fbpx
Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube Rss
Pillar

The Human Person

The first pillar of a decent society is respect for the human person, which recognizes that all individual human beings have dignity simply because of the kind of being they are: animals whose rational faculties allow them to know, love, reason, and communicate. It also recognizes that human beings are persons, members of the human family who flourish in a community that respects their fundamental rights and who long to discover transcendent truths about the nature of reality.

Emerging Tech and Religious Freedom

By
Read More

Learn more about the Human Person: get your free eBook today!

Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe

Seeking Consensus: The Incoherence of a Singular Islam

By
Debates about whether Islam is inherently violent obscure more than they clarify because they misconceive the nature of religious authority in Islam. A lack of central authority lies at the heart of the difficulties facing Muslim reformers and explains why it is so difficult to disentangle violence from Islam.

Abortion’s Miscarriage Problem

By
By acknowledging the tragic reality of miscarriage and supporting those who grieve, we can build a culture of life and encourage our society to recognize the humanity of the unborn child.

Life Worthy of Life: Down Syndrome, Equality, and My Son Silas

By
Those of us blessed by the love of someone with an extra twenty-first chromosome look forward to October. October invites me, along with all other parents of children with Down Syndrome, to proclaim loudly that our children live lives worthy of life.

The Future of Pro-Life Legislation and Litigation

By
In her landmark 1971 paper, Judith Jarvis Thomson tried to defend abortion by appeal to norms of justification consistently applicable in a range of other cases. By contrast, the courts in and after Roe and Casey have treated the right to abortion as an unquestionable legal principle. This inverted approach is doomed to fail as it continues to reveal the anomalous character of abortion rights.

Autonomy or Worthiness? How to Find Dignity in Death

By
There is dignity in living and dignity in dying, because the concept of “dignity” is inseparable from our humanity. Even when our autonomy is lost, all people can still undergo suffering and death with a noble and dignified serenity.

All Death is Death Without Dignity

By
Advocates for “death with dignity” seem to deny reality, since no human death is truly dignified—even if a person chooses or accepts it. Instead, what ultimately gives death dignity is the kind of life that preceded it.

Mother Teresa’s 1994 Message to the Supreme Court on Abortion

By
Mother Teresa of Calcutta was canonized yesterday by Pope Francis. In 1994, she submitted an amicus brief, filed by her counsel Robert P. George, pleading with the United States Supreme Court to reverse its decision in Roe v. Wade. The text of her brief appears below.

Banning Muslim Travel to the US? A Thomistic Perspective on Donald Trump’s Proposal

By
Is there a moral obligation for the US not to enact Donald Trump’s proposed ban on Muslim travel into the US?

Religious Liberty Crisis Averted in California

By and
The war is far from over, but a recent battle in California shows that pluralism, religious liberty, and traditional values can be defended where there is a will to mobilize and resist.

What Opponents Can Learn from Assisted Suicide Advocates

By
A playbook exists for reversing the slide toward death on demand. It’s time to use Compassion & Choices’ tactics against it.

Abortion as a Positive Good: How the Abortion Movement Echoes Radical Slavery Rhetoric

By
Like John C. Calhoun, who famously embraced slavery as a “positive good,” the abortion movement of 2016 has shifted from seeing abortion as a “necessary evil” to celebrating it as good for women and society.

Congress Should Protect Conscience Rights for Medical Students Like Me

By
Congress should pass the Conscience Protection Act to send a message to the entire nation that our freedom of speech and religious freedom are protected and valued.

Texas Lawmen and the Lawless Court

By
The Governor and Attorney General of Texas should obey the law, not the Supreme Court’s ambiguous abstractions. They should continue to secure the fundamental liberty of vulnerable Texans and make the abortion industry assert its super-claim-rights in court.

A Pledge Betrayed: The Obama Administration Nullifies Conscience Rights

By
The Obama administration not only enforces but unilaterally expands some civil rights laws, such as when “sex” became “gender identity” in Title IX. Yet it promotes exceptions, loopholes, and countervailing arguments for other civil rights protections, such as conscience rights for those who oppose abortion.

SCOTUS and Abortion: Three Failures and Opportunities for the Pro-Life Movement

By
There comes a time where gross disregard for human life and for our constitutional order should stir us from docile obedience and impel us to resistance.

The Supreme Court vs. Women’s Health

By
The Supreme Court’s latest abortion decision is a significant setback for women and the unborn.

Handshakes, Islam, and Religious Tolerance in the West

By
True religious freedom demands that we allow space in our society for difference, even when we don’t understand the reasons for a particular religious practice. Having to live without fully understanding others comes with the territory of genuine diversity.

Some Choices You Don’t Get to Make: What’s Wrong with Me Before You

By
A new film in which the main character commits suicide sends the message that “me and my needs come before you and your needs.” It is a tale of autonomy run amok—a result of the radical and ludicrous idea that we do not live connected to, dependent on, or in relationship with others.

Mystery vs. Mastery: Reframing the Debates in our Culture Wars

By
The bitterness of competing narratives in today’s culture wars can give the impression that no agreement is possible between opposing sides. Margaret Somerville proposes a way forward through a shared ethic of wonder at the mystery and dignity of human life.

To Defend or Defund? Evangelicals Go Wobbly on Planned Parenthood, Public Justice, and Moral Judgment

By
Despite arguments to the contrary, pro-lifers simply cannot support federal funding for Planned Parenthood. If the price for a seat at the public justice table is taxpayer funding for the nation’s leading abortion provider, it may be time to think about another table.

Never Do Evil So Good May Come of It: Why Legislators Must Stop Justifying Surrogacy

By
The law is a teacher. By legalizing surrogacy, Louisiana legislators are teaching people that it is morally permissible to use people as means to an end.

Can We Make Ourselves More Moral? Designer Babies, Hormone Therapy, and the New Eugenics of Transhumanism

By
If a non-teleological process produced human morality, then how can we find a measuring rod for morality outside of nature that allows us to prefer “moral” behaviors to “immoral” behaviors?
baby feet

Even Very Sick Children Deserve Medical Care: Why Every State Needs “Simon’s Law”

By
Parents of very young, very sick children deserve the right to make medical decisions for their sons and daughters, no matter how difficult those decisions may be.

The Evolving HHS Mandate: A Play in Three Acts (So Far)

By
A play in three acts, each consisting of a meeting between the CEO of a religious charity and the agent representing her health insurance company.
Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube Rss
Public Discourse © 2025 | All Rights Reserved

Get your free eBook for The Human Person

"*" indicates required fields

Get your free eBook for Sexuality & Family

Get your free eBook for Politics & Law

Get your free eBook for Education & Culture

Get your free eBook for Business & Economics