The Catholic Thing

By Fr. Robert P. Imbelli

If memory serves (an increasingly dubious supposition), my theatrical debut occurred in the first grade, when I played an elderly Civil War veteran. My opening lines ran: "Here it is Decoration Day, and I'm confined to my bed, too old to be in the parade." Having now attained eighty plus seven, it's probably prudent to inform a younger generation that "Decoration Day" was the name of the holiday we now celebrate as "Memorial Day." Decoration Day received its name from the practice of decorating the graves of those who had served their country and paid the ultimate price.

But what evoked the eighty-year-old memory was the word that lingered on the tongue of a seven-year-old: "confined." At the time, it probably elicited associations with measles or whooping cough and being unhappily "confined" to bed, though, happily, excused from school. Now, living in a retirement residence, the associations are rather with walkers, wheelchairs, and hospital stays - less pleasant prospects and confinements.

But even these pale before the "confinement" recalled in today's gospel for the Third Sunday of Advent. John the Baptist, confined in prison, straitened, physically and spiritually, poses the anguished question: "Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?" (Matthew 11:3)

"Confinement" bears the sense of being "bordered," "limited," set within "boundaries." In this sense we are all "confined:" by physical abilities, natural endowments, ultimately, by our common mortality. As the psalmist ruefully concedes: "The years of our life are threescore and ten, or even fourscore if we are strong. . .but they are soon gone and we fly away." (Psalm 90:10)

Of course, we, sons and daughters of Adam and Eve, all too often rebel against limits and restrictions, against mortality. Ernest Becker's The Denial of Death remains, even after fifty years, a pellucid diagnosis of our personal and cultural plight. We are enthralled by the insinuation: "You will not die. . .you will be like God." (Genesis 3:4-5)

So, we strive to snatch the fruit that promises unending life, limitless possibility, mastery of our destiny. Dante memorably depicts the three beasts - lustful desire, unbridled power, frenzy for fame - that tantalize and allure us by their spurious promise, even as they derail our journey to true life.

It takes no great imaginative skill to picture their prominent contemporary embodiments. They are featured daily, though diversely, on Fox and CNN. It takes more probing discernment to confess one's own complicity. So, we too implore with the psalmist: "teach us to number our days, that we may attain wisdom of heart." (Psalm 90:12)

Yet considering "confinement" more closely may yield further insight. The word might slyly contain its own reversal. There is, for instance, that strangely suggestive "con." Together we share limits; we border one another; we are bound tightly to each other. Confined, we rub shoulders one against the other - for weal and woe. "Aye, there's the rub!" Or the solution. Perhaps even an opening to salvation.

Confined, we appear diminished, reduced, solitary. Solitary confinement is a frightening facsimile of Hell. But break the word apart and a transforming reality may appear. "Con-finis:" a common end. We share together a goal, a purpose, not by nature, but by sheer grace. The grace of him who is to come; indeed, who is ever coming: the Christ of God.

"But who may abide the day of his coming? And who can stand when he appeareth?" (Malachi 3:2) And even Handel's dulcet tones cannot soften the starkness of the query.

"Go, announce to John what you see and hear: blind see, lame walk, lepers are cleansed. Even the dead come to life, while good news reaches the poor. And truly blessed is the one who does not find me scandalous."

The true scope of the scandal has only begun to be revealed on this Advent Sunday. We must first traverse this season of expectation and the mysterious wonder of Chr...

By Michele McAloon.

But first a note from Robert Royal: Friends: Today is the last day of our end-of-year fundraising campaign. We'll be happy to accept your donation anytime, of course. But why wait? We're already working at plans for the shape of TCT, new courses, our other educational campaigns, podcasts, Posses, videos, and much more. We'd like to be able to have a full picture of the resources we'll have in 2026. So now's the time to join in and become part of the process by which we reach out into the Church and the world. Giving NOW makes your contribution even more valuable. And it's tax deductible, And. . .enough. You get the point. Click the button. Write the check. Sign up for a one time donation, monthly, quarterly, annual. But just do it. Please. Today.

Now for today's column...

Advent in Germany is brightened by its world-famous Christmas markets. The smell of grilled sausage, Germany's famous mulled gluhwein, and gingerbread (Lebkuchen) blend together under multicolored lights creating a cheerful experience in anticipation of Christ's birth. Whether it is a two-day affair at a local monastery or the town fire station, or one of the huge metropolitan markets in Munich, Berlin, or Dresden, Christmas markets, now, as in centuries past, are an integral part of the economic and social fabric of Germany, and a potential sign of hope. Though they are also currently threatened by dark shadows.

Tragically, in the past ten years, festivities have been marred by violence. Terrorists have murdered market-goers in Magdeburg, Trier, Berlin and in several markets in France. German and French authorities have now been forced to take measures to prevent these threats almost everywhere.

Today, pedestrian zones typically have a hard barrier to prevent the ramming of automobiles into crowds. In many markets, entrance is strictly controlled with bag and body searches. Unusually for Germany, where police are rarely seen in everyday life, there is a heavy police presence, and surveillance cameras watching over every corner of the markets.

Thankfully, terrorism has not intimidated the people. This year, attendance at the Christmas markets is projected to break record numbers finally returning to pre-pandemic levels.

Despite everything, more than 3000 Christkindlmarkt or Weihnachtsmarkt, as they are referred to regionally, occur in Germany today. Generating billions in Euros, these markets are vital to a struggling German economy. And this is nothing new. Although they've become associated with Christmas, the oldest Christmas markets started as secular, not religious events. Medieval communities would gather in late fall and early winter to sell products and purchase supplies needed before the arrival of the harsh winter months.

Market days often coincided with Christian feast days. Local people would walk to town to worship and then stay to shop at the market. Before the Protestant Reformation, December 6, the Feast of St Nicholas, was a traditional time for children to receive gifts. Parents would buy their children toys at the market and leave them in their children's shoes during the night to honor the good bishop of Myra (a charming custom but also a precursor of Western consumerism).

The Dresden Christmas market is known as the Striezelmarkt and began in 1434, not as a Christmas market but as a meat market where town citizens could purchase Christmas roasts to break the Advent fast. Christmas liturgical symbols were adapted and assimilated as these December markets grew in popularity.

The relationship between the Church and the Christmas markets has always been somewhat ambivalent. Catholic and Protestant clergy understood both the spiritual and economic importance of these markets. They encouraged worship during the season, but were also happy to charge rent for vendors' stalls, often located in the churchyard.

German bishops today are notoriously reticent about evangelization in the public square. But at least some view the ...

By Joseph R. Wood.

But first a note from Brad Miner: Friends: I've had a long and (some would say) distinguished career as an editor and writer, and had the privilege of working with some remarkable people (William F. Buckley, Jr. was one of those). Yet I consider my time at The Catholic Thing as the peak of my professional life. Not the earnings peak, of course, but there you are. I'm very proud of the men and women who contribute to this site and impressed too by the range of their talents and achievements - by our diversity, as people and as writers. Some may imagine we're all cut from the same cloth. We aren't. But we all come together, each in his own way, to praise our Lord.

We do that whether writing about the sacraments or history; if we are being upbeat or 'judgmental.' And, believe me, we do it all for you. You may not know it, but your comments matter very much to us, although sometimes more than other times. So, please, let's keep this conversation going. To quote His Excellency Charles J. Chaput, former Archbishop of Philadelphia: "For the past . . . years, against the odds, The Catholic Thing has offered day after day of consistently invaluable Catholic commentary on the world around us and the issues we face as believers. . . . The Catholic Thing is the kind of little miracle that ripples out to touch lives in powerful ways."

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Now for today's column...

As an intellectual pharisee, I acknowledge that I'm smarter than everyone else (after all, I'm a philosopher!). Like Aristotle's unchanging, eternal Prime Mover, the only suitable activity for me is contemplating my own excellence in my intellect.

But the world needs to hear my self-expressed opinions, so I sometimes step down from the heights to correct the errors of others (i.e., opinions different from my own). When the priests are wearing purple as they are now, I often repent that the world doesn't receive the gift of my instruction more often (not for nothing did one of my Air Force Academy professors, decades ago, nickname me "Arrogance").

With TCT's strict word limit (which should apply to others, not me), I'll only attempt to address two problems I came across this week.

On December 3, Archbishop Timothy Broglio, shepherd of the Archdiocese for the Military Services USA, issued a "Statement on Caribbean Interceptions." The statement responded both to the broad Trump Administration policy of using the military to interdict drug smuggling outside our territory and to the specific act of Secretary of Defense (nay, War) Hegseth or his commanders when they ordered an attack on a presumed drug boat, followed by a second attack that killed survivors of the first attack.

Both the policy and the act raise difficult moral questions. In recent decades, the United States has faced serious threats from "non-state actors" such as terrorist organizations. Such organizations operate with no regard for international or domestic law. As such, they present tough challenges to nations that seek to codify the reason of natural law into international agreements and domestic laws that govern how we conduct warfare.

In past cases such as the brutal American counter-insurgency campaign in the Philippines, counter-insurgency against the Viet Cong, or detention of terrorists outside the United States at Guantanamo Bay, America has struggled to abide by moral principles while doing what was deemed necessary to protect Americans and allies.

Even the question of which organizations should be designated "terrorist" (subject to American economic and military action) is fraught. Should drug lords be considered terrorists like those who struck on 9/11?

Archbishop Broglio's statement mentions neither Christ nor Scripture nor Catholic sources. He seems to apply secular standards to a secular problem, though the secular standards he discusses - just war "theory" and due process - find their foundations in Western Catholic thinking.

Just war principles origi...

By Stephen P. White.

But first a note from Robert Royal: Friends: Only three days left in our end-of-year fundraising. I've liked what I've seen so far, but I'd like it even more if we can bring it now to a big close. After all, this is all about The Catholic Thing.

Now for today's column...

The word "nostalgia" was coined in the seventeenth century by a Swiss physician named Johannes Hofer. The word was a Latinized combination of two Greek words: nostos, meaning "a return home" (think Odysseus), and algos, meaning "pain." Hofer used his new word to describe a medical condition, one he noticed to be particularly common among Swiss mercenaries serving abroad, which might best be described as acute homesickness - homesickness so acute that it could sometimes be fatal.

The word remained in use as a medical term, often applied to soldiers, well into the nineteenth century. For example, in 1865, an American newspaper described conditions at a major prisoner of war camp where captured Confederate soldiers were housed:

At Camp Douglas, Chicago, there are fourteen hundred prisoners on the sick list, with an average number of interments of six per day. One of the most frequent causes of death is nostalgia, which is the medical designation for home sickness.

It wasn't until the early twentieth century that the word nostalgia took on its present meaning: a fond remembrance of the way things used to be, tinged with sadness that things are no longer so.

No one would argue that missing home is a uniquely modern phenomenon. Nor is the fond remembrance of the good ol' days something new. But there is something about the dislocation of the modern era - both physical dislocation and the dislocation caused by the rapid, if not accelerating, pace of cultural and social change - that gives both meanings a particular relevance for the contemporary world.

Surely this modern sense of dislocation has contributed to nostalgia becoming such a defining part of contemporary American life. It shapes our politics, saturates our popular culture, and even shapes how we think of the future.

And there is no time of year in which the American appetite for bittersweet indulgence in nostalgia is more on display than during Advent.

Bing Crosby first recorded "I'll Be Home for Christmas" in 1943, when millions of American men were overseas fighting in Europe and the Pacific. "It's a Wonderful Life," one of the greatest movies - not just Christmas movies - of all time, came out in 1946. "A Miracle on 34th Street" came out a year later. "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas" was recorded by both Perry Como and Bing Crosby in 1951. Como's "(There's No Place Like) Home for the Holidays" has been a staple on the radio since 1954. That same year, "White Christmas" came out (though the eponymous tune had been written in 1942).

Now, one may object that I am connecting nostalgia and Advent, but all these songs and movies are "Christmas movies" or "Christmas songs." Sure, we call them that, but they're really all about Advent - about the sense of longing which steadily grows as we approach Christmas. (Besides, you can call them "Christmas songs" all you want, but if they start playing just after Thanksgiving and stop playing right after Christmas, they're "Advent songs.")

Notice, too, that each of the songs and films I listed came out within a decade of the Second World War - the greatest collective experience of homesickness and (for the lucky ones) safe return in American history. Many of these make explicit reference to the war. And while thousands of songs and films about Christmas (and Advent) have been made since, and while some have even become immensely popular, the post-War, pop-culture, nostalgia factory which produced the old hits remains the standard against which the more recent additions are measured.

One may also object that lots of "Christmas movies" and "Christmas songs" are schlock, which I'll grant. But that only underscores the point that the a...

By J. P. Royal.

But first a note from Robert Royal: Friends: There are many challenges internal to Catholicism these days. But as today's column traces, although we've put the hard toltatiarianisms of the century past behind us, softer forms of repression of religion are still with us - and in need of constant vigilance. We have some new projects coming next year to keep you abreast of persecution of Catholics around the world (you can already consult my book about that here). But we don't intend to ignore what's happening in all our modern "democracies" either. All this calls for daily study and analysis. It calls for your support - and your reliable daily source, The Catholic Thing.

Now for today's column...

On December 10, 1989, at the confluence of the Danube and Morava rivers under the shadow of Devin Castle, tens of thousands of Slovaks marched from Bratislava to Hainburg, Austria, piercing the Iron Curtain. Large crowds also assembled at the castle to protest peacefully under the slogan "Hello, Europe!" The protesters cut through the barbed wire separating Czechoslovakia from the Free World. The very next day, the communist government in Czechoslovakia began dismantling the barriers in this border zone, effectively bringing down the Iron Curtain in Central Europe.

These events were the culmination of the Velvet Revolution, the nationwide Czechoslovak protest movement that ended over forty years of communist rule, leading to the restoration of democracy and freedom there. Slovakia and the Czech Republic, now separate countries, both celebrate these miraculous events on November 17th, the day student protests were brutally disrupted in 1989, which became the catalyst for the chain of events leading to December 10th.

Astonishingly, this holiday, called the Struggle for Freedom and Democracy Day, was canceled this year by Slovakia's Prime Minister Robert Fico. A former member of the Czech Communist Party who has served as prime minister since 2023, Fico cited austerity measures as justification. Instead, Fico's ruling party marked the anniversary with a party congress, where one of his closest advisors greeted the participants with the Marxist greeting, "Honor to work, comrades." To add insult to injury, Fico is on record averring that he does not celebrate November 17th because he does not consider it a fundamental turning point in the life of the country.

While Fico and his cronies in Slovakia attempt to memory-hole those brutalized by the ruling Communist Party during the Cold War and the bravery of those who defied it, Thomas Albert Howard admirably documents the widespread depravity visited upon Czechoslovakia and many other regions of the world over the course of the 20th century in his new book Broken Altars: Secularist Violence in Modern History.

Among the hundreds of atrocities documented in the book, two began in 1950, launched by Czechoslovakia's Communist Party General.

Operation K (for klastery, the Czech word for monastery) utilized state security to round up the vast majority of religious orders throughout the country, focusing on Salesians, Jesuits, Redemptorists, Benedictines, and Franciscans.

Operation R (for the Slovak word for nun, rehol'nicka) decimated female religious houses and convents. Both operations resulted in "the sudden liquidation of religious institutions, some of which had existed for more than a thousand years." Artwork, libraries, and other valuables were looted or destroyed while the religious were shipped to work camps, under prison-like conditions.

In spite of these and other persecutions that continued into the 1980s, as described in gripping detail in Broken Altars, a clandestine church flourished with bishops appointed secretly by the Vatican. This underground church "contributed through samizdat literature to currents of thought leading to the Velvet Revolution."

Broken Altars counters the popular Enlightenment cliché that violence is inherent to religious belief, while secular...

By David G Bonagura, Jr.

But first a note from Robert Royal: Friends: Only five days remain in our end-of-year fundraising. And we're still in need of several thousand dollars to bring this to a successful close. I want TCT to be here next year and for many years to come. If you do too, this is the moment to show it. Please, let's get this campaign done and get back to giving our full attention to the best daily commentary there is on the Church and world today: The Catholic Thing.

Now for today's column...

A turning point is an event that inaugurates substantial change, such as the Battles of Saratoga and Gettysburg or the Eagles' "Philly Special" trick play in Super Bowl LII. The change is decisive - the future takes an unexpected path that would not have worked out otherwise. Its synonyms - climax, watershed, milestone - lack the critical element of beginning something new that might not have been.

With Advent, we prepare for the biggest turning point the universe has ever seen: the Incarnation of the Son of God. The world was languishing in sin with no hope, no prospects for renewal. "All things are full of weariness," laments the Book of Ecclesiastes. "What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; and there is nothing new under the sun." (Ecclesiastes 1:8-9)

The birth of Christ permanently altered the human story. No longer is there politics without a goal. No longer is there suffering without meaning. No longer is there death without the prospect of a greater life to come.

"Now we know the path that we human beings have to take in this world," wrote Pope Benedict XVI in his first Jesus of Nazareth volume. "Jesus has brought God and with God the truth about our origin and destiny: faith, hope, and love. It is only because of our hardness of heart that we think this too little."

We cannot register a turning point until we see the endpoint, which provides a prospective for evaluating the past. Advent helps us prepare for the universe's turning point by beginning with the end point: the second Advent, the second coming of Christ. Because He will triumphantly come again to judge the living and the dead, we know that His first Advent turned the tide forever. God's Anointed, destined to rule heaven and earth in splendor, is born in Bethlehem so that we may have life more abundantly.

In Christ, we know that evil is not the final word - though, alas, it still has more to say. From the wood of the crib to the wood of the Cross, He shows us the way. "If you follow the will of God," continues Benedict, "you know that despite all the terrible things that happen to you, you will never lose a final refuge." Jesus is Emanuel - God with us, through thick and thin, even when suffering tries to tear us apart.

The West's calendar places the universe's turning point at its center. The years of antiquity are counted downwards until His Advent - the time "before Christ." A new era dawned at His birth - the years of our Lord, anni Domini - and time is now counted forward. The years will cease when the second Advent dawns.

Turning points, however, are a matter of interpretation. Where the Christian sees the reconstitution of creation in Christ, nonbelievers see nothing. As these nonbelievers have gained power in the West, they have imposed their blindness on the calendar: rather than distinguish the years "BC/AD," they insist on "BCE/CE," that is, "Before the Common Era" and "Common Era," counting the years in the same way, but with these senseless labels.

And they are senseless: there is nothing to distinguish the year 1 BCE from 1CE. Nothing happened to make the latter "common." By a nonbeliever's reckoning, those years are every bit as common as the ones before and after it. In fact, the BCE/CE system is a modern refashioning of the Book of Ecclesiastes: without Christ, there is nothing new under the sun.

It's tempting to think that turning points in "some other game" don't apply to some of us. Consider Sarat...

By Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas.

But first a note from Robert Royal: Friends: We're in the last week of our funding drive. We're close, but need one last push to bring things to a successful conclusion. I won't belabor the obvious. Now's the time to support The Catholic Thing.

Now for today's column...

Many Catholics misunderstand today's feast, which is also the patronal feast of our nation (the first country to claim her under this title). They confuse the Immaculate Conception of Mary with the virginal conception of Jesus. But today we celebrate the fact that Mary was sinless from the very first moment of her existence - which is extremely important because it demonstrates the care with which God guided the entire process of our salvation.

It's no sheer accident that the Church celebrates this feast at the outset of Advent. This privilege accorded to Our Lady was part of the work of salvation begun at the very moment when sin itself first entered the world. The experience of sin and its reign in our world came about because of human weakness and pride. Just as a woman made possible the first sin, so too a woman would make possible the work of our salvation. Mary was God's answer to Eve.

Christians today and throughout the ages love Mary because she embodies, literally, all that we hope to be. That is why Wordsworth could rhapsodize on her as "our tainted nature's solitary boast." By her faith and willingness to cooperate with God, Mary showed herself to be a true daughter of Abraham. The humble maid of Nazareth further demonstrated that genuine liberation consists not in doing one's own thing as much as it consists in doing God's thing. She proved the angel right, that the Lord was truly with her, as she pronounced that fearful but firm "yes" which reversed every previous "no" in history.

This solemnity gives us a golden opportunity to consider various theological dimensions of the Immaculate Conception.

First, original sin. Original sin is not something we can grasp; it's an absence of original holiness, grace, and unity with the Creator. And it is an "inheritance" from our first parents. Original sin is "hard-wired" into our nature. This caused St. Paul to muse about why we find it easier to do evil than to do good (cf. Romans 7:19).

Second, original sin constitutes us as "children of wrath." (Ephesians 2:3) It's common to gaze upon an infant and declare, "What an angel!" However, that is more a wish than a reality. An infant is totally self-absorbed and demanding. G.K. Chesterton called original sin "the only part of Christian theology which can really be proved." Saint John Henry Newman identifies it as "some terrible aboriginal calamity."

Third, baptism, which is necessary because it moves us from the Kingdom of Darkness into the Kingdom of Light. It returns us to the prelapsarian Garden of Eden. Georges Bernanos, in a charming phrase, referred to Our Lady in her Immaculate Conception as "younger than sin." Baptism, we can say, then, is a Christian's "fountain of youth" as it returns us to that state of original holiness, justice and grace. Hence, Our Lord's assertion to Nicodemus: "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God" (Jn 3:5).

Fourth, we have to deal with a common Protestant objection to the Immaculate Conception, namely, that it "divinizes" Mary. But several major Protestant Reformers believed in the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception - four centuries before its dogmatic definition! Similarly, Cardinal Newman, thirteen years before his conversion, could preach:

Who can estimate the holiness and perfection of her, who was chosen to be the Mother of Christ? If to him that hath, more is given, and holiness and divine favour go together (and this we are expressly told), what must have been the transcendent purity of her, whom the Creator Spirit condescended to overshadow with His miraculous presence? What must have been her gifts, who was chose...

By Fr. Brian A. Graebe.

Isaiah stands as the great prophet of Advent: so powerfully does he foretell Christ's coming (as well as his Passion and Death) that this book has been called the "fifth Gospel." Later in Advent, we will hear his most direct prophecy: "the virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall name him Emmanuel." On this Second Sunday of Advent, though, Isaiah paints for us a vivid description of the Messianic age, one that reads like a pastoral ode: "the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid."

Here, all of nature rests in harmony and peace. It calls our mind back to Eden, free of violence and death. We glimpse the restoration of that fallen world in this vision of hope, from the prophet of hope.

But Isaiah is not the only prophet whom we encounter today. We also meet St. John the Baptist, the last and greatest in the long line of prophets. It is he whom Isaiah foresaw as "a voice crying out in the desert." John's message, though, appears quite different: "Repent!"

John knew that mankind left Eden a long time ago. That original harmony shattered when our first parents sinned against God, and we've all followed suit down the ages. That's why John was baptizing in the Jordan River. His baptism was not a sacrament; it couldn't take away any sins. But it was a way of expressing sorrow for sin as the washing prefigured the rebirth that baptism would bring. Each newly baptized person, however old, emerges from the waters a newborn child, reclaiming lost innocence.

That's surely a reason why Almighty God, the creator of the universe, appeared on earth as a baby: to remind us of our need to be childlike, to mirror the humility and trust that characterize children. As Isaiah tells us, there will be "a little child to guide them." Jesus wants to guide us to that innocence and joy, but we know that not everyone is willing to follow.

Certainly not everyone was willing to follow John. We see the Pharisees and Sadducees, so proud, so smug, so consumed with their own self-righteousness. John calls them out bluntly: "You brood of vipers!" Jesus himself will use the same language later on, both of them warning of what awaits those who persist in their sins.

They had to use such strong language: the Pharisees and Sadducees, blind in their arrogance, thought they had no need for John's call to repentance. Because they were children of Abraham, they all thought they had it made. We see that same mindset among some fellow believers today: because I'm baptized, or a self-proclaimed good person, or because I've accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior, of course, I'm going to Heaven.

John holds up his hand and raises his voice to say: Not so fast. It's the one who knows his sinfulness, his constant need for mercy, his own lowliness, who wins God's favor. What's lower than stones? Yet John tells us that God can make even these children of Abraham.

Isaiah speaks to that lowliness in his image of the root - buried in the ground, the short stump of Jesse. Through Jesse's son, David, would come the promised Savior, as that root sprouted to become the wood of the Cross. It is the sprinkled blood from that Cross that makes us true children of Abraham, adopted into the bloodline of salvation.

And as newly adopted sons and daughters, we have a mother to whom we must turn. Mary offers the perfect model of trust and humility. As we celebrate her Immaculate Conception tomorrow, we recall how Mary remained entirely unstained by sin throughout her life. That purity in mind and body allowed her to be God's honored vessel, magnifying him in her immaculate soul.

It's no coincidence that in her many apparitions, Mary so often appears to children. Their docility, openness, and lack of ego enable Mary's message, which is always Christ's message, to be received and announced with unobstructed resonance.

God Himself came to Mary as a little child, and through Mary, He comes to us, at Christmas and...

By Msgr. Charles Fink

But first a note from Robert Royal: Friends: Many people these days think that the evil in the world is some sort of anomaly, rather than - as Sacred Scripture shows - a constant feature in a fallen world. As today's review of a new book makes clear, current incarnations of evil have ideological as well as spiritual sources. This page appears daily, precisely to make clear distinctions about good and evil, truth and error. We think this is a responsibility that everyone needs to shoulder every day. We're doing that. Will you help? You know how. Just click the button and select one of the many ways that you can be part of the work of The Catholic Thing.

Now for today's column...

When the American novelist Walker Percy was asked by an interviewer why he had become a Catholic, he famously answered, "What else is there?" He was too intelligent and analytical to be merely flippant. He knew that other religions and philosophies, although they might contain elements of truth and wisdom, could not answer to the human thirst for a wholeness of vision that addresses all the exigencies and vagaries of mortal existence and that they often contain errors and the seeds of aberrant behaviors. Not to mention that some are, by nature, virulently anti-Catholic.

In his latest book, Modern Monsters: Political Ideologues and Their War against the Catholic Church, George Marlin shines a bright light on the dark corners of anti-Catholicism that have characterized the thinking of five centuries of influential religionists, philosophers, activists, and politicians. As the title suggests, this is not a book looking to promote ecumenical dialogue or build bridges across the aisle that separates disputing parties. It's a diagnostician's examination of what ails the modern world, how it came to be so ill, and implicitly what it needs to be cured.

With copious quotes from primary and secondary sources - which alone make the book worth reading - Marlin sketches vivid portraits of more than a dozen prominent thinkers whose ideas and rabid anti-Catholicism have shaped our culture, mostly for the worse. Whether he's writing about Martin Luther or Machiavelli, or closer to our own time, Nazis, fascists, and communists, we find illustrated again and again what Pope Pius XI pointed to in his 1937 encyclical Mit brennender Sorge:

Whoever exalts race, or the people, or the state, or a particular form of state, or depositories of power, or any other fundamental value of the human community - however necessary and honorable be their function in worldly things - whoever raises these above their standard value and divinizes them to the idolatrous level distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God: he is far from the true faith in God and from concepts of life which that faith upholds.

Further documented is the nearly megalomaniacal self-assurance of the purveyors of such idolatrous notions who believed that implementation of them would lead to a world far superior to the one we know, if not to an earthly paradise. In short, most of the individuals covered by Marlin turn out to be utopians, who, finding resistance to their utopian vision, morph into totalitarians intent on destroying whoever and whatever stands in the way of the realization of their dreamed-of more perfect society.

This accounts for their invariable hostility to the Catholic Church, ever ready to fight the tendency of ideologues to reduce the individual to a mere means to an end or a cog in the machine and, with perfect realism, also to assert that no individual or group is capable of creating heaven in this fallen world.

From beginning to end, Marlin is dealing with those who, absolutely assured of their vision of how to perfect the world, will brook no opposition to the implementation of their plans. How could they? They have usurped the role of God, only without God's mercy and love. All who oppose them must be eliminated by whatever means necessary....

By Fr. Benedict Kiely.

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Now for today's column...

"O God be gracious and bless us and let Your face shed its light upon us." So begins Psalm 68, often said in the Daily Office, or Breviary, at the start of the day. In St. John's Gospel, Philip says to Jesus, "show us the Father and that will be enough for us." Jesus responds, "Philip, to have seen Me is to have seen the Father." The light shining from the face of Christ is the light of the Father. The blessing of seeing the face of Christ is the gift we will soon celebrate at Christmas: God has become man, and we can look upon Him.

This is why we can revere holy images, and in a special way icons, because of the Incarnation. We do not worship the images, but they become a window, or portal, in which we can enter into the mystery of the divine and have, in a very real sense, an encounter with the One portrayed. A holy icon of the face of Christ, for example, is a way that we can gaze into the sacred humanity and divinity of the Lord, and feel the blessing, warmth, and light of His face.

In the priestly blessing of Aaron in the Old Testament, in the Book of Numbers, he prays that the "Lord make His face to shine upon you … the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you His peace."

The peace of Christ, which St. Paul tells us is beyond all human understanding, comes from the shining countenance of the Lord. It is a warming presence, driving away the sadness of weariness and despondency.

Apart from the necessity of cultivating gratitude for the wonderous gift of the Word made flesh, Advent is a time to drive out that enervating weariness, both physical and spiritual, and the easy despondency that comes from both forgetfulness of what Christmas really means and the slavery of being captured and captivated by the bad news that surrounds us.

Thomas of Celano, the earliest biographer of St. Francis of Assisi, who is usually credited with the invention of the Christmas creche, complete with Ox and Ass, wrote that one of the reasons that St. Francis decided to create the Manger scene was because the "love of the world for Christ had grown cold."

The creation of that scene of the birth of Christ, so often today rather saccharine and unrealistic, in the 13th century, when perhaps hardened hearts might be melted more easily than those made cynical by loveless and unlovely secularism, allowed, according to legend, some even to see the Baby Jesus moving in the crib.

Chesterton, that man who loved Christmas more even than Dickens, often wrote of the contrast between the warmth and comfort of the fire within the house, the "cosiness," he called it, and the rain, cold, and snow outside. Christ, he said, "is not merely a summer sun of the prosperous but a winter fire for the unfortunate." To lack the warmth of Christ is to be more than unfortunate. The cold that ensues freezes both body and soul.

Paradoxically, especially for those who dislike the winter in the western hemisphere, and who find the idea of skiing, going down a mountain on two sticks, a sure sign of mental imbalance, it is something of a blessing to experience the lack of sun and the cold, in order to be reminded of the Son who never sets, and the winter fire of Christ who is truly the warmth of the unfortunate, as was all of humanity before the first Christmas.

This is confirmed by some words of St. Seraphim of Sarov, the Russian Orthodox saint, who died in 1833. St. ...