
When Belief is Agony
I love being a Christian. I mean, I love Jesus too. But I also love all the rest of it: Brunch after church with friends, hylomorphism, late-night Eucharist on Christmas Eve, and carols and stollen and roast beef and friends’...

In Memoriam: Gerald Russello
Gerald Russello (July 27, 1971-November 7, 2021) graduated from Georgetown in 1992, and got his JD from New York University Law School in 1996. He served as a managing director in the legal department of Bear, Stearns & Co., and...

Common Good Constitutionalism Considered
Right. I read it. And by “It” I mean, of course, Adrian Vermeule’s Atlantic piece. Here’s the thing: Vermeule’s “Common good constitutionalism” is not actually that different from, for example, Hadley Arkes’ natural law constitutionalism. That tradition of Finnis-inspired Lincoln-loving...

Death in Venice
In the summer of 1575, plague struck Venice. The city fathers tried to stem the contamination by requiring crews suspected of infection to stay on the island of Lazzaretto for forty days. These quaranta giorni are the origin of the...

On Chosen Family in East Village Vaguely Soviet Speakeasies
Last night, we launched Issue 23 of Plough Quarterly, at the Red Room at KGB Bar on East 4th Street. I went there first when I was probably sixteen or so, for a book launch of my father’s, and I’ve...

Moldbug Through the Looking Glass
(Ed. Note: A version of this piece was originally published on Susannah Black’s blog Radio Free Thulcandra.) This post is dedicated, with love, to my enemies. Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings, Moldbug/Calloway, Mencius Moldbug|Curtis Yarvin (Neoreaction/California), Caroline Calloway...

Sealed in Blood: Aristopopulism and the City of Man
Table of Contents After Liberalism Failed Tankies and Tocquevillians The Critic’s Critics The Ways of Judgment Political Animals Comedies and Common Goods Slave State Liberalism Wolves to Men City of Dads The White Rose Third Sailing — After Liberalism Failed...

Movie Review: A Wrinkle in Time
I’m fairly sure that the first time I ever ran into any of the words in the Bible in print was in the pages of Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time. It’s the first of many occasions in the book...

Jesus the Imagination: A New Magazine Launches in Midtown Manhattan
The current story of Christian media is not—despite the pain occasioned by the passing of Books and Culture—exclusively one of decline and buzzfeedification. This summer marks the advent of a new annual, edited by Michael Martin, titled Jesus the Imagination.

The Most Reluctant Convert: Lewis, Theater, and the Friendship of Debate
It’s not that I ever pictured C. S. Lewis as a sixteen year old girl. It’s that when I was one, and reading Surprised by Joy for the first time, I thought of him as a peer. Was this because...