Defending the Faith

The Vatican said Wednesday that an Italian journalist it has previously corrected was not speaking accurately when he claimed that Pope Francis denied Christ’s divinity. "As already stated on other occasions, the words that Dr. Eugenio Scalfari attributes in quotation marks to the Holy... Read more

In the Acts of the Apostles, one of the earliest issues the Church had to confront was the admission of Gentile converts into the Christian faith (cf. Acts 15). There were differing views regarding whether converts needed to abide by the law of Moses and be circumcised first in order to become a... Read more

Out on the Kansas plains, he was just turning 21 when the Second Vatican Council promulgated its Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium) and its Decree on the Pastoral Office of the Bishops in the Church (Christus Dominus). So it’s unlikely that the Fathers of Vatican II had... Read more

Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School in Indianapolis announced this week that the Vatican has suspended a decree prohibiting the school from calling itself Catholic. The announcement has led to speculation and debate about the likely outcome for an appeal filed against the decree. But the canonical... Read more

Perhaps it was because Notre-Dame de Paris was burning. Perhaps it was because the best place to hide something from view is in plain sight.  Or perhaps it was because we look for power in wind, earthquake, and fire, but miss the “still small voice” of God when He passes by. (1 Kgs... Read more

James Carroll, the author of this month’s Atlantic’s cover story, “Abolish the Priesthood,” is famous in certain Catholic circles for his bitter denunciations of the Church. To the well-documented renunciation of his own priesthood years ago, Carroll now adds the claim that, by its very... Read more

This past June, the Archdiocese of Indianapolis opened a huge can of wormswhen it asked two Catholic schools within the diocese—Cathedral High School and Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School—not to renew the contracts of two male teachers who had, in flagrant violation of the Church’s... Read more

Much has been written about the decision to reconstitute the Pontifical John Paul II Theological Institute for Marriage and Family Sciences in Rome. I do not believe the point has been sufficiently made that the graduates of the institute in Rome, and of those elsewhere as well, have made... Read more

While the actual event of the Assumption of Mary into Heaven is not recorded in the Scriptures, there is a biblical basis for the teaching that, considered as a whole, confirms Catholic teaching as both fitting and in keeping with biblical principles. Let’s ponder this feast in stages: The... Read more

The Archbishop of Melbourne has said he is prepared to defy a proposed new law that would force priests in the Australian state of Victoria to violate the seal of confession. The proposed legislation would include priests in mandatory reporting laws in cases of child sexual abuse, without any... Read more