Category: Meta

Over the next week I plan to make some updates and improvements to the blog while also loading up fresh content. If you catch an error, such as a broken link or ill-working widget, please bring it to my attention. After much resistance, I finally created a real “About” page (of sorts). The first of several generously donated images has now replaced the dull, grey background that several readers rightly chided me for. I am steadily expanding the “Blogroll” and “Sites of Interest” links. If you happen to link to this blog and I haven’t linked you back, it’s not out of ingratitude; I am just slow-moving with these things. And as always, if you have any suggestions for improving Opus Publicum, I am all eyes.

Note: This post is lifted largely from an e-mail exchange, albeit with a few edits and redactions. It was prompted, in part, over a “concern” about why I tend to identify myself as a traditional Catholic and, moreover, why I continue to support the Society of St. Pius X despite its canonically irregular status. I apologize in advance if some of the paragraph transitions are a little choppy. Consider this post a placeholder for a more detailed discussion of the topics covered.

As you can see, activity has not picked up on the blog; I am busy with other, life-related, things. So it goes. Between ebola and the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri, surely there is plenty else in the world to keep you occupied. In “Catholic land,” our Sovereign Pontiff, Francis, has just finished a visit of South Korea where, among other things, he called for peace and reconciliation between north and south. Some economists are fretting over whether or not there is another recession on the horizon and, despite my best efforts, I think I may fall short of finishing Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century before I return it to the library. Rectify, which aired this season’s penultimate episode last week, remains the best (and most under-appreciated) show on television. Oh, and in an unprecedented show of in-ring brutality against a made main-eventer, Brock Lesnar destroyed John Cena at Summerslam for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. The last time I saw a beating that bad, Phil Coke was on the mound for the Detroit Tigers. Speaking of the Motor City Bengals, it looks like upgrading to having David Price in the rotation has done absolutely nothing with respect to their win/loss record. Perhaps this is Kanas City’s year…but probably not.

Anyway, I shall return — I am just not sure when. I’m aiming for Thursday. 

I still haven’t found much time for “blogging” and with the Feast of the Assumption (Dormition) tomorrow, I may not get back around to Opus Publicum until this weekend. Thankfully that doesn’t mean the Internet is without other things to read in the interim. Here are a few pieces which caught my eye over the last week.

I am not a big fan of doing “current events” posts, but recent developments in Iraq have turned a few gears in my head. As of right now, the United States is engaged in a low-level two-pronged mission: (A) Drop humanitarian aide to minority religious populations who are being directly persecuted by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS — though some use ISIL); and (B) Commit airstrikes against ISIS forces intended to protect U.S. personnel and, it seems, slow their advance through Iraq. At the political level the action marks a rather significant turnaround in foreign policy for the Obama Administration — probably not the last one we will see over the next two years. Humanitarians who are normally not thrilled with military solutions to manifest military problems are, somewhat surprisingly, praising the operation, though their praise may be tempered quickly by the fact that hawkish pundits are already using the ISIS engagement as a vindication for Israel’s harsh measures in Gaza. Politics are never simple, especially at the international level, though one would hope — and pray — that some meaning distinctions can still be drawn between preventing a full-scale genocide from advancing further and a localized military engagement where the doctrine of proportionately became the first casualty.

If you haven’t bothered to click over to The Josias yet, you really must. Today part four of a six-part series on “The American Founders and the Aristotelian Tradition” went live. You still have time to digest it all before tomorrow’s installment. Here are the links.

• Part 1: Happiness as Comfort, Government as Self-Service
• Part 2: Thomas Jefferson, Breaker and Forger of Chains
• Part 3: The Laws of Nature and Nature’s God
• Part 4: Political Prudence and its Limits

For those interested, my first post over at The Josias, “Have the Principles of the Right Been Discredited? Leo Strauss’s Rome and Ours,” is now up and available for your perusal. If you haven’t already, be sure to follow The Josias on Facebook and on Twitter: @Josias_Rex

Last week I mentioned a new venture, The Josias, which I will be contributing to in the near future. After getting some technical matters out of the way, including a new web address, The Josias is starting to host fresh content. For those interested in the purpose behind the site, here you go:

Here we have endeavored to collect some writings which may be useful in improving the understanding of justice and the common good. We know that what is said here may seem strange and unwelcome, disconnected from the questions disputed among the Great and the Wise of our time: but we are not writing a mirror for princes, and hope that we may observe those things the more clearly in whose outcome we are the less invested.

Here are some links to the latest posts.

• Theses and Responses on Antiamericanism
• Notes on the Relation Between Sovereignty and the Commonwealth
• A Brief Introduction to the Concept of Right

Note: This post is from the old Opus Publicum; it is being put back up by request. It was originally posted on December 8, 2013.

Since I am sure all of you, dear readers, do not have enough blogs to read, let me suggest one more: The Josias — a new collective blogging endeavor which will, on occasion, feature my posts from yours truly plus a small horde of other folks who have far more interesting things to say than I. If you are curious about the “theme” of the blog, look no further than its first posting, Abbott Dom Gerard’s 1985 Pentecost sermon which I have posted here before under the title, “Illiberal Catholic Manifesto.” Also, be sure to follow The Josias web-log on Twitter: @josias_rex

Note: The blog address has been updated to reflect its most current location.