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The apologies of the Church Fathers were written to explain Christianity to a hostile world. As I read Fratelli Tutti—released on the Feast of St. Francis—the style and intent of those ancient documents came to mind over and over. I couldn’t shake the sense that Pope Francis is offering his latest encyclical as an explanation and defense of his methods and goals, doing so for both outsiders but perhaps more so for those of us in his flock, especially his most vocal critics.

That said, there are two key takeaways for Catholic ecologists that go beyond Fratelli Tutti's intimate connection with the eco-encyclical Laudato Si’.

The first is its catechetical foundation.

In his letter to all humanity (which is the Italian inference of the word Fratelli), Pope Francis presents the scriptural basis for Christianity’s radical understanding of love of neighbor. It's as if he's building a case—or, perhaps, a defense—rather than simply instructing the faithful and those of other faith traditions.

Masterfully and lovingly taught, Pope Francis goes about this instruction not with mere snippets of scripture or by relegating scriptural passages to the endnotes. Rather, he places lengthy citations directly into the...

Before the days of global quarantine, it had been a while since I’d found the time to read “for fun”, and even longer since I’d been glued to a real page-turner. But that’s exactly what Michael Crichton’s Next is. You know it’s good when you’re charging towards the end of a 500-plus page novel at three in the morning and slip off the end of the last chapter with a real sense of surprise that the whirlwind story is actually finished.

But it wasn’t finished for me. Next got me thinking about my response to it as a Catholic reader. What follows is meant to be part book review, part reflection on bioethics. Fitting for a novel starring some wonky hybrid animals, I suppose.

Next is the work of Michael Crichton, the mastermind whose movie-adapted Jurassic Park brought dinosaurs into our living-rooms. The author whose name has become synonymous with meticulously-researched sci-fi thrillers that border chillingly on social prophecy. Jurassic Park has always been one of my favorite movies (that’s for another post), which eventually led me to read some of Crichton’s novels. Having enjoyed Prey and Disclosure so much, I was surprised I’d never picked up Next when I...