Free Republic

March 16 marks the anniversary of the assassination of the Western Roman Emperor Valentinian III in AD 455. Though he reigned for thirty years, Valentinian III presided over the slow but steady dismemberment of the Western Empire and was considered a weak and vacillating emperor. He had risen to the throne at the age of six or seven and was therefore under the thumb of powerful figures at court for most of his reign. Fortunately for him, one of these figures was the capable general Aetius who successfully defended the empire from the potentially cataclysmic invasion of Attila and his...

My wife and I went to see Cabrini last night. Given the mixed yet passionate reaction to the film by a variety of folks whose opinions I respect, I was looking forward to it. Having now seen it, I think the mixed reaction is completely appropriate. My reaction was also mixed, though tending more toward the negative. On the positive side, the film had a lot of spoken Italian in it which was fun. It was also well acted and beautifully shot, with a moving soundtrack that reminded me of a cross between The Village and Master and Commander. Though...

Yesterday marked the opening of a new film by Angel Studios — Cabrini — and the film has already generated an impressive amount of buzz. Considering the Catholic content of the film, this is somewhat surprising but in a very good way. I haven't seen the film yet, but I intend to over the next week. I'm told that local theaters are basically sold-out this weekend. Of course, nothing produced with religious content is without controversy. Cabrini is being promoted as a sort-of feminist anti-Barbie, which is an interesting tactic. This indicates that the filmmakers are attempting to broaden the...

In March of the year AD 538, the late Roman general, Belisarius, pulled off one of the most incredible feats in military history: he successfully defended the massive city of Rome—with its 12 miles of circuit walls—with a scant 5,000 soldiers, against a vast army of Goths that outnumbered his own some 15 or 20 to 1. Indeed, by the time the Gothic King Vitiges broke up the siege after twelve frustrating months, it had become unclear which side was the besieged and which was the besieger. Unable to prevent the Romans from bringing in supplies or leaving the city...

The well-used quote: "The floor of hell is paved with the skulls of bishops," may be found in a variety of forms. Perhaps the most colorful version of it is: "The road to Hell is paved with the bones of priests and monks, and the skulls of bishops are the lamp posts that light the path." This saying has been attributed to one of several Fathers of the ancient Church and to Protestant revolutionaries from more recent times. Most often, it is claimed to be taken from the writings of St. Athanasius or St. John Chrysostom. After a thorough search,...

Social media grenade-launcher Matt Walsh recently posted the following on his FaceBook page: "Many people claim to know for a fact that the practice of psychotherapy has been deeply helpful to humanity. To those people, I ask: If therapy is generally so helpful, and more people than ever are doing it, then why are people less able to deal with hardship and cope with suffering than ever before? Is it because our lives are really so much more difficult?" It's a fair question. It's certainly hard to make the case that our lives are so much more difficult than, say,...

The Scriptural recounting in the Gospel of Saint Matthew of the mysterious wise men who visited the baby Jesus bearing gifts is one of the most enduring and compelling scenes in Sacred Scripture. The rudimentary nature of St. Matthew’s description of the Magi’s arrival has encouraged a flowering of apocryphal literature across the centuries which has added depth and detail to the occasion of the Epiphany. There are numerous references to the Magi in early post-Scriptural literature. Saint Justin Martyr mentions them prominently in his debate with Trypho (Chapter 78) in the mid-second century AD. Magi were of the priestly...

December 6 is the feast of Saint Nicholas of Myra, later of Bari. Though known more commonly in modern times for his connection with “Santa Claus”, Saint Nicholas was considered a great saint in his day and numerous anecdotes relating to his acts of holiness, courage and generosity have come down to us from antiquity. Here is an excerpt from an anonymous history from the 4th century AD entitled, Praxis de Stratelatis (Act of the Generals). In it, we see Saint Nicholas doing what he does best: using his authority as bishop to rescue the innocent and speak the truth...

When Justinian secured the so-called "Eternal Peace" with the Persians in AD 532 after the Battle of Daras, it is likely that he realized that the peace on his eastern frontier would not actually be perpetual. But he probably thought it would last longer that seven or eight years. In any event, the emperor made the most the respite, gathering his substantial forces from the east which had previously been on station to face down the Persian menace, and readying them for a thrust to the West. His first target was the Vandal Kingdom which had ruled Roman Africa for...

Throughout the history of the Church, several Popes have been deposed for a variety of reasons. Pope Liberius was deposed and exiled by the Arian emperor, Constantius II in the mid-4th century. Six hundred years later, Pope Gregory VII was deposed by anti-Pope Clement III, the creature of the Holy Roman Emperor, Henry IV. During the reign of Justinian, Pope Saint Silverius, who I have written about previously on this blog, was not only deposed—he was martyred by the political forces who coveted his ecclesiastical power as head of the Church. In my previous post, I included an excerpt from...

Here's something you don't see every day. The FBI posted the following on Twitter: In reference to the false assertions about investigating parents at school board meetings, #FBI Director Wray told the House Judiciary Committee that the Bureau is not in the business of policing speech. Read more here: https://t.co/dZSUPgpAwS pic.twitter.com/7jebphhgIb— FBI (@FBI) July 12, 2023Then, directly under this post appears the following: Readers added context they thought people might want to know The FBI’s statement is misleading. On May 18, 2023, former FBI agent Steve Friend testified before the House Judiciary Committee that he and others were directed to...

I recently picked up a copy of Pierre Toussaint: A Citizen of Old New York by Arthur and Elizabeth Odell Sheehan at a homeschool conference on Long Island. Truth be told, I knew next to nothing about Toussaint before I began reading, though I can honestly say I had wanted to know more about him. I especially wanted to know what heroic virtues this man possessed that has him on the path to canonization as a saint of the Catholic Church. Well, to start with, Venerable Pierre Toussaint's life story is anything but typical. It is a study in contrasts...

Recall, Christians, what Sacred Scripture declareth: "Pride goeth before destruction: and the spirit is lifted up before a fall." [Proverbs 16:18]And also: "Pride is the beginning of all sin. He that holdeth it, shall be filled with maledictions, and it shall ruin him in the end." [Ecclesiasticus, 10:15]Pride is numbered in the Catholic Catechism among the Seven Deadly Sins [CCC 1866]. Writing in the early Seventh Century AD, Pope Saint Gregory the Great reflected on the sin of pride in his epochal Moralia in Job, saying: "Whoever extols himself above his proper condition, is weighed down by the very burden...

Like Jeanne d’Arc or Francesco di Bernardone, Francesco Forgione was one of those unique individuals gifted by God to the human race to assure us of His love, His understanding, and above all else, that He is not deaf to our sufferings and entreaties. But unlike these other great visionary saints, Forgione was not a streak of light which flashed across the firmament and returned quickly to heaven. Saint Joan’s mission lasted about two years before she was martyred at age 19. Saint Francis of Assisi was 45 when he passed to eternity, roughly 20 years elapsing between his call...

One of the more enigmatic figures from early Christian history is Saint Veronica—the woman known to Catholics from the Sixth Station of the Cross, who is said to have wiped the face of Jesus while He carried His cross on the road to Calvary. There is a memorable and beautifully presented sequence of scenes featuring Veronica in Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ. But nowhere is the woman or the incident described mentioned in Sacred Scripture. To learn about Veronica, we must turn to extra-biblical sources. The first mention of a woman named Veronica associated with Our Lord may be...

In the year of our Lord 1521, on Easter Sunday, March 31, the first Mass on what would later be known as the Philippine archipelago was said on a small island known as Limasawa. Little did those attending that Mass realize that the seed planted that day would blossom into a brilliant faith that, 500 years later, would make the Philippines one of the most devoutly Catholic nations in the world. An account of that epochal event exists, written by Antonio Pigafetta, a Venetian accompanying Ferdinand Magellan on his voyage of circumnavigation, who kept a detailed journal of events: Here...

One of the best kept secrets of the war involved the Japanese balloon bomb offensive. Prompted by the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo in April 1942, the Japanese developed the balloon bombs as a means of direct reprisal against the U.S. mainland. The balloons, made of paper or rubberized silk, carried anti-personnel and incendiary bombs. The first operational launches took place on Nov. 3, 1944, and two days later a U.S. Navy patrol boat spotted a balloon floating on the water off the coast of California. Japan launched some 9,000 balloons during a five-month period, to be carried by high altitude...

Almost exactly 15 years ago, I received a book in the mail entitled El Cid: God's Own Champion. When first flipping through this book, I remember thinking to myself, "This probably won't be very good." After all, it was a work by an unknown author, meant for young readers, and self-published to boot. But as it turned out, I loved it. My kids have read it—even the one with dyslexia read and enjoyed it. Since I wrote the above-linked review in 2008, I have recommended El Cid to hundreds of people. A few years later, Mr. Fitzhenry published another equally...

George Cardinal Pell is dead. As a man, Cardinal Pell stood accused of grievous sins before several earthly tribunals. He was convicted of some of those crimes in secular courts and as a result, spent over a year in prison—much of it in solitary confinement. He was later acquitted and released when the High Court of Australia unanimously overturned his convictions saying that the jury likely made its decision based on faulty evidence, and that there was a significant possibility that an innocent person had been convicted. Was Cardinal Pell guilty of the crimes he was accused of? Or was...

Much of our detailed knowledge of Attila and the Huns comes from one relatively obscure source, the late 5th century History of Priscus. It’s probable that you’ve never heard of Priscus because his history was considered lost after about the 10th century AD. All that survives of it are fragments that later historians have recovered from other ancient and medieval sources that incorporated or paraphrased certain passages of interest. Excerpts from Priscus may be found embedded within works such as the Gothic History of Jordanes, the Histories of Procopius, the works of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, the Suda, the History of John...