Catholic Husband

One or two weeks a year, all four kids end up spending a week or so with their grandparents. Whether some time away, or attending a camp, it’s a week that is different from any other. Before it starts, however, I always do the same thing. As we prepare to pack the kids’ things, we first spend half a day giving the house a deep cleaning. My goal is to start the week with a tot...

Our summer RV trip is over, but its events are now part of our shared memory and language. It was a vacation unlike one we’ve taken before, and it found its anchoring in the many holy places we visited along the way. These green hills, leafy valleys, and empty fields were the places where saints tread.

Pilgrimages are an ancient tradition, and while they cause us to th...

Our summer RV trip is over, but its events are now part of our shared memory and language. It was a vacation unlike one we’ve taken before, and it found its anchoring in the many holy places we visited along the way. These green hills, leafy valleys, and empty fields were the places where saints tread.

Pilgrimages are an ancient tradition, and while they cause us to th...

Over the last several months, I’ve spent a lot of my time ruminating on aesthetics. This particular branch of philosophy focuses on the nature of beauty and taste. Society usually thinks of beauty in terms of physical looks and attraction, and only in the context of what that beauty can do for it. But aesthetics recognizes beauty for what it truly is, a good unto itself.

Over the last half century, the general agreement between Church and culture has broken down. The Church and culture held a common set of values and standards of conduct, but slowly and deliberately, the culture chose to make its own path. This break has lead to the fractured society we now live in, where we don’t even acknowledge the same reality.

For many, the Cathol...