You Gotta Be Great

As the final credits rolled on Brave, I was reminded of a line from The Kid, where the Emily Mortimer character practically shouts (if elegant Emily can be imagined shouting) at the despicable Bruce Willis character, "The worst of it is, you could have been GREAT!"

"For the Glory of Your Name"

I promise, I'm not psychic.  Even if I was born in a caul on Halloween.  I wrote the last post before I went to noon Mass, and as usual I had not idea who the saint of the day was or what the readings were.  It would have been hard for either to be more appropriate.

Sackcloth and Ashes

So we can put the champagne back in the cupboards.  The Individual Mandate is a tax, says Chief Justice John Roberts (though Justice Kennedy apparently disagrees).

I feel a bit like Alice in Wonderland.  That new kind of Wonderland, in the movie version I wouldn't watch if you paid me to, with The Depp in fright makeup.

If Only Occupy Had Had a Sense of Humor ...

... it could have looked like this:

House Hunting ...

... I have been doing.  And I have found the perfect home:

Si Vis Potes

Motet from the gospel according to St. Matthew (8:2-3).

If Only All Priests Wrote Music Like This ...

Your music (and history) for the day:

On "The Theology of Marriage and Celibacy"

It sometimes happens that, in seeking to speak of The Other Vocation with respect, in seeking to honor that which was not our choice and our call, we speak of it with a touch of envy.  Thus, the married person will think of the peace of the cloister, or of the purposefulness of a life spent in ministering to the world at large; of the high spiritual delights presumed to go along with being the bride exclusively of Christ, or of the impossibly great duty of standing alter Christus with the holy Flesh and Blood between one's hands.  The married person will think on these things, and think on them with a sort of unhappiness, as having missed a chance at something truly fine.

"People Will Talk"

This name "Mankiewicz" was familiar.  I didn't know what he had directed, but I did know I had heard of him before—a good sign, that.  The back of the VHS case assured us that we were about to see some kind of chipper romantic comedy.  The reviews around the web proclaimed it to be tiresome, anti-McCarthyite, liberal propaganda.  IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes gave it about a 7/10.

Because It's ... Wednesday

"Quia Respexit" and "Omnes Generationes," Bach, Magnificat.

Wumpick and the Trough

My Dear Wumpick,

So, your patient is going through one of those troughs that the man from Belfast described in his scurrilous, indecent, and, I need hardly add, inaccurate scrawl concerning the tactics we employ for the cause of Our Father Below? I hope she does not know about the troughs, Wumpick? that she has not read that book? Or at least, if she had read it (I seem to recall your predecessor mentioning it in his dossier) I hope that it was some time ago. Of course, she has heard of the book; but you will have taken care to associate it in her mind with what the humans call “interpersonal relations,” and managed to keep the more spiritual chapters out of, or at any rate, in the back of, her head. This is all well and good, especially if you can keep helping her see the faults of the fictitious patient, his fiancé, his mother, as well as the faults of the real, living people around her, but not those in herself. See that she applies the book’s lessons very well, very personally; and she will—apply them, well, personally—to every person but herself! See that it never enters her mind to do that.

Pray for Rain

There's a decent little piece over at Crisis on how men should behave.  There've been better bits of commentary on the current existential crisis of the eternally uncertain male-female entente; but this one was thoughtful, reasonably mild, and written, thank heavens, by a man.

The End of a Great Movie

... which I referenced here, and on which I will write ... next week ... ?  Consider this a teaser.

The Transit of Venus

... is ...

Bad People

I so badly wanted for this to be a good movie.

Wumpick and the Right Kind of Vanity

My dear Wumpick,

So, your patient has embarrassed herself, and you are enjoying her humiliation.  I have nothing against that, of course—though [expurgated] knows why you should be enjoying yourself at all.  Your attitude in this is highly suggestive of an unhealthy absorption of human fantasies about spying.  It is clear that you consider it to be an extremely romantic activity, one more likely to be pleasurable to the practitioner than not—Bondism, if you will.  You had better not be becoming a Bondist, Wumpick.  Even the silliest humans, in their heart of hearts, know better than to romanticize undercover work.  War is war, and war is hell, as one of their generals said; and he meant no compliment to us.  If you will pick a few crumbs of pleasure while you are at it, see that you don't gorge yourself.  Even the humans know that a little hunger sharpens the brain.