Paul L. Caron
Dean
Pepperdine Caruso
School of Law
Faith
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WaPo Op-Ed: A Christmas Puppy And Jesus
Washington Post Op-Ed: Getting a Puppy Was the Best Worst Christmas Idea Ever, by Megan McArdle: There is little in this world more charming than the idea of a Christmas puppy. The festive music, the cooing family, that adorable little face with the holiday lights shining from his eyes. The reality, however, is something of…
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WSJ Editorial: In Hoc Anno Domini
The Wall Street Journal has published this wonderful editorial each Christmas since 1949, In Hoc Anno Domini (In The Year Of Our Lord): When Saul of Tarsus set out on his journey to Damascus the whole of the known world lay in bondage. There was one state, and it was Rome. There was one master…
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How We Named Our Daughter: A Story For Advent And Christmas
Dispatch Faith: How We Named Our Daughter: A Story for Advent and Christmas, by John McCormack & Lauren McCormack: On the morning of December 24, 2023, we were holding hands while attending Mass at John’s parents’ parish in Madison, Wisconsin. The gospel reading that morning, the Fourth Sunday of Advent, was the Annunciation—when the angel…
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Winston Churchill’s Christmas Eve Message To America
Douglas Murray (The Free Press), Things Worth Remembering: Winston Churchill’s Christmas Message to America: As we near Christmas, I am reminded of the wonderful, 393-word speech delivered by the inimitable Winston Churchill on Christmas Eve of 1941. He spoke from the South Portico of the White House, in the midst of war. … [T]he reason…
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Christmas And Hanukkah: Distinct Holidays With A Common Challenge
Dispatch Faith: Christmas and Hanukkah: Distinct Holidays With a Common Challenge, by Michael Reneau (The Dispatch) & Ephraim Radner (Wycliffe College, University of Toronto): Michael Reneau: This year is unusual in that for only the fifth time in the last 100-plus years, the first night of Hanukkah falls on December 25. Christian theology professor Ephraim…
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NY Times: December 23 Is ‘Christmas Adam’
New York Times, Behold! ‘Christmas Adam’ Is Born.: First there was Christmas Eve … and then a new celebration was created. Some 2,000 years ago, on a holy night in Bethlehem as stars were brightly shining, a young woman gave birth to a baby and laid him in a manger. The baby Jesus was a…
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TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup
Saturday: This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts July 2024 California Bar Exam Results Raskolnikov Presents A New View Of Formal Equality Today At The Italian Society Of Law And Economics Sunday: David Brooks: My Decade-Long Journey To Faith Pope Francis: There Is Faith In Humor Wicked, Luigi Mangione, And Evil More On Pepperdine,…
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David Brooks: My Decade-Long Journey To Faith
Update: New York Times Podcast: David Brooks: I Found My Faith in a Crowded Subway Car New York Times Op-Ed: The Shock of Faith: It’s Nothing Like I Thought It Would Be, by David Brooks: When I was an agnostic, I thought faith was primarily about belief. Being religious was about having a settled conviction…
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Pope Francis: There Is Faith In Humor
New York Times Op-Ed: There Is Faith in Humor, by Pope Francis (Co-Author, Hope: The Autobiography (Jan. 14, 2025)): Life inevitably has its sadnesses, which are part of every path of hope and every path toward conversion. But it is important to avoid wallowing in melancholy at all costs, not to let it embitter the…
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Wicked, Luigi Mangione, And Evil
Christianity Today: Wicked or Misunderstood? Q&A With Beth Moore: Each week on The Bulletin, Russell Moore, Mike Cosper, and Clarissa Moll discuss the media’s top headlines—the people, events, and issues that are shaping our world. In this conversation, The Bulletin talks with best-selling author and Bible teacher Beth Moore about the new hit movie musical Wicked and the arrest of Luigi Mangione, the…
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More On Pepperdine, Fire, And God
Following up on last Sunday’s post, Pepperdine, Fire, And God: Watch the latest video at foxnews.com A Message from President Jim Gash to the Pepperdine Community: The last few days have been a turbulent time in our community. Sirens wailing, fires blazing on the horizon and on our hillsides, multiple shelter-in-place orders—these were not the scenes…
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This Week’s Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
Legal Education: Derek Muller (Notre Dame), Projected 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings New York Times, Black Student Enrollment At Harvard Law Drops By More Than Half Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), Pepperdine, Fire, And God The Atlantic, The Two-Body Problem: Spousal Hiring In Higher Education National Law Journal, Attorneys, Law Professors Flock From X To…
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TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup
Saturday: This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts Pepperdine Academic Freedom Colloquium: Faith And The Academy Empowering Ukraine’s First Legal Responders: Ukrainian-US Collaboration And Clinics The Digital Advertising Tax: An Overstep By State Taxing Jurisdictions Sunday: Pepperdine, Fire, And God ‘Gentle Parenting,’ Human Nature, And God Human Flourishing Is About More Than Just Power…
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Pepperdine, Fire, And God
Update: More On Pepperdine, Fire, And God I am grateful for the many folks who reached out to me last week upon hearing the news of the Franklin Fire that tore through Malibu and threatened the Pepperdine University campus. I did not have time to respond individually to everyone, so I thought I would share…
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‘Gentle Parenting,’ Human Nature, And God
Dispatch Faith: What ‘Gentle Parenting’ Misunderstands About Human Nature, by Megan Dent: I recently recognized the afterglow of thrilling misconduct on my 3-year-old’s face. His older brother had left a piece of finished schoolwork unattended, and the younger seized his chance to grab a fistful of crayons and scribble all over it until it was…
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Human Flourishing Is About More Than Just Power
Dispatch Faith: Flourishing Is About More Than Just Power, by Fr. Robert Sirico (Co-Founder, Acton Institute): In the current era of constant debate, shifting ideologies, and intense elections, it may be that holiday get-togethers can offer something more than a continuation of the same. Among people who love one another, it might also be a time of more…
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Robert George: The Future Of Conservatives In Academia
Aaron M. Renn (American Reformer), The Future of Conservatives in Academia: I’m very honored this week to have as my podcast guest Robert George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton. Academia is almost entirely dominated by the left. But Professor George has thrived in it as a strong, conservative Catholic. Is it possible for conservatives…
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This Week’s Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
Legal Education: Carolyn Young Larmore (Chapman), First-Gen In The Field Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), 40% Through The Fall 2025 Law School Admissions Season: Applicants Are Up An ‘Unnatural’ 25% (Black Applicants Are Up 39%) The Setonian, Former Assistant Dean Sentenced To 3 Years In Prison For Embezzling $1.3 Million From Seton Hall Law School Grand…
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Pepperdine Academic Freedom Colloquium: Faith And The Academy
Academic Freedom at Faith-Based Institutions of Higher Education:A Colloquium on Faith and the AcademyMarch 6-8, 2025Malibu, CaliforniaRegistration In March of next year, Pepperdine will welcome representatives from faith-based institutions to join in an intimate 2.5-day colloquy on academic freedom. Apart from the plenary events, participants will be organized in seminar-sized groups of 12-18 led by…
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TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup
Saturday: This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts First-Gen In The Field The Consequences Of Limiting The Tax Deductibility Of R&D Sunday: NY Times Movie Review: ‘Mary’ — An Epic Biopic For The Mother Of God Turning Water To Wine Wasn’t Jesus’ Real Miracle At Cana ‘AI Jesus’ Tests Man’s Faith In Technology And…
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NY Times Movie Review: ‘Mary’ — An Epic Biopic For The Mother Of God
New York Times, ‘Mary’ Review: An Epic Biopic for the Mother of God: Horses gallop across a desert. Christianity’s most famous couple meet cute at a river. Swords clatter. A villain emerges from flames. Insect buzz accompanies the come-ons of a devil. (OK, the Devil.) No genre gesture goes untapped in the deliberately hagiographic “Mary,”…
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Turning Water To Wine Wasn’t Jesus’ Real Miracle At Cana
Dispatch Faith: And They Began to Be Merry, by Kevin D. Williamson: Turning water to wine wasn’t Jesus’ real miracle at Cana. … Jesus’ first miracle isn’t about transmutation of beverages—it is about social anxiety. It is about shame. Some relations have not planned well for their wedding, and they are going to be embarrassed, and…
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‘AI Jesus’ Tests Man’s Faith In Technology And God
NBC Los Angeles, ‘AI Jesus’ Avatar Tests Man’s Faith in Machines and the Divine: Would you trust an “AI Jesus” with your innermost thoughts and troubles? Researchers and religious leaders on Wednesday released findings from a two-month experiment through art in a Catholic chapel in Switzerland, where an avatar of “Jesus” on a computer screen…
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Pepperdine Caruso Law Religious Liberty Clinic Wins Important Free Exercise Case
Pepperdine Surf Report, Pepperdine Caruso Law Religious Liberty Clinic Achieves Victory in Mendham Methodist Church v. Morris County: Hugh and Hazel Darling Foundation Religious Liberty Clinic achieved a significant legal victory, securing a preliminary injunction in federal court to protect its clients, Mendham Methodist Church and Zion Lutheran Church Long Valley. The case challenges a…
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This Week’s Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
Legal Education: Chronicle of Higher Education Op-Ed (Peter Arcidiacono (Duke) & Tyler Ransom (Oklahoma)), Are Elite Colleges (And Law Schools) Circumventing The Supreme Court's SFFA Decision? AALS, The American Law School Faculty Study InspireMore, Students Pull Wholesome Prank On Law Prof On Last Day Of Class Reuters, California Bar Will Consider Campus Protests In Moral…