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Public Discourse

Conservatism after Obama

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Instead of simply reacting to modern liberalism’s advances, it’s time for conservatives to consider what their own fundamental transformation of America would look like.
Public Discourse

Thomas Aquinas in China

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Thomas Aquinas’s commitment to the importance of reason and its universal role in defining what it means to be human makes him an attractive thinker for contemporary Chinese scholars.
Public Discourse

Seven Things I Wish My Pastor Knew About My Homosexuality

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May I make two requests? Love me, but remember that you cannot be more merciful than God. It isn’t mercy to affirm same-sex acts as good. Don’t compromise truth; help me to live in harmony with it.
Public Discourse

Why Republicans Need to Change the Way They Talk about Immigration

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By purifying their party of imprudent rhetoric, Republicans will be better able to identify adequate immigration policies, win the respect of Latino citizens, and form a reasonable response to the president’s recent executive action.
Public Discourse

Not Just a Rape Culture: The University’s Rape System

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Only political reform can fight the system that protects rapists on college campuses.
Public Discourse

Good News About Relationships in America: Findings from a New, Large, Nationwide Survey

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A new study gives in-depth information about Americans' view about sex, religion, marriage, and family. Though there’s lots of bad news, there are also some encouraging results.
Public Discourse

Updike’s Wager: Brilliance, Doubt, and the Miracle of Existence

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Novelist John Updike excelled at his craft, seemingly without effort. But it is his extreme existential doubt and ultimate decision to believe in transcendence that makes Updike’s life and literature approachable.
Public Discourse

What It Means to Listen: Free Speech from the Perspective of the Abrahamic Religions

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The Abrahamic religions provide a radical interpretation of the importance of speech: it is the primary way in which God reveals himself. Because persons of faith believe that God has spoken, they are called to develop and deepen their capacities for listening. This aspect of free speech is often overlooked when concentrating on laws about what can or cannot be said.
Public Discourse

The 1950s, Principled Pluralism, and the Future of America

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A new book by George Marsden offers a fresh analysis of American culture and religion in the 1950s. It also presents a way forward, based on the concept of “principled pluralism.”
Public Discourse

Poverty, the Rule of Law, and Human Flourishing

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If we want to be coherent when addressing poverty, our concerns can’t be rooted in emotivist or relativistic accounts of who human beings are. They must be founded on recognition of each person’s freedom, rationality, and dignity.
Public Discourse

Marriage and the Black Family

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Black children have suffered the most as a result of the decline of marriage in the black community. And today marriage faces new threats. Those who promote what they call marriage equality have unjustly appropriated the language and the mantle of the civil rights movement. But there can be no equivalence between blacks’ experience of slavery and oppression and the circumstances of homosexuals. Adapted from an address delivered at the Vatican during the Humanum Colloquium.
Public Discourse

Connecting Religious and Economic Liberty

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New data suggest that countries that value and protect religious liberty offer fertile soil for economic liberty to flourish.
Public Discourse

Division and Remembrance: Syria Past and Present

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In his new book on Syria, Christian Sahner explores the rise of Islam, the place of Christianity, the emergence of sectarian politics, the autocratic state, and the Lebanese paradigm.
Public Discourse

Reconnecting an Unbound Generation

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The answer to our culture’s dramatic increase in out-of-wedlock births and children raised by single parents is not to lower the bar further. Rather than promoting “planned parenting,” we should work to build a culture of marriage.
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Civic Trust and My Friend José

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The disappearance of forty-three Mexican students serves as a cautionary tale—and a reminder of the crucial importance of what civic trust we Americans still have.
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A Tocquevillian Argument against Contraception

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Parenthood powerfully combats the two greatest dangers to a democracy: selfishness and isolation.
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J.S. Mill and the Pro-Life Cause

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In spite of its many problematic aspects, the political thought of J.S. Mill provides a low but solid foundation for the essential convictions of the pro-life movement: that the unborn, in virtue of their common humanity, deserve the full protection of the law.
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Myths about Israel and Zionism

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Debates about Israel and Palestine often assume a historical narrative that is at odds with historical realities.
Public Discourse

Evangelicals and the LGBT Community: What Does the Future Hold?

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Evangelicals are learning to model both grace and truth when discussing homosexuality and same-sex marriage.
Public Discourse

Embracing Exile, Working for Renewal: A Report from the Pennsylvania Conference on Faith and Society

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Untethered to an “establishment” and or a “mainstream” that needs to be placated, today’s conservative students can experiment freely with impolitic ideas—perhaps more closely approaching the truth in the process.
Public Discourse

Children’s Rights, or Rights to Children?

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If it’s okay to buy and sell sperm, eggs, and wombs, then why is it not okay to sell other human tissues or organs? If it’s okay to sell one’s reproductive parts, why is it not okay to sell one’s sexual parts, as in prostitution? If it’s okay to pre-sell and pre-order children via third-party reproduction, what is so wrong with buying and selling children who are already born or conceived?
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In For the Long Haul: Factors Contributing to the Marriage Crisis

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A model developed by developmental psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner, paired with the example of the pro-life movement, may demonstrate a new way forward in rehabilitating marriage.
Public Discourse

Not Sentiment, Prejudice, or Tradition: Exploring the Nature of Marriage

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Patrick Lee and Robert P. George’s new book clearly establishes that the case for conjugal marriage is not based on irrational prejudice or sentimental appeal to tradition. It is based on a series of sophisticated arguments that deserve to be answered.
Public Discourse

Trading Places with Senator Portman: How I Discovered the Truth of Complementarity

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Like Newton’s law of gravity, natural law can’t be defied or ignored, at least not for long. We deny or disregard the significance of complementarity at our own peril, for the consequences of our denial will likely be staggering.