Charles E. Rice

Charles Rice, professor of the jurisprudence of St. Thomas Aquinas for the last twenty years at Notre Dame Law School, presents a very readable book on the natural law as seen through the teachings of Aquinas and their foundations in reason and Revelation. Reflecting on the most persistent questions asked by his students over the years, Rice shows how the natural law works and how it is rooted in the nature of the human person whose Creator provided this law as a sure and knowable guide for man to achieve his end of eternal happiness. This book presents the teachings of the Catholic Church in her role as arbiter of the applications of the natural law on issues involving the right to live, bioethics, the family and the economy. Charles Rice has produced a firmly grounded and accessible handbook which touches on the most important topics regarding natural law that will benefit readers of all backgrounds.

When the University of Notre Dame announced that President Barack Obama would speak at its 2009 Commencement and would receive an honorary doctor of laws degree, the reaction was more than anyone expected. Students, faculty, alumni, and friends of Notre Dame denounced the honoring of Obama, who is the most relentlessly pro-abortion public official in the world. Beyond abortion, Obama has taken steps to withdraw from health-care professionals the right of conscientious objection. Among them are thousands of Notre Dame alumni who will be forced to choose between continuing their profession and participating in activities they view as immoral, including the execution of the unborn. And they will be forced to that choice by the politician upon whom their alma mater confers its highest honors. (Mary Ann Glendon, distinguished Harvard law professor and former ambassador to the Vatican, felt obliged to turn down the prestigious Laetare Medal because of this.) Notre Dame’s honoring of Obama is not merely a “Catholic” thing. Many thousands of citizens with no Catholic or Notre Dame connections have protested it. They see it as a capitulation of faith to expedience and the pursuit of vain prestige. Obama’s record and stated purposes are hostile to the most basic truths of faith and the natural law affirmed by the Catholic Church and by many others. Four decades ago, in 1967, the major “Catholic” universities declared their “autonomy” from the Catholic Church in the Land O’Lakes Declaration. The honoring of Obama reflects the replacement by those universities of the benign authority of the Church with the politically correct standards of the secular academic establishment and, especially, of the government. There is a lesson here for all Americans. Notre Dame fell into relativism and expediency because it rejected the Church as the authentic interpreter of the moral law. In this post-Christian era, American culture is following a similar path by reducing morality to the unguided consensus of individual choices. If no code of right and wrong has moral authority – not even the Ten Commandments – then society is ruled by the conflict of interests, and might makes right. The jurisprudence of such relativism is legal positivism in which no law can be criticized as unjust because no one can know what is “just.” What Happened to Notre Dame? by Charles E. Rice, with a Preface by Ralph McInerny and Introduction by Alfred Freddoso – three of Notre Dame’s most distinguished scholars, who together have served the University 124 years – first recounts the details of Notre Dame’s honoring of President Obama. It then examines the succession of fall-back excuses offered by the Notre Dame President Rev. John I. Jenkins, c.s.c., and University publicists to justify Notre Dame’s defiance of the nation’s bishops and of Catholic teaching. But Rice is not content with mere reportage. What Happened to Notre Dame? diagnoses the problem’s roots by first providing an overview of the Land O’Lakes Declaration, its inception and its aftermath, including the ways in which its false autonomy from the Church has led to an erosion of the Catholic identity of Notre Dame and other Catholic universities. Then, it offers a cure. Christ, who is God, is the author of the divine law and the natural law. The book presents reasons why an acknowledged interpreter of these laws is necessary, and why that interpreter has to be the Pope exercising the Magisterium, or teaching authority of the Church. And it shows why it is so important that we have such a moral interpreter for all citizens and not just for Catholics. The alternative is what Pope Benedict XVI calls the “dictatorship of relativism,” which the book analyzes. Even for those who do not share the Catholic faith, our reason leads us to conclude that the natural law is the only moral code that makes entire sense and points to the conclusion that the Vicar of Christ is uniquely suited to give authoritative interpretation to that law. In the final chapter Rice shows why great good can come out of Notre Dame’s blunder in rendering its highest honors to such an implacable foe. Notre Dame got itself into such a mess because it attempted to be Catholic without the Church and ended up defying the Church and disgracing itself. But good can result from the lesson here that roll-your-own morality is no more tenable than roll-your-own Catholicism. Rice shows why what happened to Notre Dame is symptomatic of what’s happening in other Catholic colleges, indeed colleges with non-Catholic religious affiliations. He shows how the abandonment of principle at the college level spills over to the general culture, with devastating effect, as religious standards get pushed out of the public square. And, finally, he shows why people who have never seen the Golden Dome, never rooted for the Fighting Irish, and never graced a Catholic Church, also have a stake in what happened to Notre Dame.

In this insightful book, Charles E. Rice, a Notre Dame Law School professor, argues that the widespread acceptance of contraception has set the stage for religious persecution. He contends that contraception isn't merely about sex, but a First Commandment issue, challenging our understanding of God's role. The Anglican Lambeth Conference of 1930 first allowed contraception as a moral choice, and its widespread use, following the introduction of the Pill in the 1960s, led to a shift in moral authority from God to the state. Rice explores how this has put religious groups, particularly the Catholic Church, at odds with the state, as seen in the Obama administration's healthcare mandate. He delves into the 'main event' - the battle over LGBTQ rights - and analyzes the 2013 Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage. Rice identifies underlying causes of the Church's persecution, including relativism, redefined conscience, and constitutional moral neutrality. He controversially presents contraception as an unacknowledged cause of persecution, detailing its consequences and the Church's response. The book offers speaking truth, trusting God, and praying. It's well-documented and thought-provoking.

Growing up in a world marked by wars, disasters, family troubles, and rampant secularism, today's Catholic teens and young adults need straight answers on their purpose in life. What better guide than a manual featuring the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas and Pope John Paul II on who were are, presented by a world-class teacher and an experienced seminary instructor?

Book by Rice, Charles E.

Book by Rice, Charles E.

(The Grim Revival Series)Lucrio Destine is a low-life. He's weak. He's a good-for-nothing. He would sell his soul if he could. Yet, he just might be the key to the future for the country of Allsteel and the human race itself. There's only one problem; everyone else knows this as well. The secret is out. As he begins to discover who he is, an assassination company known as The Shadowcast Institution and their maniacal leader, Director Pollock, begin ruthlessly hunting him down. With the help of a stranger named Calvin LeClarre, Lucrio will try to untangle just exactly who he is, while learning how to cope with his recent discoveries. Will he find the answers to his questions? Will he struggle with his existence and succumb to Pollock's influence? Or will he learn to accept his fate?Enjoy Part. 1 of the ongoing series.

Paperback in good condition. Covers are faintly shelfworn. Creases on spine. Small label on inside front cover; text is clear throughout. TS

Evaluate the status and prospects of the pro-life movement from a Catholic point of view.

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Charles Rice argues that we can build a culture of life, and shows that the culture of death is itself dying. A teacher of constitutional law and jurisprudence for three decades, at Notre Dame and Ave Maria College, Rice traces legalized abortion and euthanasia to their origins. He argues that the American republic is dead and the Constitution cannot be restored to what it was in the beginning. Yet this is a hope-filled book, for he offers a blueprint for reform. Readers will find a challenge – and discomfort – in his answers on such subjects as abortion, euthanasia, contraception, public schools, and vouchers, Catholic universities, “gay rights,” pacifism, the death penalty, immigration, and even global free trade.