November 19, 2015
FEATURED PUBLICATION
John Paul II’s “Beloved Krakow”
EPPC Distinguished Senior Fellow George Weigel recalls that, in the darkest years of Stalinist terror, “Father Karol Wojtyla came to the conviction that young people yearned to live lives of heroic virtue, however often their strivings might fail; and it was that conviction that led him to summon the young people of the world to World Youth Days, throughout his epic pontificate.”
Click here to purchase Mr. Weigel’s new book City of Saints: A Pilgrimage to John Paul II’s Kraków.
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Yuval Levin’s 2015 First Things Lecture: “The Perils of Religious Liberty” On November 11, EPPC Hertog Fellow delivered the 2015 First Things Lecture in Washington, D.C., titled “The Perils of Religious Liberty.” “The actual life of a society is not just a playing out of principles. It’s an experience of living together in community and in conflict, within boundaries set by our moral and philosophical commitments, but also under conditions determined by our vices and virtues, our character, our circumstances, and the habits of our variegated culture,” Mr. Levin said in his remarks. To view the video of Mr. Levin’s lecture, click here. The work of the Ethics and Public Policy Center is made possible by the generosity of our donors. To support EPPC, click here. |
EPPC NEWS
Audio from November 2015 Faith Angle Forum Now Available
Recordings of sessions at the most recent gathering of EPPC’s Faith Angle Forum are now available online. Topics discussed included “Forgiveness and the African American Church Experience,” presented by Dr. Albert Raboteau; “Religion, Economics and New Approaches to Poverty,” featuring AEI President Arthur Brooks and John Carr of Georgetown University; and “The Bible and Biology: How Did We Get Here?” featuring Dr. Ted Davis of Messiah College. (See also this particularly timely discussion from the May 2015 Faith Angle Forum, “The Islamic State: Understanding its Ideology and Theology.”)
Bradley Lecture: Henry Olsen on the Four Faces of the GOP
On December 10, EPPC Senior Fellow Henry Olsen will speak at the American Enterprise Institute on the fight for the 2016 presidential nomination. Mr. Olsen, author of a new book on the same topic, will describe each of the factions of the GOP electorate, their historic roots, and how and why neither the insider/outsider nor the establishment/conservative way of looking at the race is correct. To register for this event, which is jointly sponsored by EPPC and AEI, click here.
NEW PUBLICATIONS
How to Tell Your Children About a Terrorist Attack
Writing from Paris, EPPC Fellow Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry describes how he and his family handled the news of last week’s terrorist attacks, and counsels parents that “your children are more mature than you give them credit for, more capable of handling life and reality.”
Special Snowflakes? Or Fascists?
In light of the “fascistic” protests roiling college campuses, EPPC Senior Fellow Mona Charen issues an urgent reminder that “the job of academics in a free society that hopes to remain so is to instill respect for freedom of thought and expression.”
Catching Up with Roger Scruton: The Philosopher as Composer and Novelist
EPPC Senior Fellow Roger Scruton talks with Catholic World Report about his newest book, his thoughts on Pope Francis, and the four books he would encourage smart young people to read as soon as possible. (To purchase a copy of Mr. Scruton’s Fools, Frauds, and Firebrands – an updated and expanded version of his 1985 book Thinkers of the New Left – click here.)
Sixty Years on, Conservatives Must Still ‘Stand Athwart History’
Writing on the occasion of National Review’s 60th anniversary, EPPC Hertog Fellow Yuval Levin reminds conservatives that their work to confront the errors of progressivism is as important as ever: “A Constitution-minded conservatism therefore stands once again to be a force for modernization in American life through the reinvigoration of our system of government and the recovery of the insights and instincts that undergird it.”
The Grittiness of Christian Faith
Walking the streets of Jerusalem, EPPC Distinguished Senior Fellow George Weigel observes that, at a time “when the basic institutions of civilization are being deconstructed in the name of personal willfulness and ‘autonomy,’ the Old City of Jerusalem is a powerful reminder that there are Things As They Are, and that the road to human happiness (which the Gospels call ‘beatitude’) lies through, not around, those givens in the human condition.”
Our Bitter and Graceless President
EPPC Senior Fellow Peter Wehner laments that, in his press conference in Turkey earlier this week discussing ISIS and the chaos in Syria, “the president was prickly, petulant, condescending and small-minded.”
The Errors of the Militant Atheist
EPPC Fellow Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry examines the arguments of leading atheists to show how “we have arrived at a peculiar moment when our elite institutions and discourse seem to be utterly ignorant of their own philosophical and cultural legacy.”
Why It’s Time to Turn the Music Off
Teaching young people to appreciate and to perform music helps them to “understand that music is not a blanket with which to shut out communication, but a form of communication in itself,” writes EPPC Senior Fellow Roger Scruton.
Chris Christie Recycles a Tired Leftist Attack on Pro-Lifers
Chris Christie’s comments on drug and alcohol addiction “look like an exercise in the kind of moral exhibitionism that has become so common on the left and that Christie ought to be above,” arguesEPPC Senior Fellow Mona Charen.
