Here are some articles, essays, and editorials that caught our attention this past week or so.*
Rage Bait – “Online content deliberately designed to elicit anger or outrage by being frustrating, provocative, or offensive, typically posted in order to increase traffic to or engagement with a particular web page or social media account.” And the Oxford Word of the Year 2025 is… rage bait (Oxford University Press)
Fertility Decline – “The West’s demographic dearth is capturing the attention of growing numbers of public officials.” The Fertility Crisis Will Not Be Solved by Economics Alone (First Things)
Theists and Atheists – “Yesterday, the Yule Blog featured an essay about how theists and atheists are not all that different from each other; we are almost all transcendentalists in the sense that almost all of us find some kind of moral, ethical, and even spiritual meaning as we encounter the world.” Day 6: Personal Meaning (Providence)
Islam as a Governing Project – “Islam diverges significantly from Christianity, and in some ways that Karl Marx might have appreciated” Islam and Communism (Catholic Answers)
Return of the Strong Gods – “The ruler bears witness to the meaningfulness of reality, and in doing so he augments its meaning, opening up the world to the dimensions that would allow a properly human existence to unfold.” The Crisis of Authority (Communio)
Dead Sea Scrolls – “Long before the biblical canon was formally defined, these texts were copied, guarded and revered as sacred.” The Scriptures Jesus Knew: Stepping Into the World of the Dead Sea Scrolls (National Catholic Register)
Microscale Robots – “Engineers at Penn Engineering have created robots barely visible to the naked eye that operate without tethers, magnetic fields or joystick-like controls.” The world’s smallest programmable, autonomous robots (Penn Today)
Sacred Images – “All of it is oriented toward a kind of spiritual service, to try to provide a kind of mental framework for Christian life, that can actually be inhabited by modern people.” A Year of Sacred Images; An Inheritance We Can Still Inhabit (The Sacred Images Project)
(*The posting of any particular news item or essay is not an endorsement of the content and perspective of said news item or essay.)
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Saint Catherine Labouré, her visions, and how they changed the world
@ Dead Sea Scrolls
Yes. In terms of historiographic evidence of what the previous dated extant texts revealed they are significant. As are the texts such as Daniel that foretold Antiochus Epiphanes and the abomination of desecration in the Jerusalem Temple. The Hellenization of Israel. The struggle for retaining Hebraic Jewish identity under Hellenic and Roman occupation.
Nevertheless, what is indicated is the strength of the Christ revelation, which proved to be the irrepressible truth of the events and message. Additionally, providence had the two major cultural affiliations Greek and Roman as part of adopting and furthering Christ’s revelation to the known world.
@ Return of the Strong Gods
“Some people experienced traumatic shock when some church
leaders questioned customary notions about the solidity and scope of
hierarchical church authority itself” (excerpt book review Paul Misner emeritus Marquette. Transcript unavailable on this website).
This edited edition describes the meltdown of significant doctrine among which is the requirement for confession of sins and repentance. What the new breed of young theologians suggest as remedy is a form of ecumenical dialogue within the Church inclusive of dissenting parties to authority itself.
Insofar as my brief overview it seems that Leo XIV may have this form of resolution in mind for the January cardinals consistory. Again as opined previously success in that format is questionable. Contention of the opposing parties is too strong for strong God’s. We require a Vicar of Christ who doesn’t fear either the truth or its implementation.
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Saint Catherine Labouré, her visions, and how they changed the world
Extra, extra! News and views for Wednesday, December 31, 2025
My Top Ten Movies of 2025
Baffled by a bishop
MPAA Rating: R USCCB Rating: NR Reel Rating: (3 of out 5 reels) Sin has a nasty way of poisoning everything it touches, even if it is accompanied by the best of intentions. Black Mass illustrates this point […]
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