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Nov 8, 2024 | 
catholiceducation.org | Christopher Kaczor |Msgr. Charles Fink |Theodore Dalrymple |Jeff Mirus
The Ghent Altarpiece: God Almighty by Jan van Eyck, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. In his fantastic book Five Proofs of the Existence of God, Edward Feser explains this argument at length. Inspired by Augustine, let’s begin with the reality that 2+2=4. Some realities exist in matter. A house is made of wood, nails, and cement. A dog has fur, muscles, and bones. Other realities exist in a mind.
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Oct 4, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
If you were born in 1224, the odds are not in your favor that you’ll have a blow-out 800th birthday celebration. But Thomas Aquinas is the exception to that rule. A recent conference at the University of Notre Dame, “Aquinas at 800: Ad Multos Annos,” brought 580 registered participants from twenty countries to hear more than 150 papers on the work of the great Dominican St. Thomas Aquinas.
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Oct 2, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
Plato wrote, “Beauty alone has this privilege, to be the most clearly visible and the most loved.” In the Symposium, Plato writes about a ladder of love. First, an individual becomes attracted to a particular beautiful person. Next, the individual sees that beauty is possessed by other persons, by nature, and by society. Finally, an individual can arrive at “beauty absolute, separate, simple, and everlasting . . . without diminution and without increase, or any change” But what exactly is beauty?
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Sep 23, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
Woody Allen once said, “I don’t want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve immortality through not dying.” Since not dying isn’t an option, Allen advised, “Don’t think of death as an end, but think of it more as a very effective way of cutting down on your expenses.” What (else) happens to you after you die? Nothing? Forever? Or is there life after death? Such questions can be considered both theologically and philosophically.
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Sep 5, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
After years of hearing about it, I finally got around to reading the most famous work of the great British writer Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited. I wish I hadn’t waited. (For those who like to listen to books, an audio version is superbly performed by Jeremy Irons.)The novel tells the story of the romances, tragedies, and transformations of Charles Ryder. His family life is not exactly ideal.
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Aug 20, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
While at Blanchet High School in Seattle, my friends and I wanted nothing more than to repeat as the undefeated state champions. Our coach Leo Genest, “G-man,” had led his teams to the last three out of four state championships in cross country. He was ultracompetitive, and so were we. As an incoming senior, I trained hard, running more than five hundred miles that summer.
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Aug 20, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
Is all reality nothing but a collection of atoms? Materialism can be defined as the worldview that nothing exists but what is material or physical. As Julian Baggini explains in his book Atheism: A Very Short Introduction, “There is one kind of stuff in the universe and it is physical, out of this stuff comes minds, beauty, emotions, moral values—in short the full gamut of phenomena that gives richness to human life.” If materialism is true, there is no God, no soul, and no afterlife.
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Jul 22, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
Long is the line of distinguished philosophers who have converted to Catholicism. They include Sir Michael Dummett, Jacques Maritain, Elizabeth Anscombe, Jennifer Frey, Alasdair MacIntyre, Peter Kreeft, Edward Feser, J. Budziszewski, Nicholas Rescher, Robert Koons, Mortimer Adler, John Finnis, Ronda Chervin, Eleonore Stump, and Candace Vogler. Indeed, a recent book, Faith and Reason: Philosophers Explain Their Turn to Catholicism, looks at their stories.
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Jul 5, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
In his recent essay “A Revolution in Understanding the Embryo,” Dr. John Wallingford, the Regents Chair in Molecular Biology at UT Austin and a past president of the Society for Developmental Biology points to an amazing fact: Fifty-four years ago, I did something extraordinary. I built myself. I was a single, round cell with not the slightest hint of my final form. Yet the shape of my body now—the same body—is dazzlingly complex. I am composed of trillions of cells.
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Jul 2, 2024 | 
wordonfire.org | Christopher Kaczor
The logical problem of evil holds that any evil whatsoever disproves God’s existence. If there is just one person with a painful hangover, this suffering is enough to know that God does not exist. No need for abstract speculation, too many wine coolers at a Prince concert is all you need to disprove the existence of the Almighty. What is the argument for this view? The ancient Greek philosopher Epictetus put the argument this way: “Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
