Category: Reading

February 20, 2015 Meta, Politics, Reading

Comments on Left/Right Blogs, or What’s Fun to Read?

A friend queried me the other day as to why Left-leaning blogs are, on average, more fun to read than Right-leaning ones. Because I am quite aware of his politics, I am confident he meant something else other than, “Why are Democratic blogs more fun to read than Republican ones?” Still, the categories “Left” and “Right” are often difficult to define, especially when applied to bloggers who write about more than just politics. I’ll start here. Is Opus Publicum a Right-leaning blog? Regardless of whether or not my posts are fun to read, the views they express are integrally bound up with the Catholic Faith. If I read an academic article and comment on it, I do so as a Catholic. If I read a book and review it, I do so as a Catholic. And when I discuss socio-economic matters, whether in the form of critiquing liberalism or championing alternative avenues, I do so as a Catholic. Given all of that, it seems that Opus Publicum can be safely categorized as Right-leaning, which maybe also means that it’s foolhardy for me to advertise its contents as “fun” to a single, well-adjusted human being.

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February 17, 2015 Reading

Two to Read from Dr. John Rao

Dr. John Rao, an associate professor of history at St. John’s University, pulled double duty in traditional Catholic cyberland. First, over at The Josias, the opening part of Rao’s survey of the Catholic Church’s relationship to contemporary secularism, “The Question of the Res Publica Christiana in Post-Conciliar Catholic Doctrines,” went up online. Parts two and three will follow in due course. Next, over at Rorate Caeli, you can find Rao’s guest post, “Is the Papacy in Turmoil?–Call in the Outsiders.” Both pieces are well worth reading.

February 10, 2015 Reading

Two for Tuesday

Here is a two-part reading recommendation for all of you.

First, the Thomistic blog Stomachosus Thomistarum is back from hiatus. After you finish perusing the archives, you may wish to cast your eyes on the author’s multi-part translation of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s obscure (and arguably unofficial) response to Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre’s dubia concerning Dignitatis Humanae.

Second, over at The Josias, “Beatrice Freccia” makes her debut with an outstanding, and no doubt controversial, article, “Understanding Aristotle’s Account of the Relationship of the Household to the State.” The second part will be up on Wednesday.