I’ve been moved by realizing I know many people, good friends some of them, who in these times of crisis, are among those who move toward the danger. Not in reckless ways. Not in unnecessary ways. Just the opposite, in fact. I just got off the phone with one of them, whom you will be able to hear in an upcoming National Review Institute faith and culture “virus-free” episode.


Among them are some of the Dominican friars who do health-care ministry in Manhattan. And in the first of our conversations, Fr. John Maria Devaney, O.P., talked about their life and work and especially in these coronavirus times. And earlier this week, he and some of his brothers were profiled in the New York Times. Another one of the friars, Fr. Walter Wagner, isn’t able to make hospital runs anymore, but talked about engaging himself and with others on a real fundamental issue of the day — what the Gospel looks like when your ways of living it are essentially taken from you.

Here’s the New York Times piece. Here’s the earlier conversation with Fr. John.