This news made me pretty mad. open.substack.com/pub/millies/...

Catholics have a challenging problem. We must put behind us the divisions and those who have encouraged a spirit of division without, ourselves, dividing against them. Last week's strange leak and the appointment of Abp Hicks were an occasion to think about that. religionnews.com/2025/12/23/w...

Son of immigrants, Marco Rubio, calls human beings "despicable" and wants to dump them in other countries like trash. Since he loves authoritarian cruelty so much, he should deport himself to Cuba’s dictatorship and stop violating the rule of law. If despicable has a face in this story—It’s him.

"This President simply cannot tolerate the degree of freedom and independence that art and artists require." This is the heart of something important and it touches on my immediate instinct after last year's election—art alone... Trump Dishonors the Kennedy Center www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...

The full spiked 60 Minutes CECOT package, clean & subtitled. 1/5

The annual curial Christmas spanking was one of my favorite Pope Francis traditions. I am surprised and delighted that it continues. Ad multos annos. Pope offers gentle critique of Vatican culture in Christmas greeting reminiscent of past | National Catholic Reporter share.google/z08pPD2OudI0...

Just watched the 60 Minutes segment. Basically it debunks the fundamental claim used by Trump admin that the detainees it sent there are “terrorists” and corroborates torture using clips from El Salvadorean influencers Bukele uses internally. Would be a shock to low information voters, probably

A great Christmas gift from Pope Leo today. This document on the priesthood in fact advances synodality in the Church considerably. Mirabale visu!! www.vatican.va/content/leo-...

Over the weekend, JD Vance said: "In the United States of America you don't have to apologize for being white anymore.” That’s a longtime theme of white supremacists in America, as Vance no doubt knows. In this thread, I cite similar racist rhetoric using the “apology” theme. 1/6 🧵🧵🧵🧵🧵🧵

Father James Altman, a MAGA Catholic priest who has lost some of his canonical faculties because he cannot be obedient or prudent, is more bloodthirsty than a presbyter ought to be. Also, he is a moron.

It’s a little funny to post this, put down the phone, and turn on TCM to find DESK SET… which may be the first anti-AI movie, depending on how you choose to read METROPOLIS. It’s definitely the first anti-AI comedy.

The theory of the unitary executive hinges on the phrase "shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." Trump's claims to expansive power depend on his charge to execute laws enacted by Congress "faithfully." Except when they don't. apnews.com/article/rele...

What an incredible confession of clerical fragility. The primary sacrament of Christian life is baptism. Even for seminarians. Even for priests. They need to be more like laypeople (which seminarians are), not less. +Martin has good ideas. God bless him. More please. share.google/cSnbvDsB4NvH...

I learned who Jake Paul is today. I don't feel like I've been missing much. There's a lot to be said for reading books and skimming what happens in the world.

Spectacular. Mandatory viewing. Give me all your ecclesiological thoughts on tradition and the incoming archbishop of New... Oh. You're just a fragile homophobe who can't talk about anything else. Oh. Well. Protest too much as you like. x.com/Catholicizm1...

For a man that regrew his ear it’s strange that his hand is always in recovery mode

They were focused on different redactions. www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2025...

Gosh that's a lot of Bill Clinton photos. It's almost like somebody selected and frontloaded them.

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A member of staff survived an encounter with me yesterday when they suggested the world can learn nothing from intellectuals. I want to underscore that we both earn salaries at a school. But I wanted to ask them this--Look around. Was it intellectuals who destroyed the world? Or anti-intellectuals?

Another nail in the coffin of Weigel’s infamous “End of the Bernardin Era” thesis.

I heard Donald Trump's guns I heard Maria crying Late last night I heard the news That Venezuela was dying Venezuela was dying

I'm not a drowning man And I'm not a burning buiding

You need to read this. The besc scholarship possible on this question.

My latest newsletter for paid subscribers: a terrific new Mavis Staples album, a solid record from Cheap Trick, Roddy Bottum's riotous memoir, the Avett Brothers and Mike Patton collaborate, and the best albums by the Black Crowes and Green Day get deluxe editions.

Just a reminder that at least 600 Americans were fired for failing to show sufficient respect after Charlie Kirk's murder.

One day Donald Trump will die. I think I will write about him here in his own style every day for a year to memorialize the event. It will be the period of mourning he deserves.

A masked man in tac gear I can buy on Amazon can insist he is law enforcement so I must believe him and I must comply. Yet he need not credit a *federally mandated* REAL ID that airlines and *federal facilities* accept as proof of identity and citizenship. Because it's not abt law enforcement.

Everyone: tune in 90.9 FM WDCB for Tom Marker’s last blues show before he retires. A Chicago institution. Taught the classic blues, while always playing new talent too. Will be missed. wdcb.org/staff/tom-ma...

You know who ISN'T IN THE JEFFREY EPSTEIN FILES? Joe Biden.

I am exhausted by explaining higher education to the people who control higher education. Exhausted.

This is worth your time. I can't recall the last time a Catholic prelate got so much natl airtime & described a church anybody would be proud to be in. In these terrible times, something is happening. Chicago's Archbishop weighs in on a year of immigration enforcement www.npr.org/2025/12/10/n...

60yrs since Vatican II, 7mos into the Leo papacy the game is over and the dividers lost. www.ncronline.org/opinion/60-g...

Have you ever seen these two people in the same place at the same time?

American Utopia came back to mind this week and I re-watched it. Incredible. It holds up 5yrs later. And I forgot I wrote this, but it also holds up. Egad it is long. But I am still happy with it. It's very far away but it's growing day by day. smillies-53543.medium.com/a-city-in-my...

Last month I led some CTU students through the Basilica of the Natl Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in DC, a place I've known well for >30yrs. We ended with The Holy Family Resting by Anna Hyatt Huntington, a piece I love so much for its realism I have a replica here at home. The students...

Waiting for Green v. Connally to receive further consideration in light of Mahmoud because that's where this is headed. Meanwhile, churches struggle to get into detention ctrs & minister to detainees because none of this is about religion.

How much will it cost? Oh. $100/year.

NCAA ought to replace Div I football and basketball with AI. No need to play or watch games. Simply ask ChatGPT who would win. More efficient, less expensive, and basically the same thing, right? Something like this will be my reply to suggestions we need AI in the classroom.

A long read but Mike Lewis has something here in this analytical framework drawing from Lévi-Strauss. Recommended. "John Paul II insisted that truth requires unity of faith and reason — precisely the unity that bricolage disrupts" wherepeteris.com/bricolage-an...

If a "stable government" is the measure, no one should let an American in anyplace. apnews.com/article/trav...

This weekend brings the 60th anniv of Gaudium et Spes, as well as Vat2's conclusion. And, I believe Pope Leo's call to unity in fact means he's telling us the argument over Vat2 (and much else in the Church) is over. The dividers have had their day and it is done. religionnews.com/2025/12/05/a...

Impaired.