Weekly Summary: 10/18/25
The week in review, from the perspective of a veteran Catholic journalist
• The Vatican announced the ordination of a new auxiliary bishop in Shanghai. Is that evidence of success in the Vatican’s secret deal with China regarding the appointment of bishops? Not really. Because: 1) Beijing named the new bishop unilaterally; only later did the Pope approve (or acquiesce?) 2) There already was an auxiliary bishop in Shanghai, approved by the Vatican, ordained in 2012— and under house arrest ever since!
• Can Pope Leo restore unity to the Catholic Church? I called attention to a post by Edward Pentin, the most consistently reliable English-language reporter at the Vatican, who pinpoints the key question the new Pontiff must confront.
• Last week a few priests of the Chicago archdiocese led a Eucharistic procession to an ICE detention facility. If they really wanted to bring the sacraments to prisoners, they should have contacted officials in advance and scheduled a pastoral visit. The “procession,” I conclude, was a shameless publicity stunt.
• Have you been reading the preview chapters of my novel, Ghost Runner? I posted Chapter 7 this week. If you haven’t started, there’s still time to catch up; publication date is just one month away.
• Leila wrote about the letter a Knoxville priest wrote to his congregation, explaining why the Traditional Latin Mass would no longer be celebrated. It’s a sad letter, in many different ways. And why didn’t the bishop, who made the decision, explain it himself?
• If you haven’t discovered the writing of Bishop Erik Varden, you’re missing something. I couldn’t resist another recommendation.
• Plus another recommendation for a piece by Amy Welborn, who finds a new way to ask the question: “why is the TLM the only impermissible mode of liturgical expression?”
• When Pope Leo issued Dilexi Te, countless Catholic writers leapt immediately to comment. But barely a week later, the discussion of the Pope’s first major teaching document had petered out. Was it really so forgettable? No— not if it is read the way it was intended. But in my analysis on the CatholicCulture site, I explain that what’s most remarkable about the document is what it doesn’t say.
• My just-war seminar continues, with a look at the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas, who leaned heavily on St. Augustine but added some important new principles. I find it particularly interesting that the Angelic Doctor asks whether one military tactic is immoral because it is an offense against honesty. We’ll study more of St. Thomas, notably the famous “principle of double effect,” next week. Again, it’s not too late to join!
• Leila and I had both good and bad news to discuss on our weekly Home Front podcast. The good news: younger Catholic priests are much more conservative/orthodox. The bad news: older Catholic bishops are callously suppressing the traditional liturgy.
• To close out the week, I looked at the latest news about Vatican financial scandals, boiled down what has happened into simple, understandable terms, and explained why, unfortunately, there’s not much reason to think the problems are solved.