John Tuttle

Steve Rogers’ buddy “Bucky” Barnes has had a rollercoaster of a life: a life that he was, at times, not fully in control of. From World War II playboy to terrorist-spurred, brainwashed assassin, Bucky knows well what violence costs. While the Marvel Cinematic Universe character (played by Sebastian Stan) presents an interesting dilemma concerning the culpability for one’s sinful actions, his turn from villainy and his progress toward an inner life of peace are equally worth our consideration....

The Symposium on Advancing the New Evangelization, an annual conference held at Benedictine College which was canceled in 2020, commenced on Friday.
This year’s symposium was markedly different from past conferences, including the use of Zoom for one lecture and standard mask-wearing procedures for participants.
The convention entailed numerous presentations on theological and philosophical issues and their intersection with culture.
Dr. Matthew Muller, assistant professor of theology and pro...

It's often said the United States is built upon the backs of its immigrants, and it's true. The American melting pot would not be what it is without our ancestors. Without the Irish immigrants of the past, much of the country's institutions and culture would be sorely lacking today.
Overseas immigrants flooding into major ports and cities made for a predicament. Many came from a rural existence and had to adapt to city life. Impoverished travelers to these hubs of industrialization were force...

The distant shores of silence begin
at the door. You cannot fly there
like a bird. You must stop, look deeper,
still deeper, until nothing deflects the soul
from the deepmost deep.
When I hear the phrase “the universe,” I, perhaps like many others, picture a starry pattern arranged on a dark canvas — the Milky Way or another iconic Hubble image. But if I dwell on the words just a bit longer, I start to think, “There’s more.”
A number of films depict the interplanetary beauties of the universe...

They have ‘ethical responsibilities to follow the law and to preserve civil rights’
On his first day in office, President Biden released an executive order interpreting Title IX to “prevent and combat discrimination on the basis of gender identity or sexual orientation.”
A member of the former administration wasted little time challenging Biden’s Department of Education to enforce Title IX’s literal ban on sex discrimination in federally funded programs.
Adam Kissel (above), deputy assistant ...

As human beings, there are feelings inherent to who we are that we experience regularly. Pain, both physical and emotional, is a struggle many of us are faced with. But the capacity for joy is also a part of being human.
We can’t experience either, however, if we don’t really live, if we’re not engaged in life abundantly. This means giving of ourselves and not getting hung up on ourselves. This sort of selflessness defines many heroes in real life. Joan of Arc, with confidence instilled by Go...

Many a literary colossus has come from a military background. Spanning centuries, the writers of what we today consider classics had served in a variety of military capacities.
From soldiers and spies to advisees, correspondents, and medics, many veterans had a passion for picking up their pen and pouring out their heart. These literary powerhouses carried the same conviction in writing as they had when drawing up strategies and carrying out orders.
For some of these writers, their love of la...

Among the many things that 2020 took from us, Chadwick Boseman was a big loss. In late August, news broke that he had died of colon cancer — a disease that hardly anyone knew he was battling.
Boseman’s biggest role was playing the titular character in Marvel’s Black Panther movie, and his legacy will certainly be long-lived. In fact, even after his death, he is still making headlines. In early December 2020, he received the Hero for the Ages Award at the MTV Movie and TV Awards. And in this y...

If good Star Wars stories are anything, they’re often intentional. Midi-chlorians in organisms allow some to have Force abilities. In the Clone Wars era, Palpatine’s plans are orchestrated with precision and with attention to some of the finest details, bringing about an elaborate militaristic onslaught. Anakin’s betrayal to the Dark Side comes with a reason, an allure of hope for keeping Padme safe. Luke intentionally seeks out Yoda on Dagobah in order to gain wisdom.

“Yet, despite the extremes we have confronted this year, there might be a way of turning away from this ‘great divide.'”
Putting it lightly, the past year has been a milieu of outbreaks—those of infectious illness and those which decried social and political agendas. It is a blunt statement, but it does not require much elaboration. We have all lived through it.

He ‘dismiss[ed] student perspectives that are different from his own’
Students and a state lawmaker are calling on the University of Central Florida to investigate an adjunct professor for referring to the novel coronavirus as the “Wuhan Corona virus.”
Some accused Alvin Quackenbush of “racist” grading practices, “biased” assignments and sharing his political views in class, but their criticisms also focus on disagreement with the grades the white professor has given.
Rep. Anna Eskamani, an a...

C.S. Lewis, a literary-bent mind if ever there was, had the habit of discussing other writers (and their influences on him) within his own stories. In Out of the Silent Planet, for instance, Dr. Ransom can’t help but envision the loathsome brutes of H.G. Wells’s fantasies while en route to the alien world of Malacandra.[1]
In Lewis’s The Great Divorce, another author of renown gets more than a mere mention within the story’s context. He is, in fact, an actor in it. The narrator bumps into thi...

Letters from Father Christmas
by J. R. R. Tolkien
Houghton Mifflin Company, 2020.
The name Tolkien is first and foremost associated with what is widely acknowledged as the man’s chief literary creation, The Lord of the Rings. The writer’s mind vibrantly fleshed out Middle-earth in history, in phonetics, in flora, and in verse. Certainly, there was rather little that his creation lacked. It became a realm as genuine in the reader’s eyes as it was in Tolkien’s.

For all those who have read Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol or have watched one of the plentiful screen adaptations, it is hard to be unmoved by Tiny Tim. So young and so full of the delight he gets from going to church, the little Cratchet boy might need crutches to walk, but he has wings on which his wonder takes flight.
The scene Dickens paints of Tim has him set in a place of love and affection within his family. But, as it is, sickness holds no partiality. Tiny Tim’s life is threatene...