Fr Barron on Hitchens [HT: CMR]

Grandma, What Big Teeth You Have!

Double speak, Greg at Jihad Watch says, is most confusing. Let's see if I can keep my eye on the ball: those who fought and defeated Nazis are now the ones acting like Nazis for speaking about those who made the bombs to blow up the Tube, July '05 like Nazis? Hmmm. It sounds like someone doesn't want Nazi like actions to be labeled as such for some reason. I wonder why – maybe because playing the victim card is helpful? The wolf in sheep skin in grandma’s bed again.

Ultimate Frisbee -- Nunsense

The next time someone says all nuns are 105 years old, show them this: [HT: Creative Minority Report]

A Modest Proposal

A PhD grad student, Shamim Hunt, offers a ”modest proposal” regarding women and Muslim attire. A fatwa will, no doubt, be shortly forthcoming. [Via MercatorNet]

The Catholic Novel

Evelyn Waugh - 1941

Marion Crowe pens a good piece at First Things, "The Catholic Novel is Alive and Well in England."

Some people believe that the Catholic novel is either dead or terminally ill. In 1982, one critic referred to his book on the Catholic novel as an “elegy for an apparently dying form,” and two years later another wrote that “the religious or spiritual novel is in some sense only a memory.” Some attribute this demise to the imminent dissolution of the religion that inspired it, arguing that the dissent and chaos that have come in the wake of the Second Vatican Council are simply the death throes of a religion that is not sustainable in an age that is increasingly secular, liberal, scientific, and pluralistic. Some Catholics believe that the great Catholic novels of the past reflect the fortress mentality of the pre–Vatican II Catholic ghetto and have no place in today’s Church. Continue reading . . .

A Cross the Crowded Ways of Life

I know it's all over the place, but the Michael Yon’s image is really nice for a change.

Bosom Buddies - Pass the Soap, Please

But will they pass the sincerity test?
("I really, really feel like a transgender, dude. Just let me in, okay?")

I KNOW A WHOLE lot of teenaged not-identified-as-male boys who are going to be vvery happy about this here piece of legislation. "Hey, mom! Can we move to Montgomery? Fast?"

Ora + et + Labora

Do not depend on the hope of results.
When you are doing the sort of work
you have taken on, you may have
to face the fact that your work will be
apparently worthless and even achieve no
worth at all, if not perhaps results opposite
to what you expect.

As you get used to this idea, you will
start more and more to concentrate not on
the results, but on the value, the rightness,
the truth of the work itself.
-- Thomas Merton
[HT: The Catholic Worker]

Carpe Diem - Robert Hugh Benson

Glancing as I do down the list of blogs that the 4 Mass'keteers lists, I noticed at Daniel Mitsui's superb THE LION & THE CARDINAL something really exceptional. He offers a series of tapestries made by hand by Robert Hugh Benson, “The Dance of Death” tapestries. Why should this be so outstanding? For two reasons, really: first, Robert Hugh Benson was a British convert to Catholicism in the early twentieth century who, like Arnold Lunn, Ronald Knox, G. K. Chesterton, and others led the way to opening the sluice gate for Catholicism in England. Possessing a fine and agile mind, Benson became Monsignor Benson and the author of many works, fiction as well as nonfiction in defense of the faith.

Secondly, these tapestries show an aptitude for whimsical skill in arts and crafts that was hitherto unknown to me about the great man. I can't wait for the next revelation about my favorite group of people, it seems more and more apparent, British Catholic converts. I may find that John Henry Cardinal Newman was really a Pre-Raphaelite next. Who knows?

Some Advice for Moderate Muslims

Mark Shea gives a measured and thoughtful missive here.

British Anti-Semitism Grows

Not that there's any lack of other depressing developments to brighten your day.

via Instapundit

"Hey, Mmm! ... Confess Here Often?"

Orthodox Catholic Pickup Lines, by Patrick Madrid [HT: Holy Whapping]

Dawn Eden on Chastity & Freedom

It's Not "Just Don't Do It"

Pro-life Hollywood?

"This baby stuck its head out and kind of looked as us, and the thought that the baby is no longer with us is very difficult," Hayden Panettiere, who stars in the NBC show "Heroes"

Sadly, the TV star is talking only about a dolphin, not a human being.

Tis a very strange land we must pass through on our way back to our Home.

Bernard of Clairvaux & Rene Girard

A friend recently sent me this paper out of the Cistercian Studies Quarterly (1991-2007).
Bernard of Clairvaux and René Girard on Desire and Envy by Jonah Wharff, ocso

A feeling of incompleteness is part of the human condition. It is by comparison with others that we become aware of this feeling. We compare ourselves on the basis of comfort or feelings of well-being.We compare our insides to others’ outsides and discover a difference that is experienced as an insufficiency. The exterior of the other appears more substantial than the internal fragility of the self. Awareness of this difference leads to a sense of insecurity that is difficult to articulate. Our consumer culture capitalizes on this unease by offering us products, activities, and celebrities to distract us from anxiety over our inadequacies. Yet we continue to feel (and resent) this lack. This longing for completion is called desire.

Alternative Narnia

While I have for years, personally been trying to prepare/warn parents about Philip Pullman and his agenda to rob the joy from their kids, it seems only now that the movie is almost out that anyone is willing to do anything. Golden Compass comes out on the anniversary of a day that will go down in infamy (I can't help but think Mr. Pullman is having a bit of an evil laugh on that one), and folks are finally starting to ask what they can do.

Well, instead of bashing Mr. Pullman (although his anti-Christian slant would have you believe his head has already suffered a bit of a bashing), my recommendation is to promote a Narnia, or Christian children's weekend (MacDonald, Lewis, Ryle, L'engle, . . .even Veggie Tales) at your parish or school. Whining about Golden Compass will only make more of the foolish wish to see it, and than help to assure a sequel; so let's in turn just promote all the amazing material (instead of "His Dark Material") that Christians have been writing for years.

Show the Narnia film/BBC, or have a George MacDonald storyteller night; maybe create a little Narnia in your parish with your own Aslan.

Let's be proactive about this, and save the whine and cheese for DaVinci Code II (o:

How to Handle A Woman ... Not

There's a way, said the wise old man ..." sang Robert Goulet in Camelot, r.i.p. +

And then there's this way, by one Saudi cleric Muhammad Al-’Arifi, who does little or no singing, but explains proper wife beating to young teens. Kinda sounds like Leonard Bernstein programs of old, doesn't it? Well, maybe not.

Christian Halloween Fan

A full service website for all your All Hallow’s Eve needs. [HT: Mark Shea] UPDATE: HellCo's Corporate Propaganda

Pilgrimage Route to Reopen

Now here is something the Four Mass'keteers should one day undertake: an 100-day pilgrimage on foot from Canterbury to Rome: the Via Francigena, which dates back to the 10th century, stretches from England across France and the Alps into Italy. What ho and anon, gentlemen. What sayest thou?

Care Enough to Smoke?

Dang! I suspected I was being hasty with that non-smoking thing . . .


(via Instapundit)