When Sen. Arlen Specter announced last week that he opposed the Employee Free Choice Act (legislation permitting union organizing by card check rather than secret ballot), it appeared to diminish chances of the bill’s passage for the time being. But the idea will no doubt be back, so it might be worthwhile to reflect for a moment on how this particular ports with Catholic social teaching (CST). Opponents of card check argue that it will open workers to union pressure...

Last night I watched the latest episode of The Apprentice: Celebrity Edition. I have been pulled into the series this year largely because of pelling finishes where The Donald lectures celebrities about their work habits and managerial ineptness. Dennis Rodman has been a draw because of his incredibly bad behavior. This was Dennis’ week. His teammates chose him to be the project manager because they hoped he would rise to the challenge if he was running things. It worked, for...

Sports are still able to foster human virtues, especially classical virtues like courage and fortitude. Like any good thing, sport all too often risks ing an idol, not because of any fault within the institution itself so much as the fault lying within each human participant. If there’s anything that distinguishes modern sports from classical antecedents, I suppose it would be the wealth that is often attached to high-profile sports today. You might call it the professionalization of sport. Yesterday’s...

Fr. Kevin’s talk raised a number of questions about the status of sports in our society. Here are some of them: Have we lost a healthy sense of leisure and play, to the point where sport and entertainment have e similar to a religious ritual or duty?Is the desire to win at all costs inherent to sports? What’s the point of playing a game if not to win?Why don’t religious leaders criticize athletes who cheat, such as flopping Italian soccer...

We as Americans are very proud of our history. We admire our forefathers who took a stand for liberty to found this great nation, but it would be unwise, as her former colonists, for Americans to overlook the British contribution to human freedom following the events of 1776. Doing so will allow us to understand more fully the role of religion and freedom in our own society. The beginning of the 19th century was a tumultuous time for those who...

In the new book The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan, James Mann wants you to meet Reagan as the rebel who parted ways from cold war hawks in his own administration and foreign policy “realists” who were loyal to containment. It could be argued that Reagan was the atypical conservative dove in Mann’s view.The author does provide a relatively fresh thesis on Reagan’s role in ending the Cold War, which reinforces his rejection of what he calls “both left wing and...

This year’s national meeting of the Philadelphia Society was my first. William Campbell of LSU invited me (a young-ish faculty member of Houston Baptist University) after reading a piece I wrote on libertarians and conservatives for the Acton Institute. I am very thankful for the opportunity and enjoyed the event very much. The list of attendees was really quite impressive and people were generally interested in and open to others. At each meal I sat with a different group of...

“Power permits people to do enormous good,” Lord Acton once said, “and absolute power enables them to do even more.” This wisdom from the nineteenth-century’s champion of state prerogative applies as well today. Politicians are crippled by the lack of the one thing they need to yank our hobbled economy out of the mire of recession: adequate power. It is our duty to grant it to them. Yes, from time to time mentary space has been critical of government meddling...

I was late in receiving my Richard John Neuhaus tribute issue from First Things, so forgive my mentioning it after many have long read it. Going through, one thing that stands out is that Richard John Neuhaus was so influential not only because of his tremendous proficiency and prolificity with words, but also because of his gift of friendship. When great groups of friends stay together for a long time, it is often because there is one person standing at...

I’ve posted a reflection on the future of higher education, with a particular emphasis on the Christian universities, over at the Touchstone Magazine Mere Comments blog. Catch it here. Here’s a clip: The economic downturn has had a substantial impact on colleges and universities. The first shoe dropped when endowments everywhere took big hits from a rapidly falling market. When endowments go underwater, they produce no e and generally can’t be touched. The other shoe will drop when we see...