Safe Haven

 The other aspect of all this discussion that gets missed is if I say, “I agree with the Church; the popes are clear in saying something that I should pay attention to, and in fact, that I understand,” I am not saying that I have a fondness for particular defendants, or a particular antipathy toward anyone who prosecuted them, etc. In fact, that’s how principles help us: passions can deceive; faith guided by reason cannot. I don’t know about you, but I always hated when someone said with abortion, “I’m pro-life, but…” We’ve all known that everything after the “but” would be unreasonable. You can’t decide moral issues on vibes. I’m not saying abortion is equivalent to capital punishment, because it isn’t. I am saying that if I understand capital punishment to be inadmissible, if that’s the ethics of the Church in light of human dignity, I don’t have to go case-by-case. We’re just not gonna do this, we’re not supporting it, and my emotions either way don’t matter. I know even a lot o...

 I never want to forget that he was my favorite player. Tom Brady eventually inspired joy, awe, and respect, and few dare even to doubt his place in the GOAT discussion. But before Brady, there was Favre. He was literally the people's quarterback. Even the fact that he's the all-time leader in interceptions thrown didn't seem to bother us. I think I liked him more. By the way, I feel the same about Favre as I do President George W. Bush: Don't bother me with criticisms, because I don't care. I'm not his priest or the pope. Mrs. Favre hasn't abandoned him, so I figure I don't have to dig deeply into his life. I usually don't get down about being disabled and a wheelchair user anyway, but Brett made me forget it all, anyway. And if it was effective propaganda, it worked. I felt a part of every success he had. With apologies to Peyton Manning, Brett Favre should have been the NFL MVP in 2009. If memory serves, he threw 33 touchdowns and 7 interceptions,...

 In the end, the guilty man is certain to die. It’s not my role to advocate to save his life. The Catholic Church now stands against capital punishment. I have no problem assimilating that reasoning and its conclusion into my thinking. I was a dedicated abolitionist 5 years before I submitted to the Bishop of Rome, to that faith, and to the philosophical tradition that undergirds it. None of the popes in my lifetime have opposed it for frivolous or personal reasons. Even were I unbound by anything in that ordinary magisterium, I should still prefer the pope’s opinion to my own. I have family members who disagree, but their place in Heaven is far from assured, for one. For another, “I love you” and “Your commitment to reason is in question” are not mutually exclusive. And we stand to be changed for the worse by this outcome, and especially if we watch it. And I believe God will hold anyone who celebrates it to account. Even in the days before the Christian teaching stood against it,...

 Catholics can have conversations among themselves concerning the ingenuity of a living Magisterium that can answer higher order questions that the Bible text itself cannot answer, because the purposes of it and parts of it are legion. But as a matter of faith, the relevant questions are these: Did Jesus establish a visible Church united in governance, sacraments, and profession? Is your local Catholic parish a current outpost of that Church? What might I expect to find if the answer were "yes"? What would invalidate the claim, or at least serve as a significant rebuttal to the claim? You see, it doesn't actually matter if one paradigm of the story of God interacting with humanity has features that someone finds appealing or advantageous. The only real question is whether Jesus established that putative Church and the features that are helpful, advantageous, or however you might describe them. Christianity and religions related to it presuppose that God reveals things tha...

 I’m not fond of loud noises. I have CP, and it gives me a startle response for sounds at 85 decibels or even less. Guns, buzzers, even squeaky HVAC systems. I’ll even mute Caitlin Clark and the Fever, if the substitution sound is “wrong.” I definitely could have enjoyed a Nuggets game with Tom Darrow, but only with earplugs. Good on them and others for creating “quiet rooms” for autistic people with sensory issues. I don’t have that diagnosis, but there’s some overlap. If I ever meet up with the “Mafia” in Iowa, the lot of them will probably go shoot guns, and I will meet the Crosses in Cedar Rapids. Aaron The Rat definitely knows his way around a firearm. C’mon. He even looks like a guy who teaches gun safety courses. We’re definitely making him drive to Iowa. I can’t think of anyone better to sponsor him as he (hopefully) will be assimilated into the Borg—let the reader understand—than Bryan and Carol Cross. Bryan’s fine, obviously. He’s a dear friend. But do you remember how Mi...

 I’m liberal enough, with enough awareness that the American involvement in transatlantic slavery—even pre-USA—was uniquely bad enough that it still has an impact today. It’s not wrong to feel bad about it; it’s not wrong to wish it never happened.  I’m conservative enough to think that the outcome of your life—insofar as you have agency—is down to you and no one else. Saw a thing on the Twitter of someone asking for opinions on interracial couples. To be clear, the picture was of a conventionally attractive white man and Black woman. No one seems to care if Asians marry non-Asians. I don’t think there’s much fuss about what Hispanic people do, though I could be wrong, and bigotry is horrifying. It was illegal in the United States for a man and woman in a mixed-race couple to marry until 1967. A person born in 1967 isn’t even old yet. My Mom spent most of that year being 11. So it’s not odd to me, but it’s still novel. If that a—hole Ray hadn’t killed MLK, there’s a chance you...

 When he played that 2007 US Open final against Novak Djokovic, he’d just turned 26. (Born August 8, 1981) I took him for granted in these prime years. We’re so used to speaking of his elegance and shot-making, but that narrative was cemented by him in his 30s and 40s, when his anticipation and variety hid the downtick in the savagery of his athleticism. You have to go back that far to find Novak Djokovic out of sorts. Roger was behind the whole time, but he knew the younger Djokovic would crack. This title was during his run of 5 consecutive US Open championships. When he lost to his rival and good friend Rafa Nadal at Wimbledon in 2008, Federer was contending for his sixth title there, consecutive. Remember that he won again on the grass in 2012, and again in 2017 (!). Even so, he lost 3 times to Djokovic there, culminating at Wimbledon 2019, at age 38, when he needed just one more shot to win his 9th title at the All England Club. The GOAT argument cannot be settled, and it neve...

 The Catholic Archdiocese of St. Louis is suing ICE because they are denying priests access to those requesting sacraments in detention. That’s Missouri, by the way. Not Laredo, Texas, or southernmost California. Before we go on, I would like to add that I believe in law. I don’t believe that deportation is, of itself, wrong. But if I wouldn’t deny sacraments to a condemned prisoner in his or her last moments, what sense does it make to treat an illegal alien worse than a murderer? People seriously would rather be “conservative” (or liberal) than Christian, it seems. This whole focus on immigration itself seems wildly disproportionate, and certain federal officials seem intent on dehumanizing anyone who doesn’t serve their ends. Unless the Mississippi River is beset by hundreds of barges full of illegal aliens who embarked off New Orleans, it’s not obvious why ICE operates a detention facility in rural Missouri anyway, but I digress. I remain much more sympathetic to anti-Islamic i...

 If anyone deserves to die, it’s this guy. A US Army officer, he started shooting, killing 13 people and injuring 32 others. And it’s terrorism. He probably became persuaded of the eventual conquest of the decadent “Great Satan.” Whatever. By the way, I don’t care if there happened to be a mosque in my neighborhood. We’re the land of the free, and the home of the brave, not the home of the paranoid. More than likely, someone first got here from the Middle East or Iran or even Africa to get away from the “Islamic” terrorists. If someone accepts our pluralistic society in general and dare I say liberal values—with apologies to Patrick Deneen and Bryan Cross—it’s not my concern. I’m more worried about progressives not accepting our way of life than Muslims, to be frank with you. You know, I am not really worried about dating myself, but I get curious about what people are saying. I started following this cute girl (woman) because she said she was a matchmaker. About 2 weeks later, I f...

 I went to a trivia night several years ago to benefit L’Arche. In St. Louis, MO, you can raise money for almost anything with a trivia night. It’s just really big in my hometown, for some reason. We’re just smart, and we like eating, drinking, and helping people. I think I just described every Catholic town on Earth. Anyway, I have become pretty aware that I arouse pity just by being out in the world. That’s life with all the visible or audible disabilities, I guess. I myself have no cognitive impairments whatsoever, and I’m happy with that. If I am honest, though, God has deserved more thanks for that than I have given so far. My intellect isn’t mine, any more than Kelsey Mitchell or Caitlin Clark or Roger Federer can take credit (entirely) for their athletic ability. Then again, a defect you carry from the beginning, the opposite of which you have never experienced, carries less sorrow than losing the ability to do something you did before. (I’m losing some of those things, and ...

 On the one hand, I served and learned alongside women as a Presbyterian in seminary (PCA). I'm highly in favor of them getting any advanced degree a man could get. I personally don't really mind them going to more "liberal" denominations to hold pastoral offices, because the taxonomy from the Anglican bishop J.B. Lightfoot within the essay "On The Christian Ministry" highlights both Protestantism's fatal flaw, and illustrates why female clergy really can only occur in a Protestant context. Many Anglicans are angered at being called "Protestant," but they'll finally get over it when they re-join the one true Church. Lightfoot said that the conception of the pastoral office is either "sacerdotal" (from the Latin for "priest") or "functional." Very low church Protestants and independent communities that emerged in the aftermath of the Reformation tend--if this is a spectrum--toward the functional end, while commu...

 She’s Christa Pike’s victim. You can’t say anything about anything without the madding crowd demanding “balance” on every question. Colleen was a person who didn’t deserve to die. She was loved by people, and first by God. She was murdered by Christa Pike more than 30 years ago. Whatever we decide to do with Pike, she did that. Colleen isn’t coming back here. But if I’m right about God, why would we want her to, on the one hand? On the other, we know from experience that human connection and love is a great solace in this vale of tears. There isn’t enough solace here in human terms, if you’re asking me. But you don’t get life from death. Christ defeated death. He didn’t make it sunshine and rainbows. Ordinarily, death begets more death. More sorrow. More loss. Look me in the face and tell me that you want the government who can’t fix our streets and bridges to be meting out death. Don’t answer me from feelings; we know what those often say. If someone killed one of my brothers or ...

 The Dobbs decision was great. It’s a great day for America, and eventually the world. And it never happens if Secretary Clinton wins the presidency. I come by it honest. If I tell you we’d be better off if Donald J. Trump never becomes our president, I absolutely mean it. But the blood would still cry out from the ground. Ask me why I don’t cheer unequivocally for Democrats, and that’s why. Troubling thing about elected Democrats and far Left activists today: Their moral rigidity would be welcome, but for the fact that they’re wrong about everything of consequence. It’s great we don’t say “faggot” and other slurs in polite society; the bait-and-switch about what families are, and what we ought to do in law and culture remains. When I talk about false sentimentality around gay activism, I mean that deep down, we know—or we ought to—that it’s not cost-free to anyone. It’s not a cutesy Will & Grace episode. And it all leads to the rivers of blood pouring out of the abortuaries. P...

 (Note: The balance of this piece was published as a Facebook status first.) People are free to like what they like, and not like stuff they don’t. And this includes Taylor Swift. Me personally? I love her music. But I have to object personally to the idea that her target audience is women and girls. I’m neither one of those things. And even if it were true, the men I associate with genuinely like and admire women and girls. We should be as offended by the idea that women are odd, or so different than men that never the twain shall meet, as we are that all men are violent monsters. Anyway, I remember hearing Taylor at 16 on the radio giving an interview. Her first song “Tim McGraw” had just come out. The interviewer asked her who she wanted to write songs with. She said Craig Wiseman. That dude has some serious credits to his name, including helping Phil Vassar write his self-titled debut in 2000. And I can remember thinking, “This kid is gonna be huge.” Right now, she’s the bigges...

 Christa Pike was the victim of a botched execution in Tennessee. It’s all the proof we need that we shouldn’t do this anymore. While we’re on the subject, her life is textbook “mitigating factors.” We shouldn’t have even gotten to this point in this case. And she was sentenced 31 years ago. Don’t read the comments. We’re coarsened by our thirst for blood. And don’t argue “limited government” with me; the Supreme Court lifted a stay that the state had granted. The federal government imposed itself to help the state of Tennessee kill Pike, and couldn’t even do it right. Your tax dollars at work. The supreme expression of government power over the individual is in killing. If you want more of it, you might be a lot of things, but you’re not a conservative in the Anglo-American sense. A lot of American Catholics are sold on the “Frank The Hippie Pope” narrative, because it obscures the fact that the popes have been moving toward abolition of capital punishment for 60 years. If you spe...

 I've seen the clip a few times. Tyler, son of the legendary coach, played on an AAU team in high school. They asked Coach if she'd coach those boys for one game. Probably not anything of great consequence, and sports in the end is not.  She calls a timeout and says, "Somebody on this team needs to rebound, if we want to win this game!" Summitt never did anything halfway. And that's why she has 1098 wins and 8 NCAA titles. We still miss you down here, Coach.

 Not in the sense of Protestant. In the sense that Jesus is my personal friend. Actually, friendship better captures what’s happening in the Scriptures than anything else. A lot of people are giving up the label. Lots of reasons for this. Sex. People want to be liberal about sex. Maybe they are sinners themselves, and the guilt of believing something else while living differently is too much. Maybe they’re just sentimental and really liked “Will & Grace.” The reality of the lives depicted there is sadder than a sitcom. The true nature of Sola Scriptura and Reformed claims about the Fall work together to make every argument an argument not about what the Bible says, but what it means. There remains a chasm between faith and reason, and under this regime, conscience and history and experience means nothing. We always thought “Where is that in the Bible?” would lead in one direction; it doesn’t. And it’s not really a question, it’s a direct challenge to any purported authority. Pe...

 I really just browse the profiles. I have only chatted with one person. You see lots of interesting women there, and sometimes shockingly beautiful women, but I have one concern, and it’s a weird one. When I see a baptism photo, I wonder if she’s going to a church that gets “creative” with the baptismal formula: “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” I think I could convince a sweet Protestant girl that I know Jesus personally. I’m just a nerd, and that’s why I became Catholic! That’s funny, right? But can you imagine if I had to say, “They got creative with your baptism, darling, and it’s invalid”? Sweet mercy, we’d be toast as a couple, inside a week. I might as well tell her Jesus is a Vogon bureaucrat, and she brought the wrong Salvation Form. Theologians are the worst.

 I had one administrator that I really enjoyed working with. He made me nervous at first, but he’s a great educator, for one thing. Could absolutely jump into a lesson on most subjects and not embarrass himself. You figure out quickly who’s been in a classroom and who hasn’t. I’ll codename him “J.F. Sebastian” in homage to the Blade Runner character. He left the high school to be a principal with primary school kids. I just go, “Awww” at the thought of it. I myself wouldn’t want to become cynical, and that can happen in a high school setting. I’m theologically trained, and serious enough to know that the innocence of children can’t save your soul. On the other hand, I haven’t heard of a better personnel shift anywhere in some time. Anyway, I did absolutely feel that at least one person wanted me to flourish. HR and the Board could disappear from the Earth with no appreciable loss, from my vantage point. But it wasn’t all bad.

 But it's not real hate. There are a few players that I dislike strongly, for reasons that may border on irrational, and I would recant that, if confronted in public. Like if I ever disrespected an actual person because he played for a rival. You might recall that the Cubs won the World Series in 2016, breaking a curse of not winning a championship for 108 years. Generations lived and died as Cubs fans without seeing that glory. I was born in 1980. Not only have my Cardinals won three times in my lifetime, but I remember 2 of them. Not only that, but the Cardinals have been the World Series runner-up 3 other times in my memory. It's easy to be a Cardinals fan. It's so easy, I feel guilty about it. In the 2010s, national articles were written about how obnoxiously good we were, and I can't even bother to disagree. It's absolutely hilarious to read about "Cardinals Devil Magic" and so forth. The Cardinals are likely to lose more games than they win this year...