williams University PoliSci Professor and OSPRI Fellow Ernest Greco has a piece in the ProJo advocating for a European style Christian Democrat party. While I don’t think U.S. political ground is as fertile as Greco does for a new political party, he offers a concise summary of the big picture. Unfortunately, too many of…
Wouldn’t it be refreshing if this sort of thing were written about our small Northeastern state? [Texas] Republicans did not take the bait [to raise taxes]. Governor [Rick] Perry told the legislature to not even bother sending him a bill with a tax increase, because he would not sign it. Instead, he submitted a budget…
Corruption of culture is a nebulous and subjective concept which has been used toward evil authoritarian ends for as we can remember. Sorry, unless there is a clear victim, legislation of such morality, or culture as you call it, is not a proper function of government, as you would certainly agree if the progressives took…
Robert George offers an important basis for emphasis here, but there’s an important inward extension to his description of the law: The law is a teacher. It will teach either that marriage is a reality in which people can choose to participate, but whose contours people cannot make and remake at will, or it will…
By coincidence, each of the past two days brought a question from somebody about my political beginnings. The answer to the when is 9/11. Practical philosophy had always been appealing to me, but it had previously followed a literary and cultural context, rather than a political one. That changed on a September morning. It wouldn’t…
A couple of things that I’ve read, recently, reinforce a healthy concern about the sheer size of the aggregated pool of power that a growing government creates and the incentives that it generates. The first example comes from an article by Kevin Williamson in National Review about Congressman Barney Frank (subscription required): Fannie Mae and…
The question of papal infallibility has probably been on the minds of conservative Roman Catholics since the publication of Caritas in Veritate. Not surprisingly, the encyclical’s controversial pararaph declaring an “urgent need of a true world political authority” has dominated coverage and conversation. Some on the right, perhaps having not had a chance to digest…