You sometimes hear Catholics express the opinion that anti-Catholicism is the last remaining socially acceptable prejudice in America.

For example, in a recent piece defending Archbishop Dolan, James Farrell of Irish Central writes:

Archbishop Timothy Dolan has come out swinging against The New York Times, accusing it of anti-Catholic bias in two recent articles.

He is right.

Anti-Catholicism is the last acceptable prejudice it seems to me in America. If the same comments that were made about Catholic religious figures were aimed at Rabbis, immams [sic] or Dali Lamas there would be widespread outrage.

The substance of what Farrell says is quite true, and I’m glad to see him stepping...READ MORE

Or will your children or grandchildren?

Before you scoff at the possibility, recognize that it has already been happening to people.

The homosexual lobby is relentless and is not seeking tolerance. It is seeking coerced social approval of homosexual behavior.

That includes forcing non-homosexuals to participate in homosexual “pride” celebrations.

It happened right here in San Diego, where four fire

men were ordered to participated in the local “San Diego Pride Parade” (notice how even the word “gay” is missing from the name of the event? That’s evidence of what linguists sometimes call the “euphemism treadmill”—where a euphemism for something viewed negatively eventually takes on...READ MORE

A correspondent writes:

I was wondering if you could comment some time about some of these spiritual promises that allegedly attach to certain prayers or devotions.  The 15 promises of the rosary seems to be the most common example, but of course there’s more.

There are more—and the reader goes on to name some—but for this post let’s look at the alleged 15 promises regarding the rosary.

First, here is a commonly given text of them.

Before we go further, I should comment about a phrase that occurs in the very first promise, because it is not in common use today and startles everybody who runs across it for the first time. According to the first promise, those who pray the rosary...READ MORE

A correspondent writes:

I am presently attending a Bible study.  During our small group discussion, a question arose from someone in our group.

We would like to know if it is wrong for us to read and examine other books and Bibles that are not Catholic-based to see what they have information-wise pertaining to spiritual matters.  For example, we both have Life Application Study Bibles and enjoy reading the associated study footnotes.

My opinion is that the Holy Spirit guides us with discernment especially when we pray before reading or delving into other Christian denomination books and Bibles.  I guard myself (my heart, mind and spirit) so that I’m not influenced in any way that could...READ MORE

There’s an episode of The Simpsons in which Homer wins a Grammy Award, and the following dialog occurs:

Homer: Oh, why won’t anyone give me an award?

Lisa:       You won a Grammy!

Homer: I mean an award that’s worth winning.

Then a crawl line scrolls across the bottom of the screen, stating: “LEGAL DISCLAIMER:  Mr. Simpson’s opinions does not reflect those of the producers, who don’t consider the Grammy an award at all.”

That’s how I’m coming to feel about the once-noble Nobel Prize.

One of the most egregious awards they made was last year’s honoring of our president with a Nobel Peace Prize before he’d done anything. (It was awarded on his 11th day after inauguration.)

Even he...READ MORE

Let me say up front that I have nothing against treating the environment in a responsible manner. It’s implied by the commission God gave mankind in Genesis 1. I also try to avoid fights about words, so whether one would call a responsible environmental position “conservationism” or “environmentalism” is a thing that does not need to be fought about.

But there is a very prominent strand in the environmental movement that takes matters to extreme and anti-human limits. In a previous post, I have referred to this position as environmental fundamentalism, to distinguish it from healthy concern for the environment.

I mean, nobody wants to make Iron Eyes Cody‘s iron eyes cry. Do they?

However...READ MORE

I am.

At least according to a quiz put out by the Pew Forum on Religious and Public Life.

The quiz has 32 questions, of which atheists in America who took the quiz got an average of 20.9 questions right. American Jews got 20.5 right, American Mormons 20.3 right, American Protestants 16 right, and American Catholics 14.7 right.

I got all of them, but that’s nothing special since this is the field I work in professionally. I’m expected to know my own field. Give me a comparable quiz on another topic and watch the number plummet. I can say with great confidence that if you gave me a 32-question quiz on sports—something very large numbers of people would do very well on—I would be lucky to...READ MORE

Recently over on Facebook (where you can friend me if you like), I posted an item which stated:

Jimmy Akin would like the world to know that he has heard exhortations to “Go Green”/“Be Green”/“Save the Planet” so often that using any of these phrases drastically decreases the chance he will agree to the proposal in question—whatever it is.

I figured that this would generate a good bit of reaction, and it did. In less than a day there were over 100 responses. That was even more reaction than the item I posted about the spider in Madagascar that makes webs 82 feet across or the woman who fended off a bear by hitting it with a zucchini!

A big part of the reason the item got the reaction it...READ MORE