The Dispatch

How to define “wokeness”

March 20, 2023 Dr. Edward Feser 55

A common talking point among the woke is the claim that “woke” is just a term of abuse that has no clear meaning.  Whether many of them really believe this or are just obfuscating is […]

Analysis

Pope Francis contra life imprisonment

February 26, 2023 Dr. Edward Feser 44

The white supremacist Buffalo shooter who murdered ten people has been sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.  According to scripture, natural law theory, and traditional Catholic moral theology alike, he is worthy of death.  […]

Analysis

When do popes teach infallibly?

December 20, 2022 Dr. Edward Feser 69

It is well-known that the Catholic Church teaches that popes are infallible when they speak ex cathedra or exercise their extraordinary magisterium.  What that means is that if a pope formally presents some teaching in a manner […]

Books

Divine freedom and heresy

October 24, 2022 Dr. Edward Feser 18

I commend to you Fr. James Dominic Rooney’s excellent recent Church Life Journal article “The Incoherencies of Hard Universalism.” It is directed primarily at David Bentley Hart’s defense of universalism in his book That All Shall Be Saved, of […]

The Dispatch

Aquinas on the sin of rash judgment

September 29, 2022 Dr. Edward Feser 4

Christ famously taught: “Judge not, that you be not judged” (Matthew 7:1).  As Aquinas points out, Christ by no means intended to rule out all judgments about another person’s actions or character.  Rather, he was […]

The Dispatch

Benedict contra Benevacantism

August 7, 2022 Dr. Edward Feser 18

I’ve been reading the second volume of Peter Seewald’s Benedict XVI: A Life  There is much of interest in it, including a new interview with Benedict at the very end.  Some of what he says is relevant to […]