Do Whatever He Tells You

By Charlie Johnston I think I gave the wrong impression when I wrote passionately about Pope Leo’s formulaic statement opposing American action on Iran, where he said that negotiation is the only answer and that violence never solved anything. Both were trite, nice-sounding platitudes that are easily and quickly disproven. But it did not signal […]

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The Emerging New World Order

By Charlie Johnston The candidate whose campaign I was managing, Kat Wall, was defeated in her bid to oust a liberal Republican incumbent on Tuesday, March 3.  In the process, though, she helped spark and add to a vitally important reform movement in Texas. Two very bright spots happened on that Tuesday night.  My old […]

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Transitions

By Charlie Johnston Our community lost one of its charter supporters and friends to begin Lent. Anne Baker passed away at 101 in the assisted living facility where she had been in Florida for the past couple of years on the morning of Ash Wednesday. Anne was the mother of our dear friend and chief […]

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Thoughts From the Texas Tundra

By Charlie Johnston I spent most of my life in various parts of the often-frozen northern states of Illinois and Colorado. Right now, I am housebound in Texas…not out of any infirmity, but because we had a decent ice and snowstorm outside. I chuckle because, objectively, what we got (about an inch and a half […]

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A Year of Reckoning for Islam

By Charlie Johnston I first posted the following article on November 20, 2015. I wrote the first version of this particular introduction to it in late 2023, right after the Hamas massacre of Israeli concert-goers. I caught a lot of flack for it, despite a certain delicacy in my candor. We were long governed by […]

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Get the First Principles Right…and All Else will Flow Clearly

By Charlie Johnston I have always been a big believer in what I call “First Things,” foundational principles which you then use as your interpretive template on all extrapolations. (Imagine my delight when, in 1990, the late Fr. Richard Neuhaus founded First Things Magazine – a profoundly orthodox Judeo-Christian publication that often has profound intellectual […]

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Prepare For a Great Blessing

By Charlie Johnston Long ago I saw that, at a decisive moment, our technology would fail. I’m no Luddite. I do not regard technology as either intrinsically evil or intrinsically good. It is just a tool which, like any other tool, can be wielded by its user for either good or evil. But we withhold […]

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A Hope and a future

By Charlie Johnston (Though it covers some old territory as a preliminary, this is a foundational piece. If you read nothing else, please read the last paragraph of the first item. It is critical, going forward. Sorry it is so long. I just didn’t have time to write a shorter piece – CJ) When I […]

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Spooking the Horses

By Charlie Johnston “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse!” – Galatians 1:8 When an organization is fractured by deep divisions, I usually encourage a “Don’t spook the horses” policy for about a year. That […]

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The Challenge Before Us

By Charlie Johnston Sheesh – the very day I write a piece saying that I am going to wait on making any significant judgment on where Pope Leo will fall, he ostentatiously blesses a huge block of ice in a suspiciously pagan-looking “climate change” event. Then he explains that anyone who supports the death penalty […]

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