Comprehending Horror through Animation: The Art of the Anti-War Animated Movie
by John Whitehead Animation fascinates me. Like painters, animators can create images of stunning beauty. Being free from the limitations of human actors or physical locations, animators can also depart from strict realism and create images that are fantastical, metaphorical, or otherwise stylized. Animation’s stylization can allow animated films to deal with darker, more serious…
Act Before We Reach “Midnight”: The Need to Seek a Cease-Fire in Ukraine
by John Whitehead Introduction The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists recently announced that they had adjusted their “Doomsday Clock,” a symbolic measure of threats to humanity, to 90 seconds to “midnight”—that is, global catastrophe. This current status is the closest to midnight the Doomsday Clock has been in its 75-odd-year history. This dire prediction, the…
The Danger of Coerced Euthanasia: Questions to Ask
by Ms. Boomer-ang Sometimes strong arguments for the Right to Life do not receive the attention they deserve. For example, an important argument against euthanasia and assisted suicide is that people can be coerced into ending their lives in these ways. I was recently reminded of this strong-yet-sometimes-neglected argument when reading a piece criticizing…
Boycott Strategy: CVS & Walgreens
by Rachel MacNair Now that the United States Food and Drug Administration allows the abortion pill to be dispensed by ordinary pharmacies, CVS and Walgreens are both seeking certification to do so. This would make them the largest chain of abortion providers in the country, surpassing Planned Parenthood. It would further normalize the killing of…
Grieving for John
by Rachel MacNair My first inclination when I thought about writing this post soon after the event was that I better not. It was a private event and my thoughts shouldn’t be broadcast for fear of invading privacy. But it’s now been publicized in The Washington Post, which is about as public as it…
“She Is a Beautiful Person”: Parents of Children with Down Syndrome Speak Out
by Sarah Terzo Babies with Down Syndrome are common targets for abortion. Estimates of the percentage of pregnancies involving children with Down Syndrome that end in abortion vary, but one study found that abortion has reduced the number of babies born with Down Syndrome by 30%. Ethicist Joseph Fletcher described people with Down Syndrome…
The Christmas Truce of 1914
World War I was starting, and the war that was expected to be over by Christmas lasted for years. But on Christmas Eve and through Christmas Day, up and down the 500-mile front, about 100,000 soldiers out of a million had spontaneous truces. Christmas carols on one side were joined in by the other side,…
Becoming a Catholic Conscientious Objector
by Tony Magliano A few years back, I was doing some serious soul-searching, trying to discern what God wanted me to write about. I walked into my 16-year-old son’s bedroom to discover a military calendar hanging on the wall. It highlighted young men and women in combat fatigues, fighter jets, an aircraft carrier battle group…
Asking Questions about Miscarriage and Abortion
by Ms. Boomer-ang While on a vacation in New York’s Adirondacks in September 2018, I ran into a family that included two gospel singers, a mother and a daughter. One day we ended up hiking together. During the hike, the daughter said, “I have a little sister in heaven. That’s neat!” The mother told her story: She…
The Need for Peacemakers: Two Urgent Dangers That Require a Response
by John Whitehead Peacemaking is urgently needed today. Peacemaking is needed in response to a variety of ongoing violent conflicts in the world. I will highlight just two conflicts that my own country, the United States, is currently involved in and that demand particular attention from peacemakers. The first is the ongoing conflict with Russia…