David E. DeCosse

The Vatican's Dignitas Infinita does an excellent job establishing the valuable character of human dignity, writes David DeCosse. The document fares less well in how it embeds dignity into life's concrete circumstances.

We need a new story in which we are bound in love and justice to the tens of thousands of persons living and dying on our streets, writes commentator David DeCosse.

There may be a connection between slavery and abortion, but it's not what most pro-life Catholics think it is, says ethicist David DeCosse.

An ethicist who supports nonviolence nonetheless finds practical and conceptual challenges when it is applied to the war in Ukraine.

The artistic brilliance of William Everson merits renewed attention. And so, too, does his canticle's anticipation of fundamental theological shifts in the understanding of faith and nature called for by Pope Francis.

I have never doubted the right to life of the fetus. But I now see that also at stake in matters of law and abortion are women's full moral agency and their right to bodily integrity.

The U.S. Catholic Church should face our difficult past neither intent on saving national myths nor on vindicating postmodern identity theory. The essential inspiration should come from convictions of Christian faith.

Commentary: Archbishop Gomez's speech criticizing social movements raises the question: Is Catholicism fit to respond to racism in the U.S.? Can we meet theologian Howard Thurman's demand for a credible Christianity?

Commentary: On Dec. 1 Los Angeles County held an annual service called the Burial of the Unclaimed Dead for 1,780 persons. The service sought to comfort the spirits of the abandoned and address a tangible failure: How could we let such abandonment happen?

Commentary: To be Catholic in California is to hunger for the church to account for its problematic mission past. But the jubilee year in the Los Angeles Archdiocese does not appear thus far to be a vehicle for historical redress.

Commentary: In a time when the Catholic Church in the U.S. is flirting with Communion bans and populist nationalism, it's good to consider anew why Thomas More, patron saint of politicians, is not a culture war hero.

Commentary: For Augustine, we face the constant temptation to seize things for ourselves — freedom, democracy, even God — instead of understanding such goods as belonging also to others.

Commentary: Catholic teaching provides ways for voters to evaluate candidates on the basis of abortion — and of other serious issues like the pandemic or racism. No Catholic is bound to vote on the basis of abortion alone.

Commentary: John Henry Newman recast the notion of conscience as a general orientation by emphasizing more the connection of conscience to freedom, responsibility and belief in God.

Commentary: The judgment of Robert Mueller's report was legal, not ethical. Russian interference in the election violated the right to self-determination of the American people. The Trump campaign's embrace of that interference made it complicit.