Yves Simon on some enlightening relations between the concept of authority and that of law
In A General Theory of Authority, Yves Simon writes that “The power in charge of unifying common action through rules binding for all is what everyone calls authority.” Immediately after this statement, Simon drops a footnote discussing various relations between the concept of authority and the concept of law. Here is that footnote in its […]
When lawyers for the United States resign
A lawyer is an agent for the client as well as a moral agent in his or her own right. A lawyer’s actions on behalf of a client are still that lawyer’s own actions even if they are also the actions of the client. When lawyers who represent the United States government resign because they […]
“Operation Mincemeat” for a Modern-Day Moviegoer
The New York Times has published a confession of sorts by Taffy Brodesser-Akner, titled “Why on Earth Have I Seen the Same Broadway Show 13 Times? An Investigation.” It’s worth reading, at least if you’re at roughly the same time of life as its author (and this post’s author). The piece can be read as […]
“Rediscovering the meaning of words” as “one of the primary challenges of our time”
In his Address to the Diplomatic Corps two days ago, Pope Leo singled out the importance of ensuring the connection between words and reality. The “meaning of words” is this connection of words to reality. Pope Leo stated: Rediscovering the meaning of words is perhaps one of the primary challenges of our time. When words […]
Address of Pope Leo to Members of the Diplomatic Corps Accredited to the Holy See
On January 9, 2026, Pope Leo XIV delivered an Address to Members of the Diplomatic Corps Accredited to the Holy See. The address begins in the present moment, so to speak, with Pope Leo acknowledging that he was new to this particular event that was traditional for the diplomatic corps. Pope Leo welcomed representatives from […]
“if you comprehend, He is not God”
Continuing with reflections on the first chapter of the Gospel of John in an Augustinian key, here is the paragraph from Augustine’s Sermon 117 that includes the oft-quoted phrase “Si comprehendis, non est deus”: It is said, “And the Word was God.” We are speaking of God; what marvel, if thou do not comprehend? For […]
“the colonists should view themselves as a distinctive people”
Chief Justice John Roberts begins his 2025 Year-End Report with a meditation on Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. Among the points Roberts highlights in anticipation of the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence is Paine’s urging Americans to think of themselves as Americans. More precisely, Roberts focuses on Paine’s urging of the […]
“Be open to what the Lord has in store for you!”
Pope Leo XIV has delivered a beautiful video message to American young adults at SEEK 2026 in Columbus (Ohio), Denver (Colorado), and Fort Worth (Texas). The message is a meditation on the first words attributed to Jesus in the Gospel of John, “What do you seek?” These words are addressed to two disciples of John […]
Samuel Johnson’s “Just” “Due”
My notice of 2026 annual dues for my Knights of Columbus council arrived in my inbox on December 31, 2025. I have been researching these days the meaning of “due” in connection with a writing project on the meaning of “justice” in the U.S. Constitution’s Preamble. This meaning, I contend, is best understood in light […]
Mary, our hope
Pope Leo XIV titled his final Saturday Jubilee audience for the Jubilee Year initiated by Pope Francis, “To hope is to generate. Mary, our hope.” This catechesis connects Mary’s generativeness with the theological virtue of hope:
“Dio è Amore!”
Pope Leo XIV concluded his General Audience of December 31, 2025 “by remembering the words with which Saint Paul VI, at the end of the Jubilee of 1975, described its fundamental message”: It is contained, he said, in one word: “love”. And he added, “God is Love! This is the ineffable revelation with which the […]
“more willingly to witnesses than to teachers”
A favorite line of Pope Paul VI’s that later popes that have quoted in their own teaching comes from the Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Nuntiandi (Dec. 8, 1975). In No. 41, Pope Paul VI observes that “Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because […]
“a finally perfect justice for the living and the dead”
Two words that are joined together throughout the CDF’s 1986 Instruction on Christian Freedom and Liberation are “truth” and “justice.” The latter is often described as gesturing toward an ideal. But Christianity affirms the eventual reality of “a finally perfect justice for the living and the dead.” This is discussed in Paragraphs 59-60: The final […]
A Christmas hymn and Hebrews 4:15
One of my faculty colleagues shared this past Christmas morning a favorite verse from a Christmas hymn: “For He is our childhood’s pattern;Day by day, like us, He grew;He was little, weak, and helpless,Tears and smiles, like us He knew;And He feeleth for our sadness,And He shareth in our gladness.” This colleague noted the way […]
Hebrews 1:1-3 in the Christmas Octave
The Feast of St. John, Evangelist in the Octave of Christmas seems an appropriate time to reflect on Hebrews 1:1-3, another “in the beginning” kind of passage: 1 In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; 2 in these last days, he spoke to us through a […]
Freedom and liberation on the Feast of St. Stephen
The Feast of St. Stephen is a fitting time to be reminded of the Truth that is the basis of freedom. Here is an explanation from the 1986 document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction on Christian Freedom and Liberation: 21. One of the principal errors that has seriously burdened the […]
Consenting to Christmas with an assist from the Litany of Trust backstory
Sr. Faustina, S.V., has explained the Litany of Trust as arising out of an inspired recognition that God does not so much ask as to consent to circumstances, but to Him. The Lord just in His tenderness broke a little bit of that darkness of the months prior, and kind of lifted my eyes to […]
Judicial ambition and the unity of the virtues
In Brutus XII, the author links the Preamble’s purpose “to establish Justice” with the tendency of federal courts to extend their jurisdiction: The second object is “to establish justice.” This must include not only the idea of instituting the rule of justice, or of making laws which shall be the measure or rule of right, but […]
An Advent view of the Advocate
The final days of Advent bring to mind a passage from Jesus’s Last Supper discourse in John. The night before his death, a new exodus, Jesus looks ahead to God’s presence among His people in a new way, through “another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth.” The Holy Spirit poured into […]
Mission and Communion in Pope Leo’s 2025 Christmas Greetings
The two themes of Pope Leo’s 2025 Christmas Greetings are mission and communion. Pope Leo XIV explains that the Church’s missionary character “flows from the fact that God himself first set out toward us and, in Christ, came in search of us. Mission begins in the heart of the Most Holy Trinity…. The first great […]
