Blog

The Crusading movement was launched by the papacy and its fate remained intertwined with that of the Roman pontiffs. As their role in European politics changed, so too did the movement’s. As Western Europe moved toward the modern world, secular rulers became more independent, and focused more on internal policies.   The scandal of the Avignon papacy and the Great Western Schism in the fourteenth century severely weakened the papacy, which the Protestant Revolution then completel …

We have returned to the Levant, we have returned apparently more as masters than ever we were during the struggle of the Crusades—but we have returned bankrupt in that spiritual wealth which was the glory of the Crusades. - Hilaire Belloc, The Crusades, 1937 In our age the Crusades are described as barbaric, wasteful, shameful, and even sinful.​​​​​Rarely are they called glorious. This is because the modern world embraces a false narrative about the Crusades. This false story, h …

“The anti-Catholic tradition could not be kept alive, would die of exhaustion, without a continual supply of fable.”  -    St. John Henry NewmanNearly a century ago, the Catholic author, historian, and politician Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953) wrote an intriguing examination of the Church and the modern world in his 1929 book Survivals and New Arrivals. Belloc was gravely concerned that the English Catholics of his time were not aware fully of the anti-Cath …

Pope Benedict XVI shocked the Church and the world at the Consistory on February 11, 2013, when he told the assembled cardinals, “After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry.” Benedict believed that his age and health had led to an inability to “adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me” and stated that &ld …

Misconceptions about the past can persist for centuries, despite the diligent work of historians, either because vested interests benefit from the distortions or because the fanciful version is more fun.  - Piers Paul ReadPope Leo XIII (r. 1878-1903) was annoyed. The Church was under attack by intellectuals seeking to limit its influence in society and by Italian nationalists and revolutionaries who intensely disliked the papacy. Leo was also concerned because when surveying the metho …