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‘Battle for the American Mind’ is a clumsy book, but it tells a story Americans need to hear…
Share Hegseth, Pete, and David Goodwin. Battle for the American Mind: Uprooting a Century of Miseducation. Broadside Books, 2022. Battle for the American Mind is, as the title suggests, a polemic. It is not a scholarly work, and it is not the work of academics. As a sort of academic myself, I know that academics often get the details right through painstaking efforts of erudition, but fail to tell a true or honest story about the whole. Modern academic disciplines make little effort and see no need to cultivate the ordinary and human love of the good or the beautiful, let alone to justify their work for prudent laymen, or to submit to the deliberations and judgment of decent and reasonable citizens. This book is in every way the opposite. It is clumsily executed, wildly inaccurate in many ...
What are muscle knots? An exercise physiologist explains what those tight little lumps are and how to get rid of them…
Imagine you’ve just completed a tough upper-body workout. Your muscles feel a bit tired, but all in all you’re able to go about the rest of your day just fine. The next morning, you wake up and realize the back of your shoulder blade feels stiff. When you rub your shoulder muscles, it feels like you’re prodding a little gumball under your skin. Every time you try to move it around, the area feels tight, with slight pangs of pain. Over the course of the next few days, your back slowly loosens up and eventually your shoulder returns to feeling normal. It’s probably something you’d like to avoid or minimize in the future if possible, though. So what was going on with that muscle knot? Knots frequently crop up in the skeletal muscles of the shoulder area. 3D Human Anatomy/Zachary Gillen, CC BY...
This week’s papal speculation risks fiddling while everyplace but Rome burns…
Listen to this story: ROME – Right now we’re in the middle of what I’ve taken to calling “World Series Week” on the Vatican beat. We tend to reserve the “Super Bowl” metaphor for transition events, i.e., the death or resignation of a pope, but this is basically the next step down in terms of significance and media interest. Think about what’s coming over the next few days. We’ve got a consistory to create new cardinals, by a pope whose increasing physical limits can’t help but invite questions about what might come next, coupled with two days of meetings with all the cardinals of the world – i.e., all the plausible candidates to take over. In between, a pope who’s dropped hints about resigning someday will be visiting the tomb of the last pontiff to step down voluntarily before Benedict XV...
Ortega’s intense persecution of the Church calls into question the Vatican’s ‘Gallagher Protocol’ …
In response to the persecution of the Church in Nicaragua, the Holy See is strictly observing the Gallagher Protocol. But the Gallagher Protocol is not being observed elsewhere, not even in Italy. As cardinals from around the world head to Rome this week, will Archbishop Gallagher himself be able to persuade them to stifle their protests over a brother bishop taken away by Daniel Ortega’s regime? In June 2021, Archbishop Paul Gallagher, the Holy See’s Secretary for Relations with States — often called the Vatican’s “foreign minister” — explained why the Holy See was silent on the fierce persecution of the Church in Hong Kong. “One can say a lot of, shall we say, appropriate words that would be appreciated by the international press and by many parts of the world,” Gallagher sai...
Wednesday is the Feast of St. Nathanael Bartholomew, whom Our Lord called ‘a true Israelite, in whom there is no guile’…
St. Bartholomew is one of the 12 Apostles, but one about whom relatively less is known. Certain Apostles immediately stand out: Peter, James the Greater and John come to mind. Certain Apostles are known only by name — think Simon or Jude Thaddeus (loss of whose memory is further compounded, as the St. Jude Novena Prayer used to put it, by “the name of the traitor [who] has caused you to be forgotten by many.” But then there’s a middle group, occasionally mentioned but not very prominent. Think Matthew, who’s called from his tax collector’s table to follow Jesus. Think Philip, who apart from some questions he poses to Jesus gets one of his few starring roles in the Gospels by finding Bartholomew under a fig tree and leading him to Jesus. Two comments about his coming to Jesus. First, ...
German ‘Synodal Way’ to Press on With Vote to Create Powerful Permanent ‘Synodal Council’…
The second synodal assembly in Frankfurt, Germany, on Oct. 1, 2021. © Synodaler Weg/Maximilian von Lachner. Organizers have confirmed that participants in Germany’s “synodal way” will vote next month on a controversial proposal that would create a powerful permanent “synodal council” to oversee the local Church. The organizers announced on Aug. 22 that a total of 14 papers will be put to a vote at the initiative’s fourth plenary assembly in Frankfurt on Sept. 8-10. They include a text entitled “Sustainable strengthening of Synodality: A Synodal Council for the Catholic Church in Germany,” which will have its second reading on Sept. 9. If the document passes its second reading, it will be formally adopted as a resolution of the synodal way, a multi-year process bringing to...
Self-proclaimed ‘Matthew 25 Catholics’ need to start taking Matthew 25 more seriously…..
Barring a startling lurch to starboard in the Empire State, Kathy Hochul, who as lieutenant governor succeeded the unlamented Andrew Cuomo on his political demise, will be chosen governor of New York in November — the first woman elected to the office once held by such worthies as John Jay, William H. Seward, Samuel J. Tilden, Grover Cleveland, Theodore Roosevelt, Al Smith, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Students used to know that three of these men were subsequently elected president of the United States. Real students of history know that Tilden almost certainly was, too, but lost the White House in a deal to end Reconstruction after a closely contested election. An honorable man who didn’t want to enflame a country recovering from a bloody civil war, Tilden accepted his fate rather than car...
Exiled Nicaraguan bishop challenges Pope’s suggestion to counter Ortega regime with ‘open and sincere dialogue’…
Listen to this story: ROME – An exiled Nicaraguan bishop appeared to challenge Pope Francis Sunday, after the pontiff appealed for an “open and sincere dialogue” with the government of President Daniel Ortega about the recent imprisonment of another Catholic prelate. “It is necessary to ask for freedom. We must not negotiate with the person [Ortega]. We must ask for freedom, because they are innocent,” said Bishop Silivio Báez in a Mass celebrated in Miami and broadcast through his social networks. Báez was calling for the freedom of Bishop Rolando Álvarez, recently arrested, along with several of his companions, on charges of trying to “organize violent groups.” Prior to his house arrest at a family home in Managua, Álvarez, together with several priests, seminarians and laity, had been b...
Archbishop Weakland, Becciu is still on trial, and Visa’s scandal…
Hey everybody, I tried to be responsible. I had big plans to get ahead of the game. I drafted out large sections of The Tuesday Pillar Post on Friday afternoon, four whole days ago, so that I’d have time to edit, polish, and hone that prose to perfection, just for love of you, dear readers. But then late Monday evening – after a Scout meeting, some Nerf gun time, and dinner – I decided that too much news has happened since Friday; I needed to scrap those pre-written sections and start from scratch. So if you come across the usual number of typos, or some rambling bits that might have been edited into phrasing more graceful or eloquent, please know that I really did try to give my prose some time to breathe. And then, well, things just started happening in the world. Journ...
Visa CEO Alfred Kelly remains on Catholic boards amid child porn dispute…
As advocates point to evidence that Visa knowingly does business with child pornography distributors, Visa CEO Alfred Kelly continues to hold high-level leadership positions at several large Catholic institutions. Alfred P. Kelly, CEO and Chairman of the Board, VISA. Courtesy photo. Kelly disputes the allegation, claiming that his company’s apparent entanglement with child porn distributors is a misunderstanding. And Visa suspended its relationship with some pornography websites this month, amid litigation for its role in child porn distribution. But the company has not heeded calls from child safety advocates to cut ties with other companies reportedly distributing child porn online, and advocates point to letters from child abuse victims asking Kelly directly to address the problem...
Pope Francis instructs Vatican entities to move all funds to Vatican bank by Sept. 30…
Though commonly called a “bank,” the IOR is technically a financial institute, with no branches, working within Vatican City State to provide services to clients, which include the Holy See and connected entities, religious orders, clergy, Catholic institutions, and Holy See employees. The IOR saw its number of clients decline by 472, from 14,991 clients at the end of 2020 to 14,519 in 2021. Nearly half of its clients in 2019 were religious orders. According to its annual report, the financial institution’s $19 million net profit in 2021 was also down from $44 million in 2020 and $46 million in 2019. In his Aug. 23 rescript, Pope Francis said article 219, paragraph 3 of Praedicate Evangelium “must be interpreted to mean that the activity of asset manager and custodian of the movable ...
What to expect at the three consistories in Rome this weekend…
In late August the College of Cardinals will have three “consistories” (plenary meetings): the first one an “ordinary consistory,” where Pope Francis will add 20 members to their number; the second, a pro forma and brief ceremony to approve the canonization of new saints; and the third, a two-day “extraordinary” consistory to discuss the recently promulgated constitution governing the Roman Curia, Praedicate Evangelium. Conclave Preparation As cardinals are dispersed throughout the world — this consistory includes the first cardinals from Singapore, East Timor and Mongolia — consistories are opportunities for them to meet together and size up who might be a future pontiff. Benedict XVI encouraged this by holding extraordinary consistories, a few days of discussion on a particular theme.&nb...
