Talks
Creation.
We’re caught in an age between environmentalists, who think that humanity is a cancer on creation, and libertarians, who think that humanity is its master and endless consumer. But the Tradition offers us something higher: a sacramental view of creation, in which our praise of God through the beauty of the liturgy offers to the whole of creation—from the farm to the workshop—a chance to be raised up with us in the knowledge and love of God.
Sin.
For years we’ve been told that the natural law, virtue, and a just political order are right around the corner. But it never happened. The classical liberals tell us that there’s nothing wrong with humanity and we should just try harder, while the woke liberals tell us that we’re unredeemably corrupt and we should just give up. The Tradition offers us something more faithful to reality: the truth that humanity has been wounded by sin, and the hope that God can heal us by his grace.
Grace.
The healing of a wounded humanity, a fragmented society, and a broken world depends on grace: the gift of love by which God makes us “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pet. 1:4). We’re used to hearing that grace heals our souls from sin personally and prepares us for heavenly glory. But the Tradition shows us that it does so much more. It gives us back the capacity for true virtue and a just political order; it frees us to use Creation for the praise and glory of the Creator once again; and it accomplishes all these things in the highest way through the liturgy of the Eucharist.
