Poetic Conviction

“A good work of fiction is one which convicts the reader of some important truth.”  But what does it mean to “convict” the reader?  Why not say “convince the reader” or “persuade the reader” or even “prove to the reader”?

“Peter the Liar Got Hit by a Bus”: Concerning the Morality of the Story

RC’s comment on my analysis (a pretty fancy word for what I wrote, but let that be) of Raphael’s two paintings of St. George and the Dragon got me thinking.  He brought up the review I wrote for StAR of Baron de la Motte Fouque’s The Magic Ring—a book that he enjoyed very much but which I, to borrow one of my favorite phrases from Sayers, praised with faint damns.  My reply to RC’s comment, explaining what I thought made for a good work of literature (or a great one) as opposed to one that is merely fair, started to get out of hand as I worked it out in my mind; and in the end I offered a simple formula to explain my views.

St. George's Day

Hopefully you will have noticed the picture on the top left side of this blog.  It's the earlier, more dramatic of Raphael's two stabs (pardon the pun) at painting St. George and the Dragon.  The latter one, the one that more commonly shows up on postcards and people's walls, looks like this:

I Didn't Sign Up for This

I know, I know ... I posted yesterday and two days before that too.  But some weeks are like ... this one.

Humor, Madness; Man and Beast

Every spring my peaceful early-morning commuter train is transformed by the presence of The Tourists.  Usually these are families with kids; and usually the kids are pretty well-behaved (the other kind ride Metro), so I don't mind too much.  It does break the morning stillness though, having half-a-dozen people jabbering behind you about what they're going to have for breakfast, while you're trying to figure out why JPII said "dynamism" (or the Italian equivalent) when "power" is a more intelligible and traditional translation of St. Paul.

Happy Birthday, Papa

Peter on the Sea

It's nice when the author of a book ties things together at the end—and as the priest pointed out in his homily on the gospel today, St. John is such an author.  In the final chapter of John's gospel, the apostles go fishing: fishermen before Christ came, they are fishermen afterwards; and so it goes.

Real Men > X

And I was thinking it would be hard to find inspiration to write this week.  I write most easily (I won't say best, although that also may be true) when annoyed.  Not frothing-at-the-mouth furious, but just ever so slightly ticked off.  But no, I thought.  It's Easter Week.  All the news (that I read) will be happy Catholic trivia and inspirational gurgles on how the celebration does borrow from paganism, but that's actually OK.  Maybe there'll be something about vestment colors or dating Passover.  Possibly a piece or two about how it's wicked to lie to your kids about the Easter Bunny.  That'll be about the most abrasive it gets.

Love and Necessity

"And if Christ be not risen again, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain." (1 Corinthians, 15:14)
"It behooved Christ to rise again ... for our instruction in the faith, since our belief in Christ's Godhead is confirmed by His rising again."  (Summa III.53.1)
"The Resurrection of the crucified one shows that he was truly "I AM", the Son of God and God himself." (Catechism, 653)

Forty Days and Forty Nights

I'm taking a little break until Easter. This (the music, not my break) is to remind you that it's Lent:

As Ancient as Eden

We all know that after gay marriage, polygamy and pet-owner weddings will be next. Think that's an extreme statement? They are already happening. And it's not just about sister wives, shih tzus, and shar peis any more: apparently it's possible nowadays to marry oneself.

In Defense of Philosophy

On the other blog, for which I occasionally write, we have been having an argument about the value of philosophy as opposed to modern science.  If I were ever inclined to tear my hair out ...  Anyroad, this is the post I wrote for that debate.

Ergo, Laetare

There are days when, all the urgings of propriety to the contrary notwithstanding, euphoria takes over. I have always been rather shamed by the admonition (repeated by numerous saints and spiritual directors, beginning, one suspects, with that persnickety Bishop Augustine) that the soul ought to be mortified during Lent. The soul, they say—not just the body. But what does a body (colloq.) do when fasting (or at any rate, giving up X) operates to make one happier? I suppose next year I could try giving up something the absence of which leaves me cranky. But then, they tell us not to do penances that "irritate," on the theory that penance ought to be penitential for us, and not for our neighbors.

Envy and Kindness

The fruit be bitter that you hold in hand;
I know, for it was mine an hour before.
And will you taste it, sweet?  Is your demand
More potent to obtain than were a score
Of pleadings on my part?  I know the taste

If the General Can Get It Right ...

In Defense of a Bad Mass

There's another combox war over at First Thing's On the Square, thanks to the dear Elizabeth Scalia who, by being gentle, moderate, and non-judgmental manages to draw the ire of everyone from the atheist to the cafeteria Catholic to the SSPX member.  In a rational mood I enjoy combox wars, rather (I suspect) as a fast driver enjoys auto accidents: There but for the grace ...  In a foolish mood, however, I will hop down combox rabbit holes with reckless abandon, and this I did in this case.

Pray Me a River

God bless our President.  He surely needs it.  And apparently he knows it.  According to the NYT, people at the White House are organizing a prayer vigil in coordination with "dozens of leaders of nonprofit organizations that strongly back the health [care] law," in hopes that it will help support the law as the Supreme Court's review of it draws near.

Duc in Altum

All my life I have been afraid of the dark.  I felt sheepish about this for a long time, until the year before college when I found out that St. Francis de Sales was also afraid of the dark.  Nothing like having a wise old patron saint who shares one of your weaknesses!  Of course, St. Francis reportedly "conquered his fear by spiritual wisdom," whatever that means—which I suppose just goes to show who's still a long way from being canonized.

Fakes, Flakes, and Fundamentally Decent Men

Romney is out with a new ad designed to let us all know that he cares.  My word, really?  Did he think that we doubted that?  He's a Mormon, a member of the Church of Latter Day Saints, one of the most notoriously family-centered religious bodies in the U.S.  He has by all accounts been a good husband and father all his life—which is more, unfortunately, than one can say for the witty Newt.  Yes, Romney has a robotic image, and a "cold" reputation.  But that's doesn't mean Americans think he doesn't care.  We know he cares—he just doesn't care about what we care about.

Four Things Rick Santorum Could Say About Last Night's Debate

1) "I told the truth.  The truth is complicated.  Unlike most politicians, I believe that the American people are smart enough to understand the truth without excessive or simplistic rhetoric."

A Modest Non-Proposal

Warning: Do not click on any of the links in this piece, unless you are prepared to be offended.  No, not even kidding.  Caveat lector, and all that.

The other day a friend of mine on Facebook (where else does one read the latest news, hm?) posted a piece on Tina Korbe.  Who is Tina Korbe?  Well, Tina Korbe is a lovely young lady who interviewed Rick Santorum at CPAC.  Go ahead and watch the video—the first thirty seconds, anyway.

A Choice of Gifts

Come Valentine's Day, come the advice—only half joking—to men. Don't give her a vacuum. Don't give her exercise equipment. (Not even those Nikes you brilliantly found on sale—leave them on the shelf. LEAVE THEM THERE. Thank you.) Don't give her kitchen gadgets—no, not even if she likes cooking. In fact, don't give her anything remotely practical, even if she says she likes practical gifts. Nothing says "I love you forever" like something that is going to be dead in a week or eaten in in hour. That may not sound romantic, but it is. Love, eating, and death are blood relatives—just ask an Italian opera singer.

"Love in the Dark"

I've been thinking for some time (spurred in part by reading the autobiography of St. Thérèse of Lisieux some months back) about the "dark night of the soul."  How is something so devoid of hope—or of the feelings that most of us identify with hope—not itself a sin of despair, but actually an occasion of grace?  I was going to write a post on the problem, and still may some day do so; but for the moment my meditations have turned into a poem instead.

Some of These Things Are Not Like the Others

I will confess that the primary reason I would not like to see Nancy Pelosi excommunicated, despite her "obstinate perseverance in manifest grave sin," is that I fear some whack bishop will immediately take the opportunity, using some variation of the seamless garment argument, to excommunicate Rick Santorum (war), Marco Rubio (married a non Catholic), and Paul Ryan (there must be something).
No matter how many times Church teaching on Church teaching is explained, some people cannot seem to get it through their heads that one of these things is not like the others.

Wumpick and Safety

My Dear Wumpick,

I find it rather ironic, all this talk of yours about making your patient "safe."  Of course you would like your patient to be "safe"—safely ensconced in her little tomb, shelved among the myriads of others who have already found their way to Our Father Below.  That is the sort of safety to which all tempter aspire on behalf of their patients.  But "safe" among the humans is the same as dead. 

Monarch of All I Survey

Reading over a writer’s account of her brief acquaintance with the late Christopher Hitchens, it struck me that the first problem of an atheist is that he is bound to be a lonely person. Hitchens, of course, was temperamentally lonely: so irascible by nature, so little prone to give his fellow men credit for virtue, that he was bound to isolation. Those whom he got along best with seem to have shared his critical personality and, even more tellingly, seem to have spent little time with him. A dedicated iconoclast is a dangerous person to befriend.

Romanticizing the Ordinary

Some time ago I read one of those critiques of Facebook—well written, well reasoned, and emotionally balanced. After leveling the usual charges against the defendant, the author made one final accusation: Facebook, in his judgement, tends to "romanticiz[e] the ordinary."

In Defense of the Indefensible

Warning: Intense authorial irritation alert.

Evelyn Beatrice Hall, characterizing Voltaire's sentiments towards his opponents, paraphrased his habitual attitude in one scintillating, oft-quoted line: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." It is a mischaracterization of Voltaire—the man who was too generous to make an enemy of Satan also closed his letters with "écrasez l'infâme"—but through its association with Voltaire the sentiment has taken on a life of its own.

Brutus, As You Know, Is Honorable

I.

Commenting on last night's primary debate, Quinn Hiller (writing for National Review's "Corner") remarked: "Santorum is about the most determinedly anti-political top-level politician I’ve ever witnessed. No matter what state he is debating in, he refuses to find some wiggle room on issues where his position is at odds with a deeply held local position. ... I don't know what to make of it."

An Unwise Man's Prayer

"Three kings" we call them, honoring
Their worldly wealth and powers;
And "wise men" by profession, for
Their grasp of heaven's hours;

My Reason Tells Me ...

The war between love and reason takes many forms. Psychologists divide their subjects into "thinkers" and "feelers". (Why does Psychology have a way of sounding SciFiesque?)

Wumpick and the Resolutions

My dear Wumpick,
So, has your patient made any New Year’s resolutions this time round? And how are they going? Please inform me at your earliest convenience. The new year is a time ripe with possibilities for us—more so than Lent, which is the closest religious equivalent to the secular world’s annual attempts at self-reform.

In Defense of a Scandalous Fashion

Every now and then from the vasty brilliance of a great mind some inane, foolish, or just plain wrong opinion will emerge, reminding us all that even the most brilliant of men are still human. Aristotle and infanticide. St. Thomas Aquinas and the Immaculate Conception. C.S. Lewis and the Catholic Church.

The Best of Worlds

In his foul, ironic, philosophical comedy Candide, Voltaire puts ten mocking words into the mouth of his character Pangloss: “Tout est pour le mieux dans le meilleur des mondes.” Roughly translated, “All things happen for the best in this best of all possible worlds.”

All He Had Was a Prayer

"Well, there's Walker, Christie, Rubio, Mike Lee, ..."

"OK, OK, I get it. But what about the ones who are actually running?"

The Stones of an Tóchar

It is a fact well known among the countryfolk that once in a every year, at midnight on Christmas Eve, the beasts of the stable can speak and converse like men about their—and sometimes our—business. So it happened many years ago that a pedlar, taking shelter on that holy night in a rich farmer's barn, heard the beasts in conference.

In Defense of the Defense of Christmas

As I sit writing, two articles lie near me. One is by a regular blogger at First Things' "On the Square"—a Protestant pastor by the name of Russell Saltzman. The other is by Christopher Hitchens.

Deo et Sibi Similes

There are many, many setting for this carol, but my favorite is the one by T. Pasatieri, sung here by Thomas Hanson (note that Pasatieri's version uses the verses here numbered 1, 2, 5, 12, 3, and 11, in that order).

1. Puer natus in Bethlehem, Alleluia.

Unde gaudet Jerusalem. Alleluia.

Born is a boy in Bethlehem
For the joy of Jerusalem.

Descendit Incarnatus

Disclaimer: This is the second post of this sort (previous one here). Because of the nature of this post, and some of the reactions to the earlier post, I feel I should say that (1) this conversation is FICTIONAL; but also (2) I think (as with everything I write) there's some truth in it (otherwise I wouldn't post it). With that in mind—and if it is not to perilous to steal the phrase—duc in altum!

The Most Jealous God

My Dear Wumpick,

Of course, you must expect your patient to be excited about—that day. She is a Christian, and it is only natural that her Christianity should provide her with a reason for excitement.

Higginsification

There are many things about people that puzzle me, but very few which I do not think I could, given a few years and sufficient resources, comprehend. Most of these things are not worth figuring out, e.g., Why does anyone eat pistachio ice cream? I'm fairly sure there's a gene somewhere that explains such insanity, but taking all those courses in DNA sequencing would really set me back in my frisbee game.

The Season

Ah, the Christmas season ...

Yes, you read that correctly. No, I don't mean Advent. Christmas. Because, while it is liturgically still very much NotChristmas, it is, based on the decorations that have been up in my office since the Monday after Thanksgiving, the price of air flights, and the attitudes of shoppers everywhere, Christmas in our hearts.

The Third Day, There Was a Marriage

The Luminous Mysteries were not initially big favorites of mine. For starters, there was the name. Luminous? Seriously? With all due respect, Blessed John Paul, did it have to be something that reminds us of light sabers at best and glow-stick-wearing hippies at worst?

Thank Goodness!

I was thinking about Thanksgiving, and how I ought to do some sort of Thanksgiving post. Thankful ... thankful ... I'm thankful for ... Hm.

With Ever Joyful Heart

Now thank we all our God
With hearts and hands and voices,

Wumpick and the Abovitists

My dear Wumpick,

I do wish you would stick to your time table. The fact is that none of my advice will do you any good if you do not send in your reports promptly. You complain in your most recent report that my advice on the Slews "didn't apply" to your patient, because your patient was "an intellectual"!

The Screwball Divorce

One of the repeated themes of the old Black and Whites was the divorced or alienated couple that gets back together again ("comedies of remarriage," Stanley Cavell called such films). The cynic could view these movies as pure propaganda from a less enlightened age, but that cynical view ignores the humane spirit of the movies themselves and (worse still) ignores the sheer fun that they are.

Three Should-Be Thrice-Told Tales, Part 1

Being the sort of person who regularly makes outlandish claims like "Tangled is the best chick flick in the last fifteen years" and "The Incredibles is the most psychologically satisfying drama in the last decade" and "Inception is the most stultifying attempt at cinematic philosophizing since I can't think when," I don't enjoy many modern movies. Oh for the days when female stars could be feminine and tough!

The Coming of the Monster

N.B. Title props to Owen Francis Dudley, whose novel of the same name has almost absolutely nothing to do with what I am going to write here.

For years now I’ve had to share my birthday with creeps, spooks, spirits (not of the medicinal kind, from which Scrooge lived “on the total abstinence principle”), specters, phantoms, ghosts, ghouls, goblins, hobgoblins, trolls, gnomes, imps, sprites, elves (oh! many elves), witches, warlocks, wizards (avaunt thee, Potter!), fiends, demons, devils, monsters (non-incorporated), aliens; and the occasional space man, cowboy, or fairy princess.

Dead and Dying Thus Around Us

Last month on the St. Austin Review Ink Desk I wrote about "one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen"—and which I saw in, of all places, a train station.

Wumpick and the Slews

My dear Wumpick,

I closed my last letter with a promise, you may recall, to look at the temptations your woman faces in living within the modern world—more precisely, those temptations that regard her femininity or, as the modern humans would put it, her "self-image." I said, and it is fortunately unquestionably true, that her perception of herself as a woman will be affected by the images of femininity around her, even if—mark you—even if she disapproves of, dislikes, or actually despises those images of femininity which the culture upholds.

Words Have Signification

We all should be able to blush. Dignity is not real apart from the possibility of shame.

Not too long ago I wrote about bad Christian art. Apparently lot of people share my distaste for the genre—in fact, four bloggers I follow have written on the same subject. Their critiques were all along similar lines; and while I differed with some of the detailed criticisms I found myself nodding my head, chuckling, and rolling my eyes with the other bloggers—

Patience and Anger

I will be patient as my day is long,
Proverbially soft and quick to please,

Joanne's Choice

A repost from the other blog.

It was California, in the autumn of 1954, and a graduate student named Joanne had a problem. She had been having an affair with a Muslim immigrant, a man her father did not want her to marry; and she was pregnant. These were the days before abortion was socially acceptable, and Joanne decided to give her child up for adoption.

"Brown v. Williams-Bolar"

Once upon a time it could be difficult to get your children into a neighborhood school. It all depended on your parents: if they were one sort of people, your child walked a few blocks to the nearest school; if they weren't, your child went miles to attend a school that had people like you. There was no law—not anymore—saying things had to be that way; but on the other hand there was a long-standing custom that they should be. Any other arrangement would have been liable to make people uncomfortable. Better that everyone stayed with their own kind.

Then along came Brown v. Board of Education and the accompanying cases, "separate but equal" was revealed for the lie it was, and school busing began.

Wumpick and Woman

My dear Wumpick,

The one thing you must on no account forget is that your patient is a Woman. You must never assume that merely because a temptation or technique works well upon a man (I understand that your previous patients have all been men? It shows, Wumpick; it shows ...) that it can be applied with equal success to the opposite sex.

For Their Own Sake

Everything you need to know is in the headline:

Pregnancy Expands Vision.

Trrrrry Pregnancy! It's good for you! The inevitable demise of Social Security will cease to be a subject of concern. Your wish-fulfillment dreams will be fulfilled. You'll be able to throw out those anti-depressants and hypertension pills. Your marriage will be more stable. You won't get breast cancer. You will have visions!! see angels!!! (Oh, wait ... not that kind of vision ... ) You will create great art! (Somehow less exciting, but still kinda nice.) See, see; pregnancy is good for you!

The First Deadly Sin

This is (hopefully) the first pair of poems in a series on the Seven Deadly Sins and the virtues opposed to them. Ehhhrrrr . . . enjoy?

It's true the truth would little flatter me,
But still I loathe my half-true hidden state,
For fear that my acquaintances might see
Some stains upon my soul, nor care how great

A Paycheck from Peoria

Them evolutionists got me upset.

It's not because they're all atheists and materialists and other things that disagree with me. I don't mind disagreements in the form of rational arguments. In fact, my addiction to rational argument is only slightly less strong than my addiction to sarcasm, which is proportionally less strong than my preferred brew of coffee. If reductionary evolutionists argued rationally for their beliefs—if they took pot shots at the Five Ways, for example—I might still have bones to pick with them, but the picking would be pleasant. But reductionary evolutionists don't much care for philosophical argument.
(Yes, click the link. No, those are not reductionary evolutionists. No, it's not relevant, except for 1:40-1:56. What, you wanted me to find just that exact sixteen seconds on YouTube? Sheesh . . .)

The Problem with Perry

There are a number of "problems" with Rick Perry. He's Texan. He's friendly to creationists. He ordered mandatory HPV vaccinations for teenage girls. He fights a dirty campaign. Some of these probably will be problems if he gets nominated, and some of them probably should be. (As is typical in politics, the ones that should be problematic probably won't, and the ones that shouldn't be probably will.)

Angelus ad Virginem

It's really a piece for March 25th, but I couldn't think of anything else for the occasion—and it seems shameful to let Our Lady's birthday go by without notice!

1.Angelus ad virginem
Gabriel the angel came
Subintrans in conclave.
To Mary's room so softly,
Virginis formidinum
Calmed the Virgin's humble fears
Demulcens inquit "Ave.
And spoke in sweetness lofty:

My Dear Wumpick ...

In an admittedly dubious and belated homage to Labor Day, with respect to those who've done this sort of thing far better (including Mary Eberstadt, Peter Kreeft, the forgotten Joseph A. Breig, and the master of them all, C.S. Lewis):

My dear Wumpick,

I am a little perplexed by your statement that you patient is lazy. In what do you suppose laziness among humans consists? Surely you do not think that mere dissatisfaction with their labors is enough to make them lazy or, in the Enemy’s eyes, guilty of the capital sin of Sloth?

Knowing God's Will

I hate decisions. (If you really want to know how much I hate them, imagine that last sentence uttered with the spittle-spewing, rage-in-defeat-induced vigor of Mad Madam Mim.) Oh, how do I hate them? Let me count the ways . . .

The Ingenuous Pessimist

Props (and apologies!) to W.S. Gilbert.

Deny them your attention and they'll claim it all the same,

These critics who decry the culture, placing all the blame

For misery on music and immodesty on dress;

Who regret our use of money but who earn it nonetheless.

Honesty

Let it first be said: I have not (knowingly) listened to a single recording by Amy Winehouse. I'm in no position to comment on her musical ability—which, if many of the obituaries are to be believed, was great—or on her style of music—which, I'm just going to guess, would not have pleased me at all. Her very public life, however, is another matter. Amy Winehouse was one of those people about whom you would hear even, and perhaps especially, when you'd rather not. Still, I would never have written about her had it not been for this piece in The Independent.

Meandering Towards the Perfect

Yesterday I attended an excellent talk on the cultural effects of social media. The speaker (John Mark Reynolds) unsurprisingly identified himself as a conservative, but went on to give a rather surprising definition of the breed to which he claimed to belong. Conservatives, said Dr. Reynolds, are people who “muddle through.” Between the easily defensible licentiousness of the libertarians and the equally easily defensible paternalism of the progressives, conservatives often find it hard to explain why they think some things should not be regulated by the government while others should. We tend not to see the policy world in black and white. (The moral world, of course, is another question.) And sometimes our apparent inconsistency (“Wait—you’re against abortion—but in favor of the death penalty??!!”) can make us appear . . . well, muddle-headed.

In Defense of Not Being Christian

Attention all Christian writers, bloggers, apologists, personalities, painters, sculptors, singers, musicians, composers, clock-makers, dress-designers, cobblers, DJs, plumbers, cooks, and chimney sweeps.
Just don't. You are so embarrassing me.

On "Dark Stuff"

I try not to be lazy, but it happens. I haven't been this lazy before—not lazy to the point of actually reposting something from the StAR blog here, or vice versa—but today is the day . . .

Laziness is only part of it, of course. This is an issue about which I care very deeply, as the following will hopefully make clear.

"The Gods Too Are Fond of a Joke"?

"Humor is the only test of gravity, and gravity of humor; for a subject which will not bear raillery is suspicious, and a jest which will not bear serious examination is false wit."

I have been remiss in writing for this blog lately, though not, I hasten to add, remiss in writing in general. Indeed, my general excess of activity in that area probably has something to do with my slacking here. Why spend the (little and it seems eternally shrinking) time I have to write in writing essays when song lyrics and snappy bits of dialogue are popping in and out the rabbit holes of the head? Why worry about the nature and destiny of man when the obvious problem at the moment is finding the right rhyme for "changes"?

Our Mother Stood

For some time now, I've wanted to devote an essay to the laughter of Christ. Somehow, that just didn't seem appropriate during Lent! and as I procrastinated and the season grew later it became even less so. Hopefully come Easter week I will have something on the topic worth posting.

In the meantime, and in honor of the Holy Week we are about to enter, here are some thoughts on the "Stabat Mater."

Let me remind you briefly of how the hymn begins. In the Latin:

Stabat mater dolorosa
juxta Crucem lacrimosa,
dum pendebat Filius.

The New Imperialism

Report

From: Mork

To: Orson

Re: Speech given by President Obama, March 28th, 2011, concerning the conflict in Libya

Sir:

What follows is a rough translation of the transcript of the American President's speech to his people. Although the speech was delivered in something that sounded like English, I found it perplexing at the time (despite my long experience among these people) and was forced to resort to a translator who interpreted the Fearless Leader's thoughts with Orkan clarity. I may say that I found his interpretation enlightening, and trust that Your Immenseness may think the same.

Translation:

Of Difficult Answers

What on earth is the use of an anonymous (or semi-anonymous) blog if you can't occasionally sound off about something that has riled you to bursting point?

The world is full today of people who are wrong, terribly wrong, about all kinds of things—things as important as abortion and as trivial as the number of piercings a woman should tolerate in her young man. (Answer to the last, in case you were wondering: None.) People who are wrong don't usually trouble me; at least, they don't put me out of temper. You can pray for them, laugh at them, argue with them or about them. You may not change their minds, but you can try. People who are wrong are rarely occasions of sin, qua being wrong. The ones who are intolerable are the ones who are sure they're right.

The Foresight of One Gabriel Marcel

Recently (through a chain of circumstances that is probably completely irrelevant to anyone reading this blog) I found myself embarked upon a first reading of Homo Viator, the large, wordy, and occasionally weighty tome of the Christian existentialist Gabriel Marcel. (I believe, having gotten perhaps a third of the way through, that he deserves the name "existentialist," his own protests to the contrary not withstanding.) I call this a first reading, and it has been worth while; but I find myself rather hoping against ever having to perform a second: existentialism is neither psychologically nor philosophically appealing. It also seems to me that with Marcel, as with Kierkegaard and Pascal, this ceding to the enemy of huge territories at the start—this refusal to fight for the premises upon which older western philosophies were based—is a rhetorical and tactical mistake of the first order.

But I come not to bury Marcel, but to praise him—praise him in a limited way, but praise him nonetheless.

Noblesse Oblige

Among my many debts to Dorothy L. Sayers I must include my introduction to the phrase “noblesse oblige.” I was reading her novels as a young teenager, and the concept was as new to me in reality as the name was. It was only in college that I ran suddenly up against (and became convinced of the reality of) class distinctions.

How Cold the Night

How cold the night, how still the air
That wraps and chills these empty walls
As cold as stones on hills that wear
Their crowns of blades of grass once fair,
Now shriveled in the winter air
Foreboding winter falls.

Another Kind of Economy

Will someone please tell me what is wrong with capitalism?

I find the antimony between the pro-market Catholics and the Distributists puzzling. I hope I am not the only one. There are two problems with capitalism: its friends and its enemies; and the same may be said of Distributism. Distributists (may their number ever increase) insist on the importance of family over finance. They believe that human beings are best served by an economy wherein private ownership of land is widespread and working for wage, renting, and borrowing are the exception rather than the rule. I do not think they are wrong. But the Distributists insist on presenting their truths as if they were practical—which is silly. What is practical depends entirely on what you want to get in the end; and if one wants to make money (as most Americans do) then Distributism is not practical at all.

The Plot

Everyone knows (I hope) that eerie sensation when the repetition of a word, however simple, leads one to suspect its spelling. Even the most common and phonetic of words strike us strangely when they rear their heads too often—our very a’s and the’s begin to achieve a Hopkinsville look. It’s still more disconcerting when the experience happens with faces—when you begin to notice, for example, the curious shape that an eye has, or a nose, or a chin; when for an instant you see in your own race the characteristics that are blindingly obvious to members of other races or, more frighteningly still, when you begin to see the oddity and uniformity of your whole species with the eyes of a preternaturally conscious dog or cat.

The Anniversary

Today is approximately the one-year anniversary of the day when I started this blog. As with most blogs (I suspect) not everything’s turned out quite as expected. For starters, politics appeared far more often in posts than I had intended it too. That’s as it should be: the year has been a strange one in DC and consequently, everywhere else in the country. Some of the top news stories of the year:

English über alles?

As a grownup, I rarely read the comics any more. Oh, the occasional volume of The Far Side or Calvin and Hobbes—maybe, maybe, if you push me, Get Fuzzy—but I don’t pick up a newspaper to read them. I have something much, much funnier: The Wall Street Journal’s “Personal Journal.”

Mothers Have a Right . . .

The Daily Beast has a column out on a slight uptick in home births. Hey, in this economy it's got to be a lot cheaper having a midwife come over than it is arranging for an epidural and a hospital stay!

In all seriousness, though, who wouldn't choose a home birth if they could be sure there would be no complications? At least one of my friends (a young mother who recently had her first son) says she's thinking about, *ahem*, telebirthing the second time round, particularly if her second pregnancy is as uneventful as the first one was.

Joe Sobran, R.I.P.

I learned this morning that Joseph Sobran passed away on Thursday. He was a grand old paleocon, perhaps a little more libertarian (certainly in his foreign policy) than I; he was a controversalist, a contrarian, an Oxfordian in matters of Shakespeare, and a Catholic journalist.

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him; may his soul, and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

Which Witch?

So, in recently broken news, we learn that Republican Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell "dabbled in witchcraft" while she was in highschool. Ms. O'Donnell's proof that she has repented of her dabbling: If she hadn't, then Karl Rove "would be a supporter." One for the lady . . .















In related news, John Dennis's anti-Pelosi campaign reveals what we've suspected all along: The Wicked Witch of the West didn't really die. At the very least, "You can always get them back!"

















What a world!

The Mosque at Ground Zero

As a young person born under Reagan and raised during the Clinton era, I remember three events as defining my childhood. The first was, sadly enough, the Lewinski scandal, about which the less said the better. The third was the death of John Paul II—a sad occasion in and of itself, but one marked by a tremendous sense of pride at being Catholic and joy at the grace of God, Who gave us for so many years so great a pope. Between the two events there was another, a more confusing and disturbing one, which (to my mind) has had and will continue to have far greater effects on us Americans than the end of either a papacy or of all presidential respect. Even great men must die, and in our culture it was only a matter of time before we elected a president worthy of being called “the Impeached”; but the events of September 11, 2001, will continue to have ramifications for years to come.

Show Me the Salsa

Let me first make it quite clear: I am no fan of Mexican food. Having attended college in the Southwest, far from my natural habitat and preferred haunts, I learned to loathe Mexican food much in the way those noble English prisoners must have done while rowing in the slave galleys run by the black- and greasy-haired whip-wielders of the Spanish Inquisition. Beans and rice with lots of spice. Grease in place of meat. Meat, did you say? From what animal did that come? I’m sorry, but when you put on enough taco seasoning, lamb, cow, and pig all taste the same. Forget venison, and those delicious Bambi-burgers one gets back home.

Everything's Up to Date in Kansas City--and It Ain't Lookin' Like Kansas No More

So . . . Ann Coulter is speaking at a gay conservatives' conference (GOProud’s “Homocon”). While I'm not surprised, I admit to being profoundly disappointed.

In related news, I was running a 1960 Stanford-Binet test on a young friend of mine today. In the “Verbal Absurdities?” section, I came across the following question:

“In the year 1915 many more women than men got married in the United States.”

What is it about us in 2010 that most adults would flunk a fourth-grade intelligence test?

Fill in the -Zona

I've been wondering why the anti-anti-illegal immigration protesters have taken to calling Arizona (which is a border state) "Nazi-zona." I mean, "Aryan-zona" would have been so much cooler, and displayed a greater knowledge of history, while getting the point (?) across just as clearly. Besides, "Aryan-zona" actually sounds kind of like "Arizona", and so by adopting it as their diffemism of choice the protesters would demonstrate a punnish flair for words and a greater sensitivity for language and sound.

But maybe I'm supposing that the protesters do have a "knowledge of history", a "punnish flair for words", and a " sensitivity for language and sound". My mistake.

The Secret of Harry

After spending a week reading criticisms and critiques of the Harry Potter series, I must confess myself shocked that the obvious truth behind the books has not so far been stated in any prominent place. It is one of the more astonishing features of this series that it has been able, by dint of some slight and subtle misdirections of the author (aided, one must assume, by a willing media) that these books have not been unmasked before.

Of Pigeonholes and Personality Tests

One of the more pervasive signs of the modern search for self if the proliferation of personality tests available online. From the ice cream personality test (six flavors, pick your favorite) to the chocolate personality test (sorry, only four choices here) to the color test (rank nine colors in order of your favorite; it will describe your love life) to the other color test (answer a couple dozen questions, and you can buy a book telling you all your secrets, including whether you are gold, blue, green, or orange). This doesn’t count the stuffed animals test, the jungle animal test, several car personality tests, an infinite number of Facebook tests meant to compare you to various real and fictional persons (full disclosure: I composed a Jane Austen one), predictions based on the Chinese calendar and the zodiac belt, and the traditional Myers-Briggs type testing.

Yes, They Really Did

Seen recently on two colleges' departmental websites:

"If you like reality TV, you are going to love Sociology!!"

"Donate to the Economics Department."

Why I Am Not a Libertarian

Immaturity.

It is popular, because it is pithy, to divide the world into twos. Those who lounge and those who pull their own weight. The kind who can count and the kind who can’t (or is that three kinds?). Those with loaded guns, and those who dig (Clint Eastwood). “Those who come into a room and say, ‘Well, here I am!’ and those who come in and say, ‘Ah, there you are,’” (Frederick Collins). “Those who say to God ‘Thy will be done’ and those to whom God says ‘Thy will be done,’” (C.S. Lewis). And, most hilariously, Robert Benchley’s distinction (also attributed, with minor variations, to Murphy, Anonymous, and probably, given the viral nature of rumor on and off the internet, to Bill Gates as well): “There are two kinds of people in the world, those who believe there are two kinds of people in the world and those who don’t.”

Pascal's Dangerous Idea

I am officially mad. Not mad (thank heaven) in a mad hatter sort of way; though that may come in time. I’m angry.

It’s a rare news story that angers me anymore, and that’s a pity, because rage makes for quickly written blog posts. (Whether those posts are the best blog posts is another question.) Politicians and celebrities can do and say outrageous things all day long, and I remain unmoved. I expect them to be outrageous; and I suspect that I have the good company in my expectations of most of my fellow human beings.

For Holy Week

Jesus, I will ponder now
On Thy holy passion.
With Thy spirit me endow
For such meditation.
Grant that I in love and faith
May the image cherish
Of Thy suffering, pain, and death
That I may not perish.

Only an Idiot

BIAS 1 : a line diagonal to the grain of a fabric; especially : a line at a 45 degree angle to the selvage often utilized in the cutting of garments for smoother fit 2 : a peculiarity in the shape of a bowl that causes it to swerve when rolled on the green in lawn bowling 3 : an inclination of temperament or outlook; especially : a personal and sometimes unreasoned judgment : prejudice. —Webster’s Online.

It sounds like an excellent idea. These ideas usually do. None of us can really know what it’s like to be a Native American, so we should just let the Native Americans speak for themselves. Likewise, no white person (with the possible exception of John Howard Griffin) can really know what it’s like to have been black in the 1960’s. No man should presume to speak about what women want (sorry, Chaucer) and no heterosexual can presume to understand homosexuality. Children are eternally puzzled by adults, who have themselves long averred that children are mysteries.

In Defense of Robin Hood

Of all the old and chivalrous heroes whose memory modernity has warped, one of the most ill-treated is Robin Hood. The attack is two-pronged in nature, giving the impression of a concerted effort; but, like so many other apparent alliances between hard left and hard right, the alliance against Robin Hood is an unintentional one, which, if recognized by either side, would be immediately repudiated by both.

What’s a Writer to Do?

I’ve run across a terribly frustrating barrier in my search for a publisher or agent for my first novel. The problem starts with me. You see, I wrote my story for myself, and not for the market.

Women in the Superbowl Ads

As usual, the adds were almost as much of a draw as the game--particularly since we all knew the Tebow add was going to be showing.

But, surprise, surprise, apparently NOW believes that the football player's spot encourages domestic violence. Hm.

Saturday at the Movies

I was feeling a little bit of a breeze from the Oscar buzz, and decided to compile my own list of movies—the good, the bad, and the quotable. Just for fun. Besides, some day I may need to start my own library, and it is good to have a plan in place for such exigencies.

Sifting "Owl Creek Bridge"

It's a bromide that teachers learn from their students. If the translation of the bromide comes to "Students impart information to their teachers of which the teachers were ignorant"

-->--I am not sure I agree. Or, if I have gleaned new information from those I teach, it doesn't tend to be the sort I was itching to know. (I really did not need to know that Ben Franklin's sells cap bombs. Really. Although I must admit it is in keeping with their patron's interests.) I will not deny, however, that I have learned from my students in this sense: that in looking for questions to ask them, I have had to dig deeper into certain questions than I would be likely to, left on my own.

In Five Acts

Recently I was reflecting on how to coax a play out of a certain story. It’s the second or third time I’ve given this particular short story a run-over, and both my earlier attempts completely dissatisfied me--so much so that this time I decided to scrap everything I had done before and start afresh. So I did what every good writer with writer’s block ought to do: I wrote something else, in this case, something in the nature of an outline. Since a great part of my difficulty with the story in question was structural (it’s cursed with scenes in many places, lots of time elapsing, plenty of authorial intrusion, etc.), I decided to set out the approximate structure of a play, in hopes that doing so might give me a template for altering the story in question.

What Humans Value

It is an unquestionable fact that we human beings value things more when we have sought them. A man who spends his entire life in the pursuit of greater riches and security will value it more than his grandson, who has no reason not to squander the old money passed down to him. A man who has had to work to find a job will be more appreciative of the job when he finally gets it, than the man who finds a plumb position dropped right into his lap. And the sensation of finally grasping a difficult proof in philosophy or in math is a wondrous one that will never be experienced by the rare geniuses who understand such things at first reading. (To be sure, genius has its own consolations; but that is another matter.)