Neither In the Jungle Nor Out of It
Lust perverts language itself, calling sex “safe” or “protected,” and cohabitation “honest,” and relationships “mutual,” which are nothing but forays into a jungle, where the strongest and most cunning survive.
The Red Herring of “Marriage Equality”
Debates about marriage will only be cluttered up, and decisions confounded, if the issue is framed in the question-begging terms of “marriage equality.”
Why U.N. Feminists Should Want to Partner with the Holy See
Both sociological evidence and the teachings of Christianity show that religion is a powerful ally for promoting the equality and dignity of women. Adapted from remarks delivered at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women.
Our First Right: Religious Liberty
America’s founding documents assume an implicitly religious anthropology—an idea of human nature, nature’s God, and natural rights—that many of our leaders no longer share. Adapted from testimony submitted to the United States Commission on Civil Rights.
Property from the Inside
While the state has a role to play in promoting the common good, left unchecked by constitutional strictures the regulatory state will crowd private property out of public life. Without private property, our nation would be impoverished not only materially but also morally. The second in a two-part series.
Property and the Regulatory State at the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court’s conflicted rulings on whether the government must compensate property owners for burdening their rights and interests raises questions about the value of private property in American life. The first in a two-part series.
Same-Sex Marriage: We’re Playing Chess, Not Checkers
Just as chess requires players to seriously consider every possible consequence of their moves, we need to seriously consider every possible consequence of the push for same-sex marriage, especially for children.
God and the Profits: Religious Liberty for Money-Makers
The Bible says “You cannot serve both God and mammon.” The Constitution doesn’t.
Same-Sex Marriage and the Abyss of Nihilism
We cannot embrace same-sex marriage and live in continuity with our past as a civilization. To embrace it is to deny that tradition, revelation, reason, and nature have any authority over us.
On Economists and Marriage
While there is something noble in economists’ assumption that social life is based on mutually beneficial exchange, rather than coercion and plunder, this fails to account for what philosophy, theology, and literature reveal to us about the true substance of marriage.
Are We Guilty for Our Religious Belief?
Is religious belief wrong, and are religious believers morally culpable for their false beliefs?
We Don’t Need to Redefine Marriage to Fix Policy Problems
Good public policy can meet the needs of all Americans without redefining marriage.
Abortion and Our “Moral Sense”
When intellectual arguments against abortion fail to persuade, recourse must be had to images and strategies that awake what David Hume considered our “moral sense.”
The Supreme Court’s First Assault on Marriage
The Supreme Court first put marriage on its track of decline forty-one years ago, when it ruled that states could not limit the sale of contraceptives to unmarried couples.
I’m Gay and I Oppose Same-Sex Marriage
While religion and tradition have led many to their positions on same-sex marriage, it’s also possible to oppose same-sex marriage based on reason and experience.
The Feminine Mystique at Fifty: Time for a New Feminism
No one wants to return to the 1950s as Betty Friedan characterized them, where women felt blocked from pursuing interests outside the home. At the same time, to insist that stay-at-home moms are trapped, desperate, and unhappy is naïve, insulting, and even damaging to the roots of society.
Liberalism’s Logic and America’s Challenge: A Reply to Schlueter and Muñoz
The Founders’ vision of the “common good” was not the pre-modern natural law conception of an objective human good, but a conception of “mutual advantage” shaped by the social contract framework. This logic of liberalism has driven our country to its current political and cultural problems.
Sustaining American Liberalism in Principle and Practice
While we should reject misguided claims that our founders adopted political voluntarism, we should follow suggestions for strengthening civic life—and thereby sustain American liberalism—through local government, families, churches, and other civic associations.
Natural Law Liberalism Beyond Romanticism
To reject the presence of natural law in documents of the Founding era is to embrace both cynicism and romanticism.
Sky Fall: Gender Ideology Comes to the Schoolhouse
Since redefining marriage requires us to deny sexual differences, even school children now have to conform to that principle at the risk of punishment.
