The Violence of Double Standards

Joseph Bottum at First Things brings to the fore the raison d'être of Chronicles of Atlantis: Truth, Goodness, and Beauty - Some Things are Worthy Fighting For.

It’s old news that we have a double standard these days: People who attack and insult Christianity are brave—oh, so brave—transgressive artists, while people who attack and insult Islam are insensitive and bigoted. The legal blogger Eugene Volokh had an interesting note a while back, comparing editorials in the Boston Globe—the editorials the newspaper had run denouncing the Danish cartoons and the editorials it had run praising Piss Christ and the elephant-dung portrait of Mary. A more recent example comes from the comic writer Ben Elton, who this week denounced British television for censoring his scripts. “There is no doubt about it,” he told the Daily Telegraph, “the BBC will let vicar gags pass but they would not let imam gags pass.”

For a long time, I attributed all this to a weird kind of disbelief in the actual reality of Islam—or, at least, to the possibility of its achieving any significant success. A certain line of modernity has always aimed, as one of its fundamental projects, at the undoing of Christianity. And for that project, any stick is a good one, even an Islamic one.

[ ... ]

It’s easy to mock Christianity, because the people who do it know that the rioters aren’t actually going to come after them. They’re too Christian, and the Poor Clares aren’t actually going to start their commando training. But can we at least stop hearing about how brave people are when they insult Christianity and carefully—oh, so carefully—leave out Islam?

Literally Immersed in God - John Paul II

Do you remember where you were 3 years ago today? The memory of Pope John Paul II's passing will stay with my wife and I for a long time. We were at the Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago listening to a young child's baptism service when the priest informed everyone of Pope John Paul II's death. So the words of Pope Benedict XVI today ring loud and clear for me. May we take to heart the spirit of JPII and his sense of total immersion in the love of Christ that was so real for him.

MAY THE CHURCH FOLLOW TEACHINGS, EXAMPLE OF JOHN PAUL II

VATICAN CITY, 2 APR 2008 (VIS) - In St. Peter's Square at 10.30 a.m. today, Benedict XVI presided at a Eucharistic celebration to mark the third anniversary of the death of Servant of God John Paul II. Members of the College of Cardinals concelebrated with the Holy Father.

Addressing the more than 40,000 people present, the Pope in his homily returned to the hours following the news of John Paul II's death on 2 April 2005, recalling the innumerable faithful who prayed before his body and participated in the funeral.

"Among the many human and supernatural qualities" of the late Pontiff, Benedict XVI mentioned "that of an exceptional spiritual and mystical sensibility. It sufficed to watch him as he prayed: he literally immersed himself in God and, during those moments, it seemed as if everything else was foreign to him. ... The Mass - as he often said - was for him the focal point of every day and of his entire life. The 'living and holy' reality of the Eucharist gave him the spiritual energy to guide the People of God along the path of history".

After recalling how John Paul II died on the eve of the second Sunday of Easter, the Holy Father highlighted how the late Pope's pontificate, "both as a whole and in many specific moments, appears to us as a sign and testimony of Christ's resurrection. The paschal dynamism which rendered John Paul II's existence a complete response to the call of the Lord, could not be expressed without his participation in the suffering and death of the divine Master and Redeemer".

Pope Benedict pointed out that the words from the Gospel that figured in today's Mass - the "do not be afraid" addressed by the angel to the women at the empty tomb - "became, from the solemn beginnings of his Petrine ministry, a kind of motto on the lips of Pope John Paul II".

He always pronounced these words "with unbending firmness, at first while carrying his bishop's staff with its cross and later, when his physical strength was waning, almost while supporting himself on it, until that final Good Friday in which he participated in the Way of the Cross from his private chapel, holding the cross in his arms. ... That eloquent scene of human suffering and faith ... revealed to believers and to the whole world the secret of an entire Christian life".

As little by little the late Polish Pontiff "lost everything, in the end even the power of speech, his trust in Christ became increasingly evident. As it was with Jesus, so with John Paul II, in the end words gave way to the extreme sacrifice, to the gift of self. Death was the seal of an existence entirely donated to Christ, conformed to Him even in physical terms, in his suffering and faithful abandonment in the arms of the heavenly Father".

The Holy Father also reminded those present that today marks the opening of the First World Apostolic Congress on Divine Mercy, which aims to study Pope John Paul's "rich Magisterium on this subject.

"God's mercy", Pope Benedict explained, "is a good key to understanding John Paul II's pontificate. He wanted the message of God's merciful love to reach all mankind and exhorted the faithful to bear witness to it".

"Servant of God John Paul II personally knew and experienced the immense tragedies of the 20th century, and for a long time he asked himself what could stem the tide of evil. The answer could not but be in the love of God. In fact, only Divine Mercy is capable of limiting evil; only God's all-powerful love can overcome the arrogance of the wicked, and the destructive power of selfishness and hatred".

The Holy Father gave thanks to the Lord "for having given the Church this faithful and courageous servant" and to the Virgin Mary "for having incessantly watched over his person and his ministry". He also asked John Paul II "to continue to intercede from heaven for each of us, and particularly for me whom Providence has called to take up his priceless spiritual legacy.

"May the Church", Pope Benedict added in conclusion, "following his teaching and example, continue in her evangelising mission faithfully and without compromise, tirelessly spreading Christ's merciful love, source of true peace for the whole world".

Emmaus Road Initiative, Etc.

GIL BAILIE, President and founder of the Cornerstone Forum, posts on vital articles by Father Samir Khalil Samir, SJ and Roy O. Brown here.

While I'm speaking of Mr. Bailie, he will be appearing this Saturday morning at Washington Theological Union at 9:30 a.m. as part of his cross-country speaking engagement forum, Emmaus Road Initiative - Inspiring a Wholehearted Faith in a Half-hearted Age. I encourage you to come, enjoy light refreshments (coffee, pastries) and thoughtful and faithful commentary for concerned Christians.

The community of believers was of one heart and mind

Today's reading from Acts 4:32.37 begins with a most important line: "The community of believers was of one heart and mind,..."

We rarely ponder the origins of anything anymore. How did a community come into existence? How did they become of one heart and mind? The human event, the gathering principle, at the beginning of all cultures, of all peoples, and of all times had been so powerful, so cathartic, so as to bring all to one heart and mind was always at the expense of the sacrificial victim. Check it out by picking up Gil Bailie's book, Violence Unveiled and reading it today.

So the text is telling us that something new has begun with this small band of believers.

"With great power the Apostles bore witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,..."

A new calling has gone out to rally people together under one heart and mind and that is Our Lord and Risen Savior, Jesus Christ.

There IS something new here.

Dawn Treading

And if you are interested in Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader should definitely catch your eye.

Two New By Girard

Chris Morrissey lists two new forthcoming books by -- you guessed it -- René Girard: Mimesis and Theory - Essays on Literature and Criticism, 1953-2005 and Evolution and Conversion - Dialogues on the Origins of Culture. Both together will only set you back, oh, $170.00. ($80.00 if you go paperback.) I hope you have more in your book expenditure budget than I do!

Divine Mercy Sunday

The Incredulity of Saint Thomas - Caravaggio (1573-1610)

FITNA Questions

At Chronicles of Atlantis, I try to look at reasons people in the West who have clearly been influenced by the Gospel still justify the myths, rituals, and prohibitions of a conventional, billion-person strong religion that is more than a little informed by the primitive Sacred. Desire to "put it to" Judaism and the Christian faith is one reason; a multicultural pipe dream of wanting to "teach the world to sing in perfect harmony" is another; and a third is blind, freakin' fear of having one's head severed from one's body, so placate, placate, placate.

Geert Wilder's fifteen-minute film has just been released. You can find it any and every where. It is, as Robert Spencer says, accurate. But are there some other valid reasons for not showing it in today's obviously scandalized state of things?

Will it influence those who are hyper-susceptible to mimesis, for example, to carry out similar heinous acts of ritual violence? Is it likely to be used as "recruiting material?" Will the "ostriches" of the West and ranting atheists like Dawk and Hitch say, "There! See? I toldja so"?

For my part, those who scold Wilders and accuse him of being a hate-monger and "racist" ( __ ? What "race" is he denigrating? Islam is a religion.) forget something. He is charged with such accusations for holding up a mirror. That is all.

If people don't like what they see in it, too bad. Maybe they should start acting differently. More tolerantly. More charitably. Less violently.

The question that FITNA brings to the fore, in my opinion, is this: What does faithful, just, Christian life look like in these tumultuous days of cultural clash and terror? If St. Francis is your thing, you may want to look at Gen's recent offering at Real Clear Religion. But for now, there are still many questions and challenges facing people of the biblical faith. Questions that FITNA raises, but only by being a looking-glass in which we see realities of today.

Prince Caspian - C. S. Lewis

See the movie. Read the book.

Better Read Some Girard

So much for the myth of “peaceful” Tibetans.

Gutsy Evangelist

National Review Online gives us a portrait of a gutsy evangelist from Egypt: Zakaria Botros:

Though he is little known in the West, Coptic priest Zakaria Botros — named Islam’s “Public Enemy #1” by the Arabic newspaper, al-Insan al-Jadid — has been making waves in the Islamic world. Along with fellow missionaries — mostly Muslim converts — he appears frequently on the Arabic channel al-Hayat (i.e., “Life TV”). There, he addresses controversial topics of theological significance — free from the censorship imposed by Islamic authorities or self-imposed through fear of the zealous mobs who fulminated against the infamous cartoons of Mohammed. Botros’s excurses on little-known but embarrassing aspects of Islamic law and tradition have become a thorn in the side of Islamic leaders throughout the Middle East.

Botros is an unusual figure onscreen: robed, with a huge cross around his neck, he sits with both the Koran and the Bible in easy reach. Egypt’s Copts — members of one of the oldest Christian communities in the Middle East — have in many respects come to personify the demeaning Islamic institution of “dhimmitude” (which demands submissiveness from non-Muslims, in accordance with Koran 9:29). But the fiery Botros does not submit, and minces no words. He has famously made of Islam “ten demands,” whose radical nature he uses to highlight Islam’s own radical demands on non-Muslims.

The result? Mass conversions to Christianity — if clandestine ones. View article …

The 'Well' vs. the 'Shadows'

Remains of Whitby Abbey, England

I have often in my life forgotten my inherent human dignity, made imago dei, as many do. This was partly due to my having a desire to stay near to my now-deceased mother as an infant, and she was a dyed-in-the-wool member of the Evangelical persuasion. (Her grandfather however was, she told me, a "bad Catholic," and I attribute my conversion to his prayers for me. I pray for them both and solicit their prayers daily.) So, I was far and away from Mother Church from the outset, as opposed to those cradle Catholic "reverts" who so daringly trace their steps back to the arms of their trustworthy Mother.

Dear G. K. Chesterton said it well in 'The Well and the Shadows' -- when we abandon the Catholic Church for the plethora of pipe dreams and promises of the world, we do not gain truth or freedom or facts. We receive a pablum of shallowness, fraud, and idolatry, with all that those can conjure anthropologically, epistemologically, and ontologically.

Praise God on this Wednesday in the Octave of Easter for the sanity, richness, and steadfast hearth and home of Mother Church. May many prodigals make their way back to Her.

Abtei Heiligenkreuz im Wienerwald

[h/t: New Advent]

Jesus Has Risen -- but the eye hasn't

Okay, so I let the scourging get a little out of hand this past Friday...

Just to let you all know that Aramis has been struggling a bit with anything to do with computer work (no postings lately)... "Now the rest of the story," as Paul Harvey would declare.

Though we cautioned our parish priest ahead of the performance, he had not seen my eye in person. Just before Good Friday I had developed a really bad infection behind the eye lid and it quickly spread. In the play my back is to the congregation until midway, after the scourging and laying on of the crown of thorns. So when the crucial moment to turn and face the people came, just in time to listen to the mob yell out, "CRUCIFY HIM! CRUCIFY HIM!" I was just praying that the Holy Spirit would be able to finish my lines, for I knew that I alone was not going to be strong enough.

Afterwards, our priest (and everyone we talked to) congratulated all involved in the performance and said that I was meant, even with the cold that had settled in the eye, to play this part. God even uses colds when He needs to get our attention.

The picture here is actually from yesterday (Easter Sunday) and the eye is quite a bit better than what it was on Good Friday. Today I am able to open the lid slightly, without using fingers to help, so posting will still be very sparse, at least from me.

Thank you Athos for the many brilliant posts this Passion Week - first class, my fellow Mass'keteer.

Happy Easter

The Morning of the Resurrection [1882] - Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones

Rejoice, heavenly powers! Sing, choirs of angels!
Exult, all creation around God's throne!
Jesus Christ, our King, is risen!
Sound the trumpet of salvation!

+

The whole bright world rejoices now, Hilariter, hilariter;
The birds do sing on every bough Alleluia, alleluia.

Then shout beneath the racing skies, Hilariter, hilariter;
To him who rose that we might rise, Alleluia, alleluia.

And all you living things make praise, Hilariter, hilariter;
He guideth you on all your ways, Alleluia, alleluia.

He, Father, son, and Holy Ghost - Hilariter, hilariter!
Our God most high, our joy and boast. Alleluia, alleluia!

5th Sorrow

BXVI Visit - Shopping Guide

John Allen provides a helpful "one-stop shopping" list of Pope Benedict's visit to the United States with nifty links here.

Good Friday

The Procession to Calvary - Pieter Bruegel

Holy Thursday

Flannery O’Connor was getting an award in New York one time and she had to get all gussied-up from her farm in Georgia to go to this award banquet. It was all literary and religious people sitting around eating dinner, there was a conversation going on at her table about theological symbolism of the Eucharist, and Flannery O’Connor is just eating away not saying anything. After a while her silence became obvious and so one of the people who was particularly lively in the conversation turned to her and said to her, “Ms O’Connor, what do you think about the symbolism of the Eucharist?” She glared over the top of her glasses and said “If it is just a symbol, the hell with it.”

It is very important to remember Jesus didn’t say, ‘take this and figure it out.’ He said, ‘take it and eat it.’ There is a huge mystery in the Eucharist, but it is I think, the mystery of our induction into the body of Christ - into the communion of saints – into the work of Christ in history.

From Entering the Biblical Story at the Eucharistic Table
A talk given by Gil Bailie

Upon This Rock - Gethsemane

On the side of the Mount of Olives stands a beautiful building called the Church of All Nations. Beside it is the Garden of Gethsemane; within it is a plain, rocky area on which, tradition has it, Our Lord prayed

before His Passion, Death, and Resurrection.

As we ponder the events of this Holy Week, recall in your busy schedule what He revealed to us in these awesome events: about Himself, about humanity, about you, about me.

Shroud Of Turin Accidentally Washed With Red Shirt

I agree with the Curt Jester: this Onion piece is pretty funny.

Catholic Church - Come Home

[Major h/t: Mark Shea]

When We Stop Pushing/Pulling Against

...Truth is a magnet, with the powers of attraction and repulsion ... The moment men cease to pull against [the Catholic Church] they feel a tug towards it. The moment they cease to shout it down they begin to listen to it with pleasure. The moment they try to be fair to it they begin to be fond of it. But when that affection has passed a certain point it begins to take on the tragic and menacing grandeur of a great love affair ... When he has entered the Church, he finds that the Church is much larger inside than it is outside.

-- G. K. Chesterton

French Techology at Its Best

I just can't resist: Run away! Run away!

Qatar - Our Lady of the Rosary

15,000 at first Mass. Awesome. You go, Our Lady.

Benedict on Confession

This is a joyful opportunity to here what the Holy Father, Benedict XVI, said recently to the confessors at the Major Basilicas. The Basilicas are staffed with confessors from religious orders, for example, Dominicans at St. Mary Major and Franciscans at St. Peter’s [Via the inestimable Fr. John Zuhlsdorf]:

Dear Confessors in the Roman Basilicas,

I am pleased to meet you at the end of the Course on the Internal Forum, which for some years now the Apostolic Penitentiary has organized during Lent. With its carefully planned programme, this annual meeting renders a precious service to the Church and helps to keep alive the sense of holiness of the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

[ ... ]

Lent is an especially favourable season to meditate on the reality of sin in the light of God’s infinite mercy, which the Sacrament of Penance expresses in its loftiest form. I therefore willingly take this opportunity to bring to your attention certain thoughts on the administration of this Sacrament in our time, in which the loss of the sense of sin is unfortunately becoming increasingly more widespread ... It is necessary today to assist those who confess to experience that divine tenderness to repentant sinners which many Gospel episodes portray with tones of deep feeling.

Read all …

Celebrity Masterpieces

Nifty artwork.

Chivalry of St. Joseph

It is my understanding that the Solemnity of St. Joseph is transfered to March 15, because the 19th is within Holy Week. For the stout hearted and chivalrous, see Stratford Caldecott's The Chivalry of Saint Joseph.

Mamet - No Longer a Spanish Prisoner

Here is news for rejoicing: David Mamet, a favorite playwright, explains ‘Why I Am No Longer a 'Brain-Dead Liberal' [h/t: The Anchoress]. I'd always hoped the writer of The Spanish Prisoner, with a break-through performances by Campbell Scott (son of George C.) as the statue and Steve Martin (yes, that Steve Martin) as his pigeon, would see through the wiles of progressive modernism. Huzzah, I say, and bully.

Zmirak on Distributism

John Zmirak on Distributism and other "Third Ways."

A Crisis of History

Catholic World News reports that in a March 7 address to the Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences, Pope Benedict XVI (bio - news) said that the study of history is particularly valuable today, to address "a society which, heedless of its own past and hence lacking criteria acquired through experience, is no longer capable of harmonious coexistence or joint commitment in realizing future aims."

"Such a society is particularly vulnerable to ideological manipulation," the Pope told the group. He said that the study of history today is being warped by "a methodology which draws inspiration from positivism and sociology" and ignores "entire epochs" because of its ideological blinders.

Have any sense of those who would want to manipulate history due to their "ideological blinders?" Here is a hint.

Read all …

Fifth Sunday of Lent

His Only-begotten Son and the Word of God - Viktor Vasnetsov

In today’s gospel Jesus said to Martha:

I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.

Gun Free Zones

(Athos - This post is merely a lame attempt at humor re: a great problem, and does not reflect the views or attitudes of any of the other Mass'keteers. Selah)

Corpus Christianum

"The Catholic Church is by far the largest, the most widespread, and the most ancient of Christian communions in the world, and is moreover the mighty trunk from which the other communions claiming to be Christian have broken off at one time or another. If, then, we limit the application of the term Christendom to this, its most authentic expression, the unity of Christendom is not a lost ideal to be recovered, but a stupendous reality which has always been in stable possession. For not only has this Catholic Church ever taught that unity is an essential note of the true Church of Christ, but throughout her long history she has been, to the amazement of the world, distinguished by the most conspicuous unity of faith and government..."

- The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XV

"Give me an army saying the Rosary and I will conquer the world!"
- Pope Pius IX

From the homepage of Corpus Christianum, which states the following:

Corpus Christianum is an international Private Association of the Faithful, open both to men and women, dedicated to praying for a renewal of Christendom.

Guided by a Catholic chivalrous spirit and Marian in character, Corpus Christianum members daily pray for the following key points:

* The renewal, unity, and spread of Christendom
* The Supreme Pontiff and all priests/religious
* The protection of Christians around the world
* The restoration of the family
* The conversion of sinners and the sanctification of all people

We are looking for courageous souls who are willing to take up the standard of Christ the King! We invite you to review the association's Statutes for more information about the organization and its obligations.

Jesus vs. "Religion Light"?

Check out this commentary entitled, Oprah's new Easter written by Chuck Norris (yes, that Chuck Norris).

The reason (Eckhart) Tolle's psychology and spirituality is marketed so easy is that it is an eclectic mix of conventional and unconventional wisdom, and Western and Eastern beliefs, presented in a tolerant, non-threatening, and non-sectarian way. In other words, it's "Religion Light," in which one can be spiritual with "little down and no credit."

Chuck continues with a plug for a new book, "Do Hard Things" by the twins, Alex and Brett Harris. They write about "a growing movement of Christian young people who are rebelling against the low expectations of their culture by choosing to "do hard things" for the glory of God." If you give this matter the reflection it deserves, you will discover that this Christian desire to serve God in all things, runs counter to the relativistic view espoused by Tolle and now endorsed by Oprah.

Norris comments:

My battle is not with Oprah – she has her guru (Tolle), and I have mine (Jesus). The real war is between those who espouse to be bearers of the truth, like Tolle and Jesus. And the question is: With contradicting truths, will we believe a mere man or one who claimed to be so much more?

And he goes on to quote C.S. Lewis:

A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a good moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great moral teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

Norris concludes: Again, the question is: Will we turn from what's easy, what's new, what's popular, what's even "Oprah" and take a step back and rediscover the answers that have been there all along? As C.S. Lewis also said, "We all want progress, but if you're on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive."

tip to Athos at Chronicles of Atlanits

Mad World

Creative Minority Report on the Born Alive Infants Protection Act and the sole presidential candidate who opposes it. (WARNING: Brief graphic image of a voiceless victim.) Moloch worship, crowd contagion, a false prophet, and demographic winter never looked so bad.

64% Say Mainstream Media Sux

Mea culpa for the low level of discourse, ahem. Little Green Footballs notes -- Survey Says: 64% Believe Mainstream Media Are Out of Touch. I would tweak that slightly and say, "64% are certain that traditional news and information organs are editorially inclined to give their "spin". Therefore, one must read between the lines at all times, and, if possible, gain access to what is really going on independently in order to see through philosophical paradigms and make an educated judgment for oneself." But that is a bit long for a headline, isn't it?

This is particularly vital during the election time kerfuffle and excitability, but essentially so when one realizes the extent to which papers like the New York Times and Washington Post, liberal progressive organs through and through, treat the masses like illiterate and wayward children who do not know what is "best", and so must be led kindly yet inexorably toward the newest expression of liberal fascism, a multicultural utopianism and pipe dream.

As friend Aramis would note, philosophy -- and I would add ratiocination and reason -- come replete with their sacrificial origins intact though covert. The a priori first principles of all paradigms are called into question by the Gospel (cf. Chapter 13 of Violence Unveiled). So, discerning truth in the media is a tricky business. Approach all such attempts with the following in one's kit: (1) prayer and humility; (2) the Catechism of the Catholic Church; and (3) a basic understanding of René Girard's mimetic theory. Any questions? Class dismissed.

Bonny Prince Harry's Return

Esmerelda Weatherwax (I just love writing that name) at The Iconoclast/New English Review on bonny Prince Harry's return. She quotes from The Times:

Prince Harry returns to England today, a hero to the Army, a changed man in the eyes of the public and a target for jihadists.

As the Queen, the Prime Minister and the Chief of the Defence Staff queued up to heap praise on the 23-year-old second lieutenant, protection for the Prince is to be upgraded. Al-Qaeda websites posted death threats against him yesterday after the worldwide coverage of his ten weeks in Helmand province, Afghanistan. In stark contrast, army message boards carried unanimous praise for the Prince.

The Times has seen messages posted on a password-protected al-Qaeda forum, al-Ekhlaas, calling for Prince Harry to be beheaded and a video of his murder to be sent to the Queen.

Arabic news items and photographs of the Prince on duty in Helmand were added to the jihadi sites. One posting said: “Nothing will break the heart of his grandmother but only if she loses him. My dear brothers in Allah, carry on provoking to kidnap this precious infidel.”

But it's a damned good thing the West isn't at war with radical Jihadists, isn't it? The peace of the Lord be with them. In honor of the royal lad's return, I offer the following as something those calling for his beheading can do with their fatwas:

Leaving So Soon?

Time Immortal posts a good question, What makes an ex-Catholic?

Truth Vs. Tolerance

Donald De Marco, co-author of Architects of the Culture of Death and a favorite columnist of mine, writes this in the Catholic Educator's Resource:

In today’s post-modern world, the notion that truth leads to freedom is regarded as narrowly Catholic and intolerant of other religious views. The new blueprint in the post-modern world is that tolerance, not truth, leads to freedom. This is a crossroad and a crisis to which Pope Benedict XVI has given considerable thought and verbal expression.

When he was known to the world as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he produced a book, Truth and Tolerance that confronts this very issue of the place of truth in the post-modern world. He recognizes that so much importance is now attached to tolerance, that it has been separated from truth, which, in turn, has been relegated to the sphere of mere opinion.

To state the matter quite simply: Tolerance has been absolutized, while truth has been relativized. Keep reading ...

The Wind Bloweth Where It Will

James Lovelock, British scientific professor emeritus and doomsayer (Revenge of Gaia -- better book than the title implies) says wind power and huge turbines are poor sources of renewable energy. This may be one reason why:

Face in the Potato

An age of signs and wonders, says the Creative Minority Report. Why, people are even seeing the face of Christ ... no, check that ... Obama's face in a potato ...

Return to Paganism

Perhaps this, Return to Paganism, by Mark Shea, explains this. Shea certainly describes what Aramis often refers to, it seems to me.

The Cross of Christ - Measure of the World

JOHN HENRY CARDINAL NEWMAN

"And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me." John xii. 32.

A great number of men live and die without reflecting at all upon the state of things in which they find themselves. They take things as they come, and follow their inclinations as far as they have the opportunity. They are guided mainly by pleasure and pain, not by reason, principle, or conscience; and they do not attempt to interpret this world, to determine what it means, or to reduce what they see and feel to system. But when persons, either from thoughtfulness of mind, or from intellectual activity, begin to contemplate the visible state of things into which they are born, then forthwith they find it a maze and a perplexity. It is a riddle which they cannot solve. It seems full of contradictions and without a drift. Why it is, and what it is to issue in, and how it is what it is, and how we come to be introduced into it, and what is our destiny, are all mysteries. Read all …

Quotes of the Day

"Since, as a result of Christ's victory, the anti-Christian powers have become really alert and ready for combat, his victory ushers in the most decidedly dramatic period of world history." - Hans Urs von Balthasar

"May God grant my continued understanding of one thing: attachment to the Church’s tradition, far from being a stumbling block, is the principle of all effective audacity." - Henri de Lubac

"Contrary to what our nihilists and relativists tell us, there is a human nature, and its resiliency is such that it often manages to adjust to the weirdest cultural insanities." - René Girard

"The chief purpose of life, for any one of us, is to increase according to our capacity our knowledge of God by all the means we have, and to be moved by it to praise and thanks." - J.R.R. Tolkien

h/t: Gil Bailie @ Cornerstone Forum

Feast of The Chair of Peter

For many a most difficult discipline in the spiritual walk is the surrendering of our time-table which we never realize, but which inevitably leads us back to our fallen default position of the return to the eternal return and violence. Only the Abrahamic journey as described and witnessed through the Judeo-Christian experience is grounded in History, leading us out of this propensity to return to the sacrificial violent center toward the self-donating Trinitarian love of God - the Heart of Life.

In this History we have been blessed with a rock of stability, The Chair of Peter - a home, a guidepost for which the trajectory of History can be measured in and through faith, hope and love. It is only in the surrendering of our will of "self" and power, choosing instead, to Take Up our Cross, and living as a member of The Church that we can gain our life - a Life in Christ.

Today's Meditation of the Day from the Magnificat by way of Doctors of the Catholic Church speaks well of this blessing - The Grace of the Chair of Saint Peter.

Turn, then, once more to the Catholic Church and see how in the Life which she offers, as in none other, there is presented to us a means of fulfilling our end. For it is she alone who even demands in the spiritual sphere a complete and entire abnegation of self.

From every other Christian body comes the cry, Save your soul, assert your individuality, follow your conscience, form your opinions; while she, and she alone, demands from her children the sacrifice by hers, and the obedience of their will to her lightest command. For she, and she alone, is conscious of possessing that divinity, in complete submission to which lies the salvation of humanity. For she, as the coherent and organic mystical Body of Christ, calls upon those who look to her to become, not merely her children, but her very members; not to obey her as soldiers obey a leader or citizens a government, but as the hands and eyes and feet obey a brain.

Once, therefore, I understand this, I understand too how it is that by being lost in her I save myself; that I lose only that which hinders my activity, not that which fosters it. For when is my hand not itself? When separated from the body, by paralysis or amputation? Or when, in vital union with the brain, with every fiber alert and every nerve alive, it obeys in every gesture and receives in every sensations a life infinitely vaster and higher than any which it might, temporarily, enjoy in independence?

It is true that its capacity for pain is the greater when it is so united, and that I would cease to suffer if once its separation were accomplished; yet simultaneously, I would lose all that for which God made it and, saving itself, would be lost indeed…In losing my individualism I have won my individuality, for I have found my true place at last. I have lost the whole world? Yes, so far as that world is separate from or antagonistic to God’s will; but I have gained my own soul and attained immortality. For it is not I that live, but Christ that lives in me.

- Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson (+ 1914) was a British convert to Catholicism who is best known for his novels about the faith.

You Remind Me of Me

Benedict Carey writes of social and psychological implications of imitation in You Remind Me of Me. Girardians will probably note that the article tends toward the self-congratulatory in terms of self-awareness of mimesis.

... To the Ridiculous

Does this mean we STILL have to cut the grass in Heaven?

Father Barron comments on "Apocalypto"

Listen how Father Barron uses the work of Rene Girard in this review.

Tell Me About It

"It’s not as easy as it used to be."

Falling in Love - 2 Lent

Fr Cantalamessa on the significance of the Transfiguration:

... things change for us too, as they changed for the three disciples on Tabor; something needs to happen in our lives similar to what happens when a young man and woman fall in love. In falling in love with someone, the beloved, who before was one of many, or perhaps unknown, suddenly becomes the only one, the sole person in the world who interests us. Everything else is left behind and becomes a kind of neutral background. One is not able to think of anything else. A very real transfiguration takes place. The person loved comes to be seen as a luminous aura. Everything about her is beautiful, even the defects. One feels unworthy of her. True love generates humility.

Something concrete also changes in one's own habits. I have known young people whose parents could not get them out of bed in the morning to go to school; or they neglected their studies and did no graduate. Then, once they fall in love with someone and enter a serious relationship, they jump out of bed in the morning, they are impatient to finish school, if they have a job, they hold onto it. What has happened? Nothing, it is just that what they were forced to do before they now do because of an attraction. And attraction allows one to do things that force cannot make one do; it puts wings on one's feet. "Everyone," the poet Ovid said, "is attracted by the object of his pleasure."

Something of the kind must happen once in our lives for us to be true, convinced Christians, and overjoyed to be so. Some say, "But the young man or young woman is seen and touched!"

I answer: We see and touch Jesus too, but with different eyes and different hands -- those of the heart, of faith. He is risen and is alive. He is a concrete being, not an abstraction, for those who experience and know him. Read all …

Father Barron on 'The Matrix'

If Planned Parenthood Hates You ...

You can’t be all bad!

Down Weeth Valentines Day!

Jihadists rage against Cupid. I don't suppose it is because it rhymes with 'stupid'?

Prayer and the Narrow Gate

h/t Doctors of the Catholic Church and the Magnificat

Meditation of the Day

Prayer and the Narrow Gate

When man encounters God in faith, he meets him with his entire existence, with everything that makes up his life. He cannot open himself to God, he cannot yield a space where God can work within him, without also trying to interest and involve God in what concerns him and what constitutes his life. There is a reciprocal invitation: Man invites God into his life, and God invites him to join in his world and to seek, as a believer, the cooperation of God.

If man’s faith is weak he will see in God primarily a support and will go to him with his little personal troubles. He will perhaps find it difficult to give way to God in everything and to trust that God understands things better than he. The more he believes, though, and the more firmly he is anchored in confidence and love, the more impersonal his petition becomes, not because he has lost interest in his own life but because he has to live it out in the service of God, and hence all his needs are dependent on God’s will.

In some way or other, all his petitions will be concerned with the will of God. He will use all his power of prayer to beseech God to carry out his divine will, to have mercy on the world and the church so they will be conformed to his will more and more and serve his purposes. His petition will become more and more a means of returning to God all things that have ever been his or that ought to belong to him. It will be like an attempt to involve God afresh in his creation, his church, his people, his faithful. But in this asking he will not forget thanks and worship. He will recall that he is only showing God one side of the relationship, and that world, church, and mankind must not cause him to forget the sublimity of God, his goodness to all beings, and his desire, and his desire to be worshiped by them.

- Adrienne von Speyr (+ 1967) was a Swiss medical doctor, mystical writer, and stigmatist.

Give yourself a treat on this Valentine's Day and read up on Adrienne von Speyr by clicking on her name.

Demographic Winter: the decline of the human family

h/t to fellow Mass'keteer Athos at Chronicles of Atlantis.


From the mission of Demographic Winter:

Of all of the causes we have in the world today, many of which particularly capture the time and space of the media and academia, it is singularly peculiar that the disintegration of an institution as important as the human family should want for attention. Perhaps it is because the family is made up of individual people, and we have become a society obsessed with a focus on the self...

From CNA (Catholic News Agency) is the following article.

Washington DC, Feb 13, 2008 / 01:25 am (CNA).- Filmmakers announced at a National Press Club press conference on Tuesday a “groundbreaking” documentary that addresses the problems of population decline and predicts a coming “demographic winter” that will result from weakened families.

The documentary, titled "Demographic Winter: the decline of the human family,” was written and directed by Rick Stout to examine developed countries that are below population replacement rates. The film brings together demographers, economists, sociologists, and civic and religious leaders to explore problems present generations will soon face due to shrinking and aging populations.

According to a press release for the film, the global birthrate has declined by 50 percent over the past half-century. Fifty nine nations, containing 44 percent of the world’s population, have birthrates below the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman.

The filmmakers report that the European birthrate is 1.3 children per woman. This dearth of children is expected to cause Europe to have a shortfall of 20 million workers by 2030, while Russia could lose one-third of its population by 2050. The chilling effect this decline is projected to have on economics and culture has led some to dub the phenomenon a “demographic winter,” a phrase from which the documentary takes its title.

Speakers at the press conference included Dr. Allan Carlson, the International Secretary of the World Council of Families; Maria Sophia Aguirre, a professor of economics at Catholic University; Patrick Fagan, a Senior Fellow at the Family Research Council; and Phillip Longman, author of “The Empty Cradle: How Falling Birthrates Threaten World Prosperity And What To Do About It.”

To see a trailer and information regarding this project link on to Demographic Winter.

Here is a little more on the creators of this documentary:
Family First Foundation
The Howard Center
World Congress of Families

Europe In the House of War

Spengler speaks truth not myth in this important piece, Europe in the House of War: [h/t: Brussels Journal]

By proposing to concede a permanent role to extralegal violence in the political life of England, the Archbishop of Canterbury pushed his phlegmatic countrymen over the edge. No one is better than the British at pretending that problems really aren't there, but once their spiritual leader admits to an alien source of coercion and proposes to legitimize it, they understand that a limit has been reached.

Williams' exercise in what might be termed the Higher Hypocrisy shows how deeply Europe has descended into the Dar al-Harb, or the "House of War" in the Muslim terms for all that lies outside the "house of submission", or Dar al-Islam. Europe's governments refuse to rule, that is, refuse to enforce their own laws because they fear violence on the part of Muslim immigrant communities who refuse to accept these laws. "No-go" zones proliferate that non-Muslims dare not enter. In the United Kingdom, according to evidence presented by respected journalists and public-interest organizations, Muslim community organizations, Muslim police officers and medical personnel collaborate to stop women from escaping domestic violence. Read all …

Tolkien (1968) and Tolkien (2007)

Angel Likenesses

So, who DID decide that angels were supposed to look like chubby dumplings when Scripture has them constantly reassuring people to "Be not afraid?" Check it out. [h/t: Mark Shea]

Bless Your Family

I like it - Sacramentals are a growing edge for me:

The Meatrix

Take the red pill and watch the critically-acclaimed, award-winning first episode of The Meatrix Trilogy. See our heroes Moopheus, Leo, and Chickity return in The Meatrix II: Revolting to expose the dark side of the dairy industry. See more at http://www.themeatrix.com/

Cursillo founder dies at 90

EDUARDO BONNIN, founder of the Cursillos of Christianity, died February 6, 2008, in Mallorca.

The National Cursillo Center will post more details on their website when they get it.

Read more here.

Girard Citation - Sandall on Scruton

Roger Sandall has quite a nice piece on Roger Scruton's criticism of atheist authors, Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens and their polemic against ALL religion including the Christian faith, Religion and Violence. References to Girard are sprinkled throughout, and we must forgive his "Jean Girard’s theory of scapegoating" at one point.

In one year 66 babies survived abortions in UK … and were left to die

In Sparta, eugenics was practised, not scientifically but selectively and judged by the infant's ability to live. If the child was deemed incapable of living, it was usually thrown from the Taygetus mountain. It was more common for girls than boys to be killed this way. Adolf Hitler considered Sparta to be the first "Völkisch State," and much like Ernst Haeckel before him, praised Sparta due to its primitive form of eugenics practice of selective infanticide policy which was applied on deformed children. - Eugenics of Ancient Sparta [Wikipedia]

Virtues - Entrée to the Palace

During this holy season of Lent, I want to explore the Virtues, both cardinal and theological in several interspersed posts. The first comes from a little book that Porthos, my fellow Mass'keteer brother, and I both have found useful on our spiritual journeys. It is entitled My Way of Life - Pocket Edition of St. Thomas, the Summa Simplified for Everyone (Confraternity of the Precious Blood):

The world of God as He is in Himself is not a world naturally open or accessible to man. But the infused virtues of faith, hope, and charity open up this world to God to man. It is as if a poor man were admitted to the palace of his king. He can roam the corridors almost at will, inspect almost all the rooms. And if he stays long enough and learns to behave as one should in the palace of the king, one day he will be admitted into the very presence of the king himself.

Faith, hope, and charity set man free in God's palace. By living a life of faith, in hope and charity he is preparing himself to be admitted into God's presence. If he dies with these virtues he will be admitted into God's presence. He will have achieved the purpose of his existence -- the attainment of the vision of God. [239]

A blessed and peaceful Lent to you.

Financial Advice - Buy a Farm

A billionaire and influential financial adviser gives some good Distributist advice: Barton Biggs has some offbeat advice for the rich: Insure yourself against war and disaster by buying a remote farm or ranch and stocking it with ``seed, fertilizer, canned food, wine, medicine, clothes, etc.''

Would that we could all do what The Yeoman Farmer has going up in Michigan, eh?

Convert England to Catholicism, Says Papal Ally

Father John Zuhlsdorf of What Does The Prayer Really Say posts on Father Aiden Nichols' new book, The Realm: An Unfashionable Essay on the Conversion of England. It is so new, in fact, that it does not yet appear in the United States on Amazon or Barnes and Noble (though a pre-order from the UK Amazon is offered).

Father Z quotes extensively from this article in The Catholic Herald, which is quite lauding of Fr Nichols. I am too; his Shape of Catholic Theology (1991) was the text for my first serious graduate level course in the Catholic realm. I'm ashamed I have not yet cracked Nichols' Christendom Awake! (1999) that I bought some time ago. Have a go with this excerpt from the Herald:

Fr Aidan Nichols, the English theologian most closely associated with the thinking of Benedict XVI, has appealed for England to be “re-made” as a Catholic country.

He set out his radical and comprehensive programme for Catholic renewal in a new book entitled The Realm: An Unfashionable Essay on the Conversion of England, published by Family Publications.

In his preface he says that Catholic Christianity should be put forward “not as an occupation for individuals in their solitude but as a form for the public life of society in its overall integrity”.

He admits that the conversion of England is “an absolutely colossal agenda”, adding: “It can only be brought into being, so far as it depends on us to do so, by a coordinated strategy for recreating a full-blooded catholicity with the power to... transform a culture in all its principal dimensions.

“That is what ‘the mission to convert’ and ‘the conversion of England’ mean to me.”
His comments will be seen as an implicit criticism of the direction of the Church in England and Wales. He points to “flagship” Catholic institutions which have “suffered shipwreck through secularisation”.

Midwest COV&R meeting - March 8 & April 11

Aramis here passing this notice on from Suzanne Ross concerning upcoming events in the Midwest COV&R region.

Dear Friends,
As you know, The Raven Foundation was formed as a vehicle for carrying out the mission of Midwest COV&R to bring mimetic theory to the general public. The Foundation invites you to two upcoming events at the Raven Foundation offices, 2624 Patriot Blvd., Glenview, IL 60026:


Saturday, March 8
10:30am to 1:00pm: Midwest COV&R meeting with lunch
1:30pm to 3:30pm: A New Look at Envy in Othello with Dr. Ebrahimian
Please join us at 10:30am to see the new Raven Foundation offices, review the website and brain storm ways to carry out our mission statement. Lunch will be provided by the Foundation. At 1:30 we will be joined by a wider audience to hear Dr. Babak Ebrahimian of Queens College, NY. Dr. Ebrahimian, studied with Rene Girard at Stanford and will present a Girardian reading of Shakespeare’s tragedy. Othello is currently playing at Navy Pier and Dr. Ebrahimian will be using clips from Orson Welles’ 1952 movie version in his presentation.


We will soon be sending you a pdf flyer for the Othello lecture.


Friday evening, April 11, 7:30pm to 9:00pm
Saturday, April 12 (9:00am to 2:30pm)
Religion and Violence: Untangling the Roots of Envy
We will be presenting keynote addresses from Trinity Church’s January 2008 conference on violence and religion held in New York City. The speakers we will hear from are Tariq Ramadan, Susannah Heschel, and James Carroll. Both Heschel and Carroll refer to Girard in their talks, and Andrew McKenna and Sandy Goodhart will present responses. We hope you’ll join this conversation. More detailed information will follow.


[If anyone reading this blog wishes to attend please leave your name and email address in a comment to this post and I will forward you Suzanne's contact information. She will need to know who plans on attending so that they can order lunch. Or if you would like more information about the Midwest COV&R group and/or The Raven Foundation leave your name and email address in a comment to this post and I will make sure to pass the information on. The website does have a contact link as well.]

Dorothy Sayers & Raymund Schwager?

Reading the Meditation of the Day in the Magnificat this morning I was struck by how Dorothy Sayers captured the major essence of Raymund Schwager's book that I have been promoting here for all to read, Banished from Eden - Original Sin and Evolutionary Theory in the Drama of Salvation.

I the image of the Unimaginable
In the place where the Image and the Unimagined
are one,
The Act of the Will, the Word of the Thought,
the Son
In whom the Father's selfhood is known to Himself,
Speak to Man in the place of the Images.
You that We made for Ourself in Our own image,
Free like Us to experience good by choice,
Not of necessity, laying your will in Ours
For love's sake creaturely, to enjoy your peace,
What did you do? What did you do for Us
By what you did for yourselves in the moment
of choice?
O Eve My daughter, and O My dear son Adam,
Try to understand that when you chose your will
Rather than Mine, and when you chose
to know evil
In your way and not in Mine, you chose for Me.
It is My will you should know Me as I am -
But how? for you chose to know your good as evil,
Therefore the face of God is evil to you,
And you know My love as terror, My mercy
as judgment,
My innocence as a sword; My naked life
Would slay you. How can you ever know Me then?
Yet know you must, since you were made for that;
Thus either way you perish. Nay, but the hands
That made you, hold you still; and since you
would not
Submit to God, God shall submit to you,
Not of necessity, but free to choose
For your love's sake what you refused to Mine.
God shall endure, and what man chose to know
God shall know too - the experience of evil
In the flesh of man; and certainly He shall feel
Terror and judgment and the point of the sword;
And God shall see God's face set like a flint
Against Him; and man shall see the Image of God
In the image of man; and man shall show
no mercy.
Truly I will bear your sin and carry your sorrow,
And, if you will, bring you to the tree of life,
Where you may eat, and know your evil as good,
Redeeming that first knowledge. But all this
Still at your choice, and only as you choose,
Save as you choose to let Me choose in you.

Who then will choose to be the chosen of God,
And will to bear Me that I may bear you?

Dorothy L. Sayers (+ 1957) was a renowned British dramatist, novelist, poet, and Christian essayist.

As daughters and sons of those very first humans, "O Eve My daughter, and O My dear son Adam," we continue, in this generation, to feel the weight of "what you did for yourselves in the moment of choice?" Read Banished from Eden to grasp the mimetic weight of choice.

Making of a Saint - Archbishop Fulton Sheen

Mass ends diocesan stage of Sheen's path to sainthood

PEORIA -- Father Andrew Apostoli wryly mentioned an old saying in his homily Sunday that if your are going to be canonized you should not write too much. He was speaking during a Mass of thanksgiving for Archbishop Fulton Sheen, a native of El Paso who became famous as a television and radio personality and writer...

In his homily, Apostoli told of Fulton’s sense of humor, as expressed in his acceptance speech after winning the Emmy for outstanding television personality in 1952. Sheen thanked his script writers: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Apostoli also praised Sheen for having spoken against contraception, abortion and euthanasia. He said that Sheen is “still very much the voice of the church.”

Read more here and here and here

Fulton Sheen obviously still plays in Peoria, now the question is will he play in Rome?

Please visit the official website for the Canonization Cause of the Servant of God

Christian Hope - There is nothing like it

h/t Magnificat and Doctors of the Catholic Church

Hope and the Beatitudes

The Christian is entrusted with something valuable: Christian hope. This hope is to be clearly distinguished from purely human hope, since it cannot be described in terms of uncertainty or calculations of probability, but like faith participates in the unconditionally and universality of love (“love believes all things and hopes all things” [1 Cor 13:7] and therefore leaps over its own shadow (“hoping against all hope’ [Rom 4: 18].

As a spiritual and not merely instinctive act of the human being, it remains a paradox that reason cannot resolve and becomes understandable only when we take it seriously as a modality of love, at least as the beginnings of a love modeled on God (a “supernatural” love). Doing so, we come to see it as the only attitude that can be justified and therefore the only attitude that can be permitted for the one living by the sign of the Son of Man, which well “appear in the clouds” (Mt 24: 30; rev 1:7) and will be God‘s final “Word” to the world, after heaven and earth have passed away (Mt 24: 35)…

And thus whoever simply refuse to shut his eyes to the abyss of hatred, despair, and depravity that can be seen in the life of men on earth, and thus who refuses to close himself off from reality, will find it difficult to contrive his own escape from this damnation through a purely individualistic conception of salvation, and to abandon everyone else to the grinding wheels of hell. Just as God so loved the world that he completely handed over his son for its sake, so too the one whom God has loved will want to save himself only in conjunction with those who have been created with him, and he will not reject the share of penitential suffering that has been given him for the sake of the whole. He will do in Christ hope, the hope for the salvation of all men, which is permitted to Christians alone.

Father Hans Urs von Balthazar (+ 1988) was an eminent Swiss Catholic theologian who wrote prodigiously.

Why Kids. Can't. Focus.

A librarian bemoans the avalanche of information that students -- and other readers -- must try to master today.

"How long is it?" has replaced "Will I like it?" The students' finicky inclinations, as well as my own recent hasty approach to reading, bothered me enough to try to trace the root cause. I suspect that the tipping point in information overload has tipped. Students' aversion to reading does not necessarily signal a weakness, much less a dislike of reading. For them, and now maybe for me, moving on to something else is an adaptive tactic for negotiating the jungle that is our information-besotted culture of verbiage.

These kids manage to survive by bushwhacking through the muddle -- while seamlessly dealing with an e-mail, a Word document or a 50-page PDF from the scholarly database JSTOR. It's taken them just a few years to arrive at the same conclusion that I've reached after a lifetime of sustained reading: The pursuit of knowledge in the age of information overload is less about a process of acquisition than about proficiency in tossing stuff out. By necessity, we spend more time quickly scanning manuals, king-size novels, the blogosphere and poems in the New Yorker than we do scrutinizing their contents for deeper meaning.

This is the price we pay for the changed demands in reading. Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Stacy Schiff defines this new reading terrain as "the paradox of our age." We've grown into a culture of searchers, not readers. "Surely, we have never read, or written, so many words a day," Schiff writes. "Yet increasingly we deal in atomized bits of information, the hors d'oeuvres of education."

Read all … yeah, right.

News of Other Bloggers

Daniel Mitsui at The Lion and the Cardinal has big news: she said yes. Congrats!

Meanwhile, our gal around town and author of Thrill of the Chaste, Dawn Eden, continues to recover from a thyroidectomy. Dawn gives us her brave brush with the big C in Gland All Over.

2012 - Again

The good news -- Tibetan monks see extraterrestrials saving us from ourselves in 2012. The bad news -- it happens after a polarized nuclear OK Corral starting in 2010. Get out your aluminum foil hats, quick.