Book Reviews – December 2021

Christmas Around the Fire. By Ryan N.S. Topping. Reviewed by Mark McCann. (skip to review) Meet the Gentle Jesus: First Communion Preparation Program. By Liguori Publications. Reviewed by Mark McCann. (skip to review) The Healing … [Read more...]

Quod Scripsi, Scripsi: The Life and Legacy of Marvin R. O’Connell

At the end of his recently published posthumous memoir, Father Marvin O’Connell quotes the words of Pontius Pilate from Scriptures. “Even though I too can write Quod scripsi, scripsi, my trouble is not the same as Pilate’s. My trouble has to … [Read more...]

Book Reviews – June 2019

The Catholic Writer Today and Other Essays By Dana Gioia. Reviewed by Ken Colombini. (skip to review) Raymond E. Brown and the Catholic Biblical Renewal By Fr. Donald E. Senior. Reviewed by Rev. John P. Cush, STD. (skip to … [Read more...]

The Color Pink and Abortion Glee

Toward Comprehending the Incomprehensible Events in New York on January 22, 2019

For many decades in most parts of the U.S., at least since the 1940s, the color pink was associated with girl babies and cute girly things. In 2017, feminists started wearing cat-eared pink hats as obscene symbols for women’s “rights.” With … [Read more...]

The New Acceptance of Sodomy

Why? And What Now?

How could a Catholic priest ever come to think that it was morally acceptable for him to engage in sodomy? In the light of more than a dozen events or factors affecting one’s thinking since 1960, a priest with a same-sex orientation might a … [Read more...]

Catherine O’Donnell’s Elizabeth Seton: American Saint

A Review Essay

O’Donnell, Catherine. Elizabeth Seton: American Saint. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2018. 508 pages. As the only scholarly biography of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton to be published since her canonization in 1975, Christine O’Donnell’s w … [Read more...]

Book Reviews for Winter 2018

Minor Setback or Major Disaster? The Rise and Demise of Minor Seminaries in the United States, 1958-1983 By Robert L. Anello, MSA. Reviewed by Fr. Scott Jones. (skip to review) One Beautiful Dream: The Rollicking Tale of Family Chaos, … [Read more...]

Culture of Encounter in Ferguson

Ferguson, Missouri has become a touchstone of contemporary discourse on race relations, usually juxtaposing African American and white populations. Yet, this Missouri town is also home to a Catholic parish that serves, among others, over a … [Read more...]

Autumn Book Reviews

Behold the Man: A Catholic Vision of Male Spirituality by Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2015), xi + 279 pp. Reviewed by Dr. Joshua M. Evans. Catholics and Protestants: What Can We Learn from Each Other? … [Read more...]

Praise or Pretense for Catholic Schools?

It’s always nice to know the hard-earned reputation of Catholic schools—from the early struggles of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton to the 1950s, when our schools were bursting at the seams with record enrollments—still lingers today. But if we’re … [Read more...]

Racketeer for Life

Book Review Essay

Fighting the Culture of Death from the Sidewalk to the Supreme Court by Joseph M. Scheidler with Peter M. Scheidler (Charlotte, NC: Tan Books/St. Benedict Press, 2016; ISBN 978-1-61890-850-6, $24.95) 455 pages. Maybe once in a lifetime, … [Read more...]

Late Winter Reading

Hope for the World: To Unite All Things in Christ. By Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke and Guillaume D'alançon; paperback; published July 20, 2016. Reviewed by Fr. Ryan Rojo. Proofs of God: Classical Arguments from Tertullian to Barth by M … [Read more...]

Winter Reading 2017

A Theology of Grace in Six Controversies. Edward T. Oakes, S.J. (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, 2016) 248 pages; $28.00 paperback. Reviewed by Steven J. Meyer, S.T.D. John Lawrence Hill, After the Natural Law: How the Classical … [Read more...]

To Whom Shall We Go?

(“To whom shall we go?” John 6: 66-69)[1. “As a result of this, many of his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him. Jesus then said to the Twelve, ‘Do you also want to leave?’ Simeon Peter answered him, … [Read more...]