Humanae Vitae and Me
Back in May, my family went to Mass in another state because we were visiting my in-laws. The kids were in rare form. Our 4-year-old daughter repeatedly tried to go under the pew, and protested loudly whenever my wife or...
Tagged: Mike Lewis
Is it really confusion?
When I read Pedro Gabriel’s excellent exegesis of Chapter 8 of Amoris Laetitia last week, I was impressed by how thoroughly and definitively he had affirmed what the exhortation says about the reception of Holy Communion for those in irregular...
Not a sidestep, but an affirmation
For two years, critics of Amoris Laetitia have pointed to Poland as a celebrated example of a national bishops’ conference upholding their view of “orthodoxy.” Beginning in 2016, when a senior Polish bishop vowed to never allow communion to the...
Marcel Lefebvre: Father of Traditionalist Dissent
I have long argued that the rebellion against the Holy Father is at its core the same rebellion staged by the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) and other extreme traditionalists against the papacy since the 1970s. A recently released...
The shock of developing doctrine: A response to Fr. Dwight Longenecker
“We cannot determine whether a professed development is truly such or not, without some further knowledge than an experience of the mere fact of this variation. Nor will our instinctive feelings serve as a criterion. It must have been an...
Fundamentalist Catholics and Ecclesial Catholics
The division among certain Catholics that began with the election of Pope Francis and became pronounced upon the public release of the four cardinals’ dubia continues to widen. Catholics, many of whom were close allies during the pontificates of St...
Critics of Pope Francis, What’s your End-Game?
In the debate over the doctrinal soundness of Amoris Laetitia — and of the orthodoxy of Pope Francis’s teaching in general — is one area where papal critics cannot provide a single clear or compelling answer: how this ends. While...
Who should “Joe Catholic” listen to?
It’s fairly evident that the debate over Amoris Laetitia has mostly stayed within the domain of a very small subset of Catholics: those who follow Vatican affairs closely, those who consume EWTN and other Catholic media, and those who enjoy...
Urban Legends and Conspiracy Theories: A Hallmark of Papal Critics
Yet another conference headlined by American Cardinal Raymond Burke and Kazakhstan Auxiliary Bishop Athanasius Schneider was held in Rome on April 7. With the succinct title, Catholic Church: Where are you heading? Only a blind man can deny that there is...
Raymond Arroyo: Derision over Truth
Image (from left): Fr. Gerald Murray, Robert Royal, Raymond Arroyo Why are we listening to young people, who really haven’t experienced a lot of life, or God, frankly? — Raymond Arroyo Note: This is the second post in a series...
GAUDETE ET EXSULTATE: Reaction Roundup
Introducing: Gaudete et Exsultate from Catholic Church (England/Wales) on Vimeo. Today, at noon Rome time, Pope Francis released Gaudete et Exulsate, a new exhortation on the universal call to holiness. In it, he reminds us that holiness is not...
Closeness is the Key to Truth
Since the first Holy Thursday of his papacy, when he moved the Mass of the Lord’s Supper to a youth prison on the outskirts of Rome, Pope Francis has used this day to paint a portrait of his vision for...
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