DaveTown

Again, Edward Feser succinctly explains what Easter is all about.

Excerpt:

The Man Who said “I am the Way and the Truth and the Life; no one comes to the Father except through Me” was either raised from the dead or He was not. If He was, then His startling claims received thereby a divine seal of approval, and the only rational response of the non-Christian can be to request baptism. If He was not so raised, then His words reveal Him to have been a megalomaniacal lunatic. An interesting lunatic, maybe; a lunatic whose historical, cultural, religious, and moral impact has vastly – one might say miraculously – outweighed that of any sane man.

Edward Feser, one of the brilliant minds of our generation (though he would be loathe, I think, to be referred to that way), answers definitively the question: “So, what is ‘Good Friday’ all about, anyway?”

I was going to insert a small quote from the piece here, but you just need to go read the whole thing.

Good Friday goodness from the late Fr. Neuhaus:

In the cross we see that of which humanity is capable: self-transcendence in surrender to the Other. All the evidence to the contrary, we are capable of love. The sign of shame and death becomes the sign of cosmic possibility. Here is the axis mundi, the moment upon which all reality turns.

Go read this fine essay by Frederica Mathewes-Green on the religiosity of science and they scientificness of religion.

(I know scientificness probably won’t be found in Websters, but I’m wordsmith here, I can create if I want.)

I’ve never heard of Tom Piatak before about 10 minutes ago, but man did he ever just lay the wood to über-atheist Christopher Hitchens. He even did it without being hateful and snarky (which in the age of the internet will probably be seen as a failing. Could even get him banned).

Anyway, tolle lege, y’all: Taki’s Top Drawer: Hitchens’ Hubris

Every once in a while, you read something that gives flesh and blood to an idea that’s been rolling around in your subconscious for quite some time.

This blog post, for example.

Finding a jewel like this is doubly fortunate, as it solidifies the concept in one’s thinking, and saves one the trouble of having to write it.

Here’s a snippet, if you’re still too hung over to click a link:

CARNIVAL, CULTURE AND CATHOLICISM

“Yet there can be seasonal misrule only within a prevailing architecture of order, just as the debates and disputations of the late medieval period are possible only within the context of an assured and absolute truth which governs humankind.” – Peter Ackroyd’s The Life of Thomas More

[T]here are certain strains of Catholicism that seem inclined towards . . . a Jansenist or rationalist conception of the Faith. It appears to me that these unhealthy tendencies among American Catholics started with too great an influence of Protestant attitudes, but have been exasperated by the current culture wars . . .

. . . There is much talk here and elsewhere about the importance of engaging the culture . . . [however] if there is no oasis from the culture wars, aren’t we condemned to a shallow faith that can never satisfy a full and healthy life? If we have no place for carnival, can we really call what we have a Catholic culture?

A Man For All Seasons

There aren’t really many “must see” movies. We all have our favorites, of course, and we’ve all said “oh, you have to see this movie”. But really, no, you don’t have to, in most cases. You could, and you’d be glad you did more often than not. But there just aren’t really many movies you must see.

This one, you must.

I mean, what could be more relevant to our day than a movie about a man who values his beliefs and conscience more than his very life? Add the fact that it’s beautifully filmed piece of cinema, and brilliantly acted, and you have yourself a classic.

Sir Thomas More (St. Thomas More, for the Catlicks among us) was the Lord Chancellor of England back in the days of Henry VIII (you know, the crazy one that killed all those wives). Being the Lord Chancellor of England in those days was roughly analogous to being Karl Rove, Alberto Gonzales, and John Roberts all wrapped up into one. Our saint had the ear and the trust of King Henry, and he was smarter. But he also had the courage of his convictions, and this was his downfall.

Long story short, Henry wanted to divorce his wife Catherine and marry another woman. He had to have the Church’s permission, and couldn’t get the Pope to grant him the annulment needed to make his move. So Henry decided that he would be the head of the Church, and told the Pope, essentially, to go to hell.

Now, I know all my good Protestant readers are thinking at this point “Hey, good for him!” First of all, shame on you. Second of all, hold your horses, it gets worse.

Henry then proceeded to pass a law saying that anyone who wouldn’t swear an oath agreeing with the idea of his supremacy over the Church would be guilty of treason.

St. Thomas wouldn’t sign. He wouldn’t speak out against the King, out of loyalty and patriotism, but neither would he put his name to an oath that he didn’t believe in it. Henry had him thrown in the Tower of London for a year, made him endure a show trial, then executed him despite the fact Thomas was more loyal to him than any thousand that signed the Oath of Supremacy.

It’s a great movie. Paul Scofield is absolutely brilliant as Sir Thomas. The late Robert Shaw perfectly balances the combination of political acumen and utter madness of Henry. A very young-looking John Hurt is great as the weasly Richard Rich. The trial scene is priceless, as is the farewell scene between Sir Thomas and his family in the Tower. There’s also a great speech about the primacy of law in a civilized society that should be memorized by schoolchildren along with the preamble to the Constitution and the Gettysburg Address:

William Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!

Sir Thomas More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?

William Roper: Yes, I’d cut down every law in England to do that!

Sir Thomas More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!

Could we even have a man like St. Thomas in our society? If we did, isn’t it likely he’d suffer the same fate?

I don’t mean he’d get his head chopped off – he’d be more likely to suffer a 21st century style martyrdom. The kind where the popular media flays one alive and leaves one to twist slowly in the wind of public opinion.

More to the point, if we had a St. Thomas in our midst, what are the chances he’d even want to be involved in politics? In Thomas’s day, it was honorable to serve the king, even if the King was a stark raving looney. Not that there weren’t power-hungry opportunists back then, of course (Cardinal Wolsey and Thomas Cromwell, for instance, in the context of AMFAS). These days, I don’t know if the word “honor” has been applied to anyone in the executive branch in a couple of generations. I can’t think of anyone in my day, right off the bat. Can you?

I think it was Arthur C. Clarke who said having the desire to be President automatically disqualifies one for the job. It’s a shame too, because if there’s anything we need today, it’s a whole passel of Thomas Mores to help us out of the mess we’ve voted ourselves into.

Posts like this one, from Dawn Eden, justify the existence of the internet.

It isn’t very often that I dive into the treacherous waters of biblical exposition (The Good Lord knows there are enough idiots out there butchering the scriptures), but something caught my eye today, and so, because, as you know, I’m all about the helpful, I share.

So, the Apostle Paul (like me, a late convert to the church, though that’s about where the similarity ends), is writing to the good folks in Ephesus, and he tells them two things in this passage:

Let us then, be children no longer, tossed here and there, carried about by every wind of doctrine that originates in human trickery and skill in proposing error.

Rather, let us profess the truth in love, and grow to the full maturity of Christ the head.

So many professing Christians love the first part of that verse, yet entirely forget the second part. It isn’t enough to be doctrinally correct, unless you are, at the same time, not just telling the truth, but telling the truth in love.

That’s where we all fall short, most of the time, whenever we discuss the truth of Christianity. If you’re not sure what “telling the truth in love” means, there’s a pretty stout definition of love in the 13th chapter of Paul’s first letter to the Church at Corinth. You can go read it, or, you can just go to a wedding at any random Church this weekend, because it will invariably be read aloud sometime during the ceremony (If you’ve ever seen “Four Weddings and a Funeral”, you know what I mean).

The point I’m making is this: If you don’t have the ability to convey the truth of the Christian faith in a manner that shows love for the other party in the conversation, you are both better served if you just go ahead and shut up.

Now, if someone will please go ahead and pass around the collection plate; I’m done here.

Bob Waldrop is running for mayor of Oklahoma City.

He’s not going to win. I know this because he has all the qualities that disqualify a person from holding public office in this country: common sense, integrity, and an heart for the poor.

Bob is one of the few people I’ve ever met who I am convinced is a saint. By that, I don’t mean he’s sweet and loveable (though he is) or that he loves bunnies and puppies and rainbows and daisies (though he may), or that he has the patience of Job (though I suspect, given his vocation, that he does). I mean he is a walking, talking example of the spirit of St. Francis, St. Augustine, Mother Teresa, and so many other real saints.

So, go read his campaign site, and while you’re at it, go check out justpeace.org as well. It’s a wellspring of good information. And if you have way too much money for your own good, send some of it to the Oscar Romero Catholic Worker House in Oklahoma City, which is where you can find Bob most days of the week, working for the poor and doing what he can to proclaim the good news.

“Is the pain in my own life all waste? Has no strength or even sweetness sprung out of my past sorrows? And when I look back on my sins, may I not sing Te Deum laudamus for all the pride they overthrew, all the humility they fostered, and all the gentleness and sympathy they begot. God has led me through many ways not of my own choosing – now high, now low – now in broad daylight, now in midnight gloom, and now in pelting storm. Yet though I am evil, He is good; and great, yea, omnipotent in goodness, since He has drawn good from the heart of evil, and He will build a home of everlasting life on the ruins of sin.”

– Vincent McNabb, O.P. (1868-1943)

Mark Steyn coins the term “axis of extinction” to describe western countries that are contracepting and aborting themselves out of existence.

Read the whole thing.

. . . to one of the finest priests in all of Romish Popery.

Some form of the “golden rule” appears in the writings of just about every culture that ever bothered to write stuff down. It usually goes something like “do unto others as you’d have them do unto you”, or, “love your neighbor as you love yourself” (for a good comparison of the golden rule as expressed by several different societies and/or religions, see the appendix to C.S. Lewis’s The Abolition of Man)

Like most folks, I try to live out this rule everyday, and, like most folks, I only do so with varying degrees of success and failure. And, to digress for a moment, I really do think that “most” folks try to live by the golden rule. After all, it’s the bad things we do that appear as “news”, not the acts of love and kindness. If it were the opposite, we’d see headlines like “Man Takes Neighbor’s Trash To Curb!” or “Friend Borrows Car For Five Minutes; Fills It With Gas!”

But there are some of us who have less problem loving our neighbors than we do loving ourselves. I’m one of those people. Oh, I love myself well enough to feed myself everyday, and all that. I don’t hate myself enough to physically punish myself (if you’ve seen me lately you know I haven’t missed many meals), but on the other hand, when it comes to issues of love, forgiveness, and giving the benefit of the doubt, I treat others way better than I do myself.

Why am I willing to cut others so much slack, yet turn around and excoriate myself for the simplest of mistakes? Why am I willing to see the good in others as my default setting, but always think the worst of myself and my motives? Why do I rarely if ever look back on wrongs done to me, while re-living certain of my mistakes and sins on an almost daily basis?

Maybe because I know myself better than I know others, but, maybe, it’s because while I was taught to love others, I never figured out what it means to love one’s self. It has to be more than just making sure I have food, shelter, and clothing. That’s instinctual. A dog can do that (well, except the clothing part; only humans would think to put a sweater on a dog, but you know what I mean).

But surely at some point I’m going to have to learn that all of the things I’m willing to do for others (albeit imperfectly), I should be willing to do for myself now and then. Or, to borrow a line from Matt Groening, someday I’ll stop living by the credo “I won’t stop torturing myself until I discover the source of my pain”.

If I made New Year resolutions, this would be one. But, I don’t, so I’ll just have to grow into it somehow over time, as I grow old(er) and perhaps wise(no er).

This article about libertarian themes in children’s literature is of interest to me as a middle school teacher, and as a person with libertarian leanings. I haven’t read any of Margeret Peterson Haddix’s work, but I know from long experience that Lois Lowry is a wonderful writer.

There is a libertarian undercurrent to the Chronicles of Narnia, as well, though with a monarchichal bent. Near the end of the The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis describes the four Pevensie children, who become the Kings and Queens of Narnia thusly:

“And they made good laws and kept the peace and saved good trees from being unecessarily cut down, and liberated young dwarfs and young satyrs from being sent to school, and generally stopped busybodies and interferers, and encouraged ordinary people who wanted to live and let live.”

We could do worse, these days. And have.

The great man himself, Clive Staples Lewis, was born this day in 1898.

He is about to undergo a bit of a revival, what with the upcoming release of the movie version of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, but to many, his works have never gone out of style. To me, certainly, he has been a warm fire on a many a cold night in the wilderness. I’ve read the Narnia series probably half-a-dozen times in my life, most recently last week. I’ll never get sick of them. They tell a great story, full of courage, honor, love, and redemption. It’s like a Johnny Cash song in prose form. The Great Divorce is one of the best books I’ve ever read, and as soon as I can find my copy, I’m going to read it again (if any of you know where I put it, leave a message). His theological works are accessible and pleasant to read (not many works of theology, by any writer, have ever been described thusly). And, most people aren’t aware, but he wrote a nifty little science fiction trilogy that is worth anyone’s time.

So, in lieu of a cake, I present to you a passage from The Silver Chair (the 6th book in the Narnia series):

“If you’re thirsty, you may drink.”

For a second she stared here and there, wondering who had spoken. Then the voice said again, “If you are thirsty, come and drink, ” and of course she remembered what Scrubb had said about animals talking in that other world, and realized that it was the lion speaking. Anyway, she had seen its lips move this time, and the voice was not like a man’s. It was deeper, wilder, and stronger; a sort of heavy, golden voice. It did not make her any less frightened than she had been before, but it made her frightened in rather a different way.

“Are you not thirsty?” said the Lion.

“I’m dying of thirst,” said Jill.

“Then drink,” said the Lion

“May I — could I — would you mind going away while I do?” said Jill.

The Lion answered this only by a look and a very low growl. And as Jill gazed at its motionless bulk, she realized that she might as well have asked the whole mountain to move aside for her convenience.

The delicious rippling noise of the stream was making her nearly frantic.

“Will you promise not to — do anything to me, if I do come?” said Jill.

“I make no promise,” said the Lion.

Jill was so thirsty now that, without noticing it, she had come a step nearer.

“Do you eat girls?”

“I have swallowed up girls and boys, women and men, kings and emporers, cities and realms,” said the Lion. It didn’t say this as if it were boasting, nor as if it were sorry, nor as if it were angry. It just said it.

“I daren’t come and drink,” said Jill.

“Then you will die of thirst,” said the Lion.

“Oh dear!” said Jill, coming another step nearer. “I suppose I must go and look for another stream then.”

“There is no other stream,” said the Lion.

“Then I fell at his feet and thought, Surely this is the hour of death, for the Lion (who is worthy of all honour) will know that I have served Tash all my days and not him. Nevertheless, it is better to see the Lion and die than . . . to live and not to have seen him. But the Glorious One bent down his golden head and touched my forehead with his tongue and said, ‘Son, thou art welcome.’ But I said, ‘Alas Lord I am no son of thine but the servant of Tash.’ He answered, ‘Child, all the service thou hast done to Tash, I account as service done to me.’ Then by reason of my great desire for wisdom and understanding, I overcame my fear and questioned the Glorious One and said, ‘Lord, is it then true . . . that thou and Tash are one?’ The Lion growled so that the earth shook (but his wrath was not against me) and said, ‘It is false. Not because he and I are one, but because we are opposites — I take to me the services which thou hast done for him. For I and he are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him . . . ‘Dost thou understand, child?’ I said, ‘Lord, thou knowest how much I understand.’ But I also said (for the truth constrained me), ‘Yet I have been seeking Tash all my days.’ ‘Beloved,’ said the Glorious One, ‘unless thy desire had been for me thou wouldst not have sought so long and so truly. For all find what they truly seek.’

(C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle, 1956)

Those also can attain to salvation who through no fault of their own do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church, yet sincerely seek God and moved by grace strive by their deeds to do His will as it is known to them through the dictates of conscience. Nor does Divine Providence deny the helps necessary for salvation to those who, without blame on their part, have not yet arrived at an explicit knowledge of God and with His grace strive to live a good life. Whatever good or truth is found amongst them is looked upon by the Church as a preparation for the Gospel. She knows that it is given by Him who enlightens all men so that they may finally have life.

(Lumen Gentium, 1964}

The more I re-read Thomas Merton, the more he seems like a prophet. To wit:

“Strong hate, the hate that takes joy in hating, is strong because it does not believe itself to be unworthy and alone. It feels the support of a justifying God, of an idol of war, an avenging and destroying spirit. From such blood-drinking gods the human race was once liberated, with great toil and terrible sorrow, by the death of a God Who delivered Himself to the Cross and suffered the pathological cruelty of His own creatures out of pity for them. In conquering death He opened their eyes to the reality of a love which asks no questions about worthiness, a love which overcomes hatred and destroys death. But men have now come to reject this divine revelation of pardon, and they are consequently returning to the old war gods, the gods that insatiably drink blood and eat the flesh of men. It is easier to serve the hate-gods because they thrive on collective fanaticism. To serve the hate-gods, one has only to be blinded by collective passion. To serve the God of Love one must be free, one must face the terrible responsibility of the decision to love in spite of all unworthiness whether in oneself or in one’s neighbor.”

The Seven Deadly Sins, demonstrated by gummi bears.

I am rarely moved to tears by anything. Maybe half a dozen times in my entire life, and, I don’t think, ever, by the printed word.

This article moved me to tears.

Excerpt:

In February, 2004, we attend Cardinal Ratzinger’s weekly Mass, celebrated Thursday morning at 7 a.m. inside the Vatican in the church of the Campo Teutonico, but open to the public.

He has celebrated the Mass for many years for anyone who wishes to come.

After celebrating his Mass, then Cardinal Ratzinger, the Prefect of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, emerged from the sacristy in a simple cassock and was greeted warmly by an excited crowd of people from all over the world, some to get the great theologian’s personal autograph, others to get a picture with the second most powerful prelate in the Church, and yet others to thank this holy German priest for his persevering and faithful service to Christ and the Church.

At first he struck us as somewhat timid.

However, as he approached the excited and sizeable crowd of people, he began to talk to and take interest in each individual person who has come to see him.

He answered questions in various languages, asked some of his own, occasionally cracked a joke or two, while always devoting his entire attention to each individual person in such a soft, pastoral way.

This much was obvious: the real Ratzinger was most at home as a man of the people, as a shepherd keeping watch over his flock.

It was our turn. We introduced ourselves to his eminence, reverenced his ring, engaged in some pleasant talk with him, and then we popped the question: “We have a favor to ask of you, your Eminence”.

He waited patiently.

“Will you celebrate our wedding mass?”

“Well, let’s see what we can do. Why don’t you write a letter to me with some possible times and dates.”

“Well, actually your eminence, we already have one prepared.”

Within a week, Marta received an envelope from the Congregation of the Doctrine of Faith. We open it, stunned: it is a yes!

Several months later and a few days before our wedding date, at the cardinal’s request, his secretary scheduled us to meet the cardinal. He wanted to get to know us a little better.

Being a responsible secretary, he emphasized over and over, “You only have 10 minutes with the cardinal ” that is all. He is a very busy man and I am responsible for keeping his schedule.

The door opened and we entered to be warmly received by the cardinal.

However, we exited his office some 30 minutes later, only at the end realizing that not we but rather he had far exceeded the set limit.