The Narthex

On the night of April 14 and the early hours of April 15, 1912, the grandest ship on earth struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic and sank in fewer than three hours, taking roughly 1,500 lives with her and drowning the proud language of an age in the frothy…

On August 9, 1943, Franz Jaegerstaetter was beheaded for refusing to serve in the German army. The March 2009 edition of New Oxford Review contains my article “Pope Benedict’s Surprise” -- the surprise being that Franz had been declared a martyr (on June 1, 2007) when the Nazis were not…

“I want to make history” is something heard at least from the ambitious. Yet it seems those who succeed are few and far between. Go check out an encyclopedia and pick any “historical” figure at random. I’ll bet that, with very few exceptions, if their life gets to fill half…

Universalism is the heresy that all persons will eventually be saved. It is fueled by various motives: that a “loving” God could not condemn a sinner to eternal damnation for even persistent wrongdoing in a finite lifetime; that God’s “love” can eventually “overcome” human resistance without damaging free will; or…

No doubt we know from the life, suffering (sometimes called “passion”), and death of Jesus Christ that God is a God of unbelievable love and mercy. Recall also that in March 2015, Pope Francis proclaimed 2016 an Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy, and that Pope St. John Paul II, during…

How ancient is the Great Easter Vigil liturgy? We have evidence of a severe fast undertaken during Holy Week as early as 329 A.D. With regard to the Easter Vigil itself, we have descriptions of Jerusalem Easter Vigils, which include the twelve Old Testament readings, also from the 4th century.…

St. Francis Xavier is a figure whose legacy deserves far greater attention than it receives. The West often treats missionaries as peripheral figures who offered spiritual encouragement alongside colonial expansion, although this assumption reflects a failure to grasp the seismic anthropological impact Christian missionaries delivered in regions shaped by radically…

“Been waiting for the bus?” I ask. “Too long,” answers Mrs. Kowalski, one of the regulars. “Late again, is it? Guess I’ll try for the afternoon run.” “Smart,” she answers, “but I’ve been sitting here too long to leave now.” Is she, gentle reader, throwing good money after bad? Sometimes…

Part 3 provided one piece of shockingly good news coming out of Notre Dame. The second piece of shockingly good news is the number of Notre Dame students studying theology. When I was researching the state of the Catholic Faith at Notre Dame, I ran across the following article stating…

In Parts 1 and 2, I promised to describe the shockingly good news coming out of Notre Dame. Before I get to the shockingly good news, let me describe the simply good news for those readers not familiar with the campus or with its history (aside from football). For those…

In Part 1, linked below, I described the shockingly bad news coming out of Notre Dame. I promised that in Part 2 I would describe the shockingly good news. Instead, in this Part 2, I provide an update on the bad news described in Part 1. The good news will…

“Ivan Ilych has died,” an acquaintance reads from the announcement of a formal obituary. Having followed earlier reports of Ivan’s mysterious illness, his colleagues in the judiciary are not surprised. In his classic story “The Death of Ivan Ilych,” Tolstoy recounts how they mourn in keeping with the hardness of…

Folks, the good news out of the University of Notre Dame is shockingly good. The bad news out of Notre Dame is shockingly bad. I’ll start with the bad. On January 8, 2026, Notre Dame announced that a professor, Susan Ostermann, is being appointed, effective July 1, as director of…

Is ours the best of all possible worlds? The philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716) thought so, and it’s a positive thought, isn’t it? But how could we know whether his claim is true? Can we even specify what would make it so? (Politicians, to be sure, often boast…

The Church’s weekday readings are making their way through the glory days of kingship in Israel, the reigns of David and Solomon. (That is to contrast them with the less-than-glorious rulers, subsequent to the division of Israel and Judah.) On Saturday, the First Reading featured Solomon’s prayer for wisdom, wisdom…