History

Did the Catholic Church Invent Propaganda?0
- History
- January 18, 2018
“The Church created propaganda.” This is the charge leveled by French philosopher and sociologist Jacques Ellul in his 1964 book The Technological Society, which now has the infamous distinction of being Unabomber Ted Kaczynski’s favorite book. Is the charge true? Yes and no. As you might expect, propaganda has been used in one form or another
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The FBI’s Attacks on MLK, Jr. Are Helpful Reminders for Today 0
- History
- January 16, 2018
Writing for the Wall Street Journal in 2005, federal judge and former U.S. deputy attorney general Laurence Silberman recalled how he was “shocked” to discover the extent the FBI abused its power to spy on Americans. Speaking of the first time he reviewed the files of J. Edgar Hoover, Silberman writes how Hoover tasked “his agents with reporting
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William of Ockham: The Man Who Started the Decline of the West 3
- History
- January 10, 2018
In modern accounts of the decline of the West, it’s become common to blame one man in particular for starting that decline: William of Ockham, a 14th-century Franciscan monk and philosopher. Those of you who have heard of William of Ockham (1287-1347) may know him best through the concept of “Ockham’s razor,” which is popularly
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Wolff’s ‘Fire and Fury’ Shows the Founders Were Right About the Presidency 0
- History
- January 9, 2018
Michael Wolff’s new book Fire and Fury is an exposé of President Trump. If even half of it is true, it is hard to not feel disgusted and terrified. Those who work with Trump in the White House paint a portrait of a man who combines moral bankruptcy with off-the-charts stupidity. Apparently, our president is
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Archbishop Damaskinos: The Greek Clergyman Who Stared Down the Nazis 0
- History
- January 9, 2018
One of the darkest hours in the history of my country, Greece, came on the 27th of April in 1941. German troops entered Athens and brought the whole country under Nazi occupation. It was at that crucial moment that Archbishop Damaskinos chose to shine. Determined to Help Dimitris Papandreou was born March 3, 1891, to
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Everything You Know About the Gospel of Paul is Probably Wrong 0
- History
- January 8, 2018
This past year, I burdened the English-speaking world with my very own translation of the New Testament – a project that I undertook at the behest of my editor at Yale University Press, but that I agreed to almost in the instant that it was proposed. I had long contemplated attempting a ‘subversively literal’ rendering
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