Topics

From the NOR Dossiers

Revert's Rostrum by Casey Chalk

A Requiem for Old Rosy

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

September 2024

Rosecrans had a reputation as a vocal Catholic with an aggressive evangelizing impulse. He kneeled alongside his soldiers at Mass, and regularly prayed the Rosary.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Seventh Last Word

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

June 2024

Christ's final word is not a cry of desperation or defeat but a “victory cry,” a uniting of His will with God, pregnant with eager expectation of everlasting joy.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Sixth Last Word

'IT IS FINISHED'

Casey Chalk

April 2024

At death will our thoughts be aimed at how to defeat it or how to make the experience an extension of the redemptive work of the Cross?

VIEW ARTICLE
The Fifth Last Word

'I THIRST'

Casey Chalk

January-February 2024

We followers of Christ are likewise called to thirst for souls, to burn with desire to see others saved — not only our family and friends but everyone we meet.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Fourth Last Word

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

November 2023

Through our pain, we are capable of actually participating in the salvific economy of Christ. This spiritual power is all the more acute at death.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Third Last Word

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

September 2023

Jesus chose for His mother’s guardian the disciple “whom He loved.” There were few, if any, who were better fit for such an important task than St. John.

VIEW ARTICLE
Perspicuity: Protestantism’s Achilles’ Heel

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

June 2023

Within the Reformed tradition, the most famous articulation of perspicuity, or clarity, is found in the 17th-century Westminster Confession of Faith.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Second Last Word

LOOKING BEYOND WORLDLY THINGS

Casey Chalk

April 2023

To die well means to place our physical concerns, however legitimate, within the broader context of the spiritual, which is infinitely more important.

VIEW ARTICLE
The First Last Word

ON FORGIVENESS

Casey Chalk

January-February 2023

The pedagogy of Christ’s first last word goes far beyond exemplifying mercy to tormentors. Forgiveness also serves an evangelical purpose.

VIEW ARTICLE
Are Catholics the New WASPs?

COMPLETE ENCULTURATION

Casey Chalk

November 2022

For many, Catholicism as a religion has become irrelevant as they have capitulated to secular American culture, as did WASPs in the mainline Protestant denominations.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Post-Liberal Project & the American Polis

NAVIGATING THE PUBLIC SQUARE

Casey Chalk

September 2022

The post-liberal project is an interesting intellectual exercise that offers cautions regarding Catholicism’s imperfect alliance with the current American regime.

VIEW ARTICLE
Mystic Chords of Memory

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

June 2022

Would I have learned to appreciate classical music — and even the very best of jazz or blues — if I hadn’t first learned to appreciate the best of rock and pop?

VIEW ARTICLE
For Mature Audiences Only

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

April 2022

America’s conception of sex is downright sophomoric, and its overhaul starts with understanding what sex is and what it is for.

VIEW ARTICLE
Overcoming Our Culture of Indifference

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

January-February 2022

We are called to care for the sojourner and to be sympathetic and responsive to the needs of those fleeing poverty, political oppression, or religious persecution.

VIEW ARTICLE
On Friendship

SEEKING THE TRUE, OBJECTIVE GOOD OF THE OTHER

Casey Chalk

November 2021

If friendship really is tied up with virtue and our eternal well-being, then it requires work, much as the romantic life does.

VIEW ARTICLE
Ministers of the Ecclesiae Mediae

THE PUBLIC SQUARE IS NOT NAKED BUT CLOTHED BY 'WOKE' IDEOLOGY

Casey Chalk

September 2021

The public square is not naked but clothed by the “woke” ideology of our bourgeois liberal elites. It has its own "church" that pronounces on orthodoxy and heresy.

VIEW ARTICLE
Conservatism at the Crossroads

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

June 2021

The American founders followed Plato and Aristotle in acknowledging man’s inclination to consolidate power, indulge his passions, and oppress his fellowman.

VIEW ARTICLE
Should Christians Pay Reparations for Racial Injustices?

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

April 2021

The Church can engage in the work of racial reparations, but only while placing the project within a broader moral framework.

VIEW ARTICLE
A Manifesto for 2021

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

January-February 2021

As always, when contemplating the political order, we should keep in mind the psalmist’s exhortation: “Put not your trust in princes.”

VIEW ARTICLE
A Davidic Similitude in Pre-Revolutionary China

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

November 2020

All of us, regardless of our wealth or circumstances, are presented with choices that lead either to our happiness or to our ruin.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Catholic Church in the Crosshairs

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

September 2020

It is a cruel irony that, in less than a century, Catholics have gone from being victimized as unwelcome immigrants to being widely perceived as racist victimizers.

VIEW ARTICLE
Sympathy for the Priest

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

June 2020

Honest, humble, Christ-like priests serve on the front lines of a multi-millennia war against evil, defiantly waving the banner of Christ.

VIEW ARTICLE
Sign-Stealing of the Times

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

April 2020

The Astros' systematic cheating vitiated the sanctity not only of the game of baseball but a core feature of American identity.

VIEW ARTICLE
Overcoming the Evils of Ecclesial Division

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

January-February 2020

The robust friendship of 20th-century Swiss theologians Karl Barth and Hans Urs von Balthasar offers a different approach to ecumenical dialogue.

VIEW ARTICLE
In Bureaucracy’s Grip

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

November 2019

Our friends are being squeezed by the vise of Islamic extremism and by the incomprehensible, inescapable grip of U.S. federal bureaucracy.

VIEW ARTICLE
All Catholics Should Major in Double E

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

September 2019

The Eucharist without the episcopacy is invalid. The episcopacy without the Eucharist is more or less useless. The two are mutually reinforcing.

VIEW ARTICLE
A Tree Grows in St. Louis

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

June 2019

A remarkable family and their little spiritual oasis in the Gateway to the West have become, as divine fate would have it, a gateway to Catholicism.

VIEW ARTICLE
Judaism’s Nonlinear History of Monotheism

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

April 2019

The historical moment when Judaism seemed most alive, its pieties and devotions most ubiquitous, was the moment God required an expanded understanding and vision of His nature.

VIEW ARTICLE
Learning the Meaning of Longsuffering

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

January-February 2019

We all suffer together, we members of the mystical body of Christ. Our every act of virtue contributes to the glory of Christ’s Church.

VIEW ARTICLE
The Strange Magnetism of Virtual Fisticuffs

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

November 2018

What happens when a fairly obscure writer picks a fight with a Christian YouTube celebrity who has over 200,000 followers?

VIEW ARTICLE
Humanae Vitae: A Manual for Better Sex?

REVERT'S ROSTRUM

Casey Chalk

October 2018

Much popular Catholic literature on NFP is utilitarian, claiming that obeying Church teaching results in a happier, more exciting bedroom experience.

VIEW ARTICLE