I realize  that  whoever wins the Presidency, he or she is not bound by their party's platform. An analysis of the major parties’ platforms nonetheless reveals a difficult truth: Neither party is committed to the family in the same way or to the same extent to which  Catholic social teaching   demands. Republicans, while implying an understanding of the nature of the family and its centrality to society, fail to consider its well-being consistently across the board. Democrats on the other hand, support some policies that provide needed relief to families, but this comes almost in spite of the severely flawed, individualistic, adult-centric vision of family life and marriage that they advance. Thus, the believing  Catholic  must pray for our elected officials in the hope that they will develop a more profound reverence for the family and commit themselves to protecting and promoting it, and with it, the common good. Catholics must also co...

T he Church considers the  dignity of the human person  to be the foundation of its social teaching; indeed, the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church tells us that the family is “the first natural society” and places it at “the center of social life.” The natural family, or the “domestic church,” is the context in which all men and women either live out their vocations or are prepared for them. So—what’s good for the family is good for both the individual and for wider society, and good public policy is, therefore, family policy Yet we live at a time when the family in America is being ripped apart by many social and market forces. All the crises our nations faces — from identity to economic — are either caused by the breakdown of the family or directly contribute to it. Remember that Pope Francis says in his post-synodal apostolic exhortation  Amoris Laetitia  (The Joy of Love), “the welfare of the family is decisive for the future of the wor...

After teaching in Catholic Schools for over 30 years, if I were to sum up her approach to the world prior to the Pontificate of Pope St. John Paul the Great, I would argue that she appears to have been trying to restore her lost public role by finding common ground with "the world" and tailoring her message to modern ways of thought. As Bl. Pope Paul VI recognized,  at the end of the Second Vatican Council liberal modernity has its own religion. The outcome of the effort has therefore been a tendency to make Catholicism sound very much like worship of the god of this world, and lead many Catholics to forget that there is a difference between that worship and our own. This is a prime thesis of my book, written as a first-hand account of the Church in the United States following the Second Vatican Council.

A Catholic priest asked that pro-abortion Vice Presidential nominee Tim Kaine “do us both a favor” and not show up in his Communion line. “I take Canon 915 seriously. It'd be embarrassing for you & for me,” tweeted Dominican Father Thomas Petri, the vice president and academic dean of the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies. Canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law instructs that those “persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion.” The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches, “Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person — among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life. ... Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abort...

Cardinal Sarah Cardinal Robert Sarah, prefect of the Vatican's Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments, urged priests and bishops at the Sacra Liturgia conference in London July 5 to start celebrating Masses"ad orientem," or facing away from the congregation, beginning the first Sunday of Advent this year. After nearly 50 years of celebration of the Mass of Vatican II, it would seem that there is an increasing awareness that the focus of the Liturgy as God-directed has been displaced, and any sense of mystery and awe at being in the presence of God has disappeared. Behind this, whether it is recognized or not, is the philosophical belief that the community is necessary for God to be totally real. The dynamic of this new emphasis on the community has led to a total exclusion of any reference to God as transcendent….In fact the community from having first of all displaced the focus of divine worship is in danger of becoming itself the object of worship....

Monsignor Michael Scooyans A principal adviser to Pope St. John Paul II who was also close to Pope Benedict XVI, Monsignor Michel Schooyans, has issued an ominous warning about the current course in the Catholic Church. In  a paper , re tired Professor Schooyans, a member of several Pontifical Academies and Councils, says that “ t he Synod on the Family has revealed a profound malaise in the Church,” writing of the 'crisis' in the Church: “it is futile to close our eyes: the Church is challenged in its very foundations.” Monsignor warns of what he says is an organized group in the Church that operates with “backing from some of the highest authorities in the Church.” The Synod on the Family showed, he says, the determination of “a group of pastors and theologians” that “ do not hesitate to undermine the Church's  doctrinal cohesion . ” This group, he added, “functions in the manner of a powerful, international, well-heeled, organized and disciplined party.” T...

Today we see the Black Lives Matter movement distorting the truth concerning incidents of white police officers shooting black males. The same tactic is employed by the mainstrem media concerning whether or not those with same-sex attratcion can have happy traditonal marriages.   Read more .

Jonathon Van Maren has offered a prescient article which struck home with me. It inspires one who endeavors to "enter the narrow gate" in our sexually-befuddled times.

Could this have happened 50 years ago? More than a year after Rachel Lehnardt of Evans, Ga. was arrested for contributing to the delinquency of minors she has finally learned her punishment. The 36-year-old divorced mother of five participated in a wild, parent-approved teen party. The mother allegedly allowed her 16-year-old daughter and others to smoke weed, get drunk and play “naked Twister” in her home. Lehnardt allegedly had sex with an 18-year-old teen in a bathroom while others continued playing “naked Twister,” used sex toys in front of the teens and claimed she woke up to find a 16-year-old raping her. As a result of all of this, Lehnardt was sentenced to six years of probation and $600 in fines. The mother, who has lost custody of her five children, must also receive drug and alcohol treatment. Lehnardt had once been a member of the Mormon church and never touched alcohol, but that changed after her 2014 divorce from her husband James. Lawyer...

In his new letter on marriage and the family,  Amoris Laetitia ,  Francis teaches that teaching kids about safe sex “promotes narcissism,” that transgender teens should just stop complaining and “accept their own body as it was created,” and that same-sex couples are not “legitimate families.” Claiming that transgender teens are “self-centered” and “self-absorbed,” Francis said: The young need to be helped to accept their own body as it was created, for thinking that we enjoy absolute power over our own bodies turns, often subtly, into thinking that we enjoy absolute power over creation. An appreciation of our body as male or female is also necessary for our own self-awareness in an encounter with others different from ourselves. In this way we can joyfully accept the specific gifts of another man or woman, the work of God the Creator, and find mutual enrichment. In addition, Francis says that gay people should receive “assistance” to bring them back to “norma...

Fr. Billy Bob Presiding at the Altar "Table" While the Band of Piano, Guitars, and Drums Renders "Oecumenical" Songs Recently James Kalb penned something with which I vehemently agree:   If you look at religion that way a worship service becomes something like a lecture, pep rally, self-help meeting, or social get-together. Other people do those things at least as well as Catholics, so why bother with Catholicism? Why not go with something even more modern and American than the New Mass as presented in the average suburban parish? Why not do praise and worship at a megachurch? I have witnessed the reality of t he  following: "...a poorly catechized Catholic attends a worship service at a megachurch, mistakenly believing the worship service simply to be a modern, non-Catholic version of the Mass. The Catholic feels emotionally drawn to the megachurch worship service and decides Mass, in comparison, is boring. A typical view might be, “Wow, I’m being ...