How do you know when you are not just in a crisis, but the crisis? A period so long, lurching from moment to moment, that it transcends a single event and becomes the event itself. In other words, the Long Crisis.
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The debates of the 21st century can obscure the vision of the Founders and the context within which they operated. “The last best hope” can sound pompous, even a little arrogant, and perhaps as a way to paper over the real issues affecting real people. But there is a reason that motif has survived since the Founding, and that reason is because it is true.
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This month I want to preview an article that I am currently writing. The Great Altars of the Catholic Church (like the one above from St. John Cantius in Chicago) are artistic treasures. But more than that, they fulfill an aesthetic need that centers and grounds the rituals of the Mass by reminding us of the celebration's solemnity. Unfortunately, post-Vatican II churches have largely done away with their altars and replaced them with bland ones, usually made of simple cuts of marble.
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