At least one columnist for a Catholic newspaper in Minnesota would have you believe that Jesus never actually met the Samaritan woman at the well who figured so prominently in yesterday's gospel reading. Bloggers over at The Seventh Age highlight some of the problems with that revisionist view, but I think the whole thing bears closer scrutiny.
Arthur Zannoni, author of the column in question, cites "irregularities" in Saint John's account as evidence for doubting "that this event ever took place in the life of the historical Jesus." Skeptics include Zannoni himself and unnamed biblical scholars who apparently consider the woman at the well a fabrication not of John but of the "Johannine community." What that community had in mind, we're told, is subversion of the dominant patriarchy and an "affirmation of new roles for women."
Ye gods. "Johannine community" is a red-flag phrase all by itself, and I can't say I've missed it since taking college courses in systematic theology and rhetorical theory back in the day. You only assign authorship to a community rather than to a person when you want to dilute responsibility for the book in question. Go far enough down that road, and scripture becomes a collection of folk tales.
Bloggers at The Seventh Age were quick to spot the flimsiness of Zannoni's interpretation ("Sure you can lift a few quotes, throw in some historical-critical speculation and come up with a subversive anti-patriarchal reading to lay the groundwork for the ordination of women, but it doesn't hold together very well in light of the gospel narratives as a whole or the tradition that has guided interpretation of this passage").
What's surprising to me, however, is that Zannoni's argument ever got beyond a first draft, seeing as how even he recognizes that scripture itself accounts for each of the three "irregularities" he cites. Because there's no point in reading his column when you can read my blog post about it instead, here's what he says, and why it's madder than a March hare:
Charge one: men and women of that culture would not ordinarily be in the same place at the same time. Answer: "Most likely she is at the well at this time because the women of her village shunned her," per John 4:16-18.
Charge two: Women did not typically speak with strange men in public. Answer: The woman herself acknowledges that, and so do Jesus' astonished disciples.
Charge three: After conversing with Jesus, the woman goes to the (male-only) marketplace to tell her neighbors about their conversation. Unusually bold, that. Answer, from the story itself: Would a woman who had had five husbands and a live-in lover have been timid? Moreover, her life had just changed, and she felt compelled to spread the good news-- not unlike Mary Magdalen, it should be remembered.
What Zannoni doesn't understand is that to read the unusual aspects of the woman at the well story as evidence for the proposition that Cindy Lou Who and her Samaritan friends in the Johannine church made it up as a homework assignment for some first-century "Gender and Power" class misunderstands the nature of any encounter with Jesus. That's not me going out on a limb, it's just helpful, garden-variety exegesis of the kind I got from Father Tony yesterday and from lay theologian Mark Price earlier last week.
Both men reminded me that when you meet Jesus, your life changes.
It's a law of nature and of nature's God that can be seen without exception throughout scripture-- even in the infancy stories, Price said, where the Magi meet the baby Jesus and "return to their own country by a different way."
On the other hand, if your life hasn't changed after meeting Jesus, then it's fair to question whether you actually met Jesus, and whether you believe what you say you do.
Some people have trouble with that because sounds-- and is-- judgmental. But it's an assertion amply supported by evidence both in and out of scripture.
Here's another way to look at this: Awed by the sacrifices of Americans in the battle of Iwo Jima sixty years ago, Admiral Chester W. Nimitz famously said that "uncommon valor was a common virtue." Multiple military decorations (including Medals of Honor, some of them posthumous) bore witness to the truth of his assessment. And the admiral was talking about courage in the face of hardship and death.
What John and the other gospel writers give us is infinitely more powerful than even that: it's a love letter; a record of our own encounter with the Author of Life.
Of course Jesus is a catalyst for change-- from Saul to Paul, from sinner to penitent, from fearful fishermen to bold "fishers of men" -- it's all there. To miss that is to mistake living water for a dead pool.
Fortunately, you don't have to be Mark Twain to see the difference between a bird bath and a river.
It's people like the Samaritan woman at the well who show the rest of us Christians how to "give reasons for the hope that is in us." When "higher criticism" lumps her with Jessica "I'm not bad, I'm just drawn that way" Rabbit, it's time to junk the higher criticism and reflect instead on the signficance and specificity of that story.
UPDATE, March 1: More information on the authorship of John's Gospel (and why it's attributed to, uh, John) can be found here and here.
Monday, February 28, 2005
Saturday, February 26, 2005
Notes from the peanut gallery
I probably won't be watching the Academy Awards. I've seen nothing that was nominated for Best Picture, (wanting to see Ray and Hotel Rwanda doesn't count). One friend told me that he and his daughter were deeply moved by Million Dollar Baby, and my wife had nice things to say about The Aviator, but I'd be surprised if it's Martin Scorcese's best work, as a gold statuette would falsely imply.
I'm not surprised to see that Oscar snubbed Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ. That film was a category unto itself, done better than anyone had a right to expect. Its worldwide box office take and positive impact on people's spiritual lives are validations enough.
It's a disappointment to me that Miracle was shut out of nominations. That retelling of Team USA's 1980 victory over the Soviet Union in the semifinals of the Olympic hockey tournament was honest and expertly crafted.
Instead of showering accolades on Kurt Russell for his brilliant portrayal of Herb Brooks, we get to laud Hillary Swank for her relentlessly downbeat and postmodern retelling of Rocky. It's not the choice I would have made, especially in a year when we lost Christopher Reeve and Terri Schiavo's plight dominated so many headlines.
Over at the Galley Slaves blog run by scribes who toil for the Weekly Standard, a reader named Jason summed up Hollywood's dilemma:
Oscar lost all meaning when Shakespeare in Love won BP over Saving Private Ryan. Sort of like when Ty Detmer won the Heisman over Rocket Ismail in 89.
I haev friends named Jan and Alan whom it's fun to watch even meaningless award shows with, but I agree with Jason on both counts.
I'm not surprised to see that Oscar snubbed Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ. That film was a category unto itself, done better than anyone had a right to expect. Its worldwide box office take and positive impact on people's spiritual lives are validations enough.
It's a disappointment to me that Miracle was shut out of nominations. That retelling of Team USA's 1980 victory over the Soviet Union in the semifinals of the Olympic hockey tournament was honest and expertly crafted.
Instead of showering accolades on Kurt Russell for his brilliant portrayal of Herb Brooks, we get to laud Hillary Swank for her relentlessly downbeat and postmodern retelling of Rocky. It's not the choice I would have made, especially in a year when we lost Christopher Reeve and Terri Schiavo's plight dominated so many headlines.
Over at the Galley Slaves blog run by scribes who toil for the Weekly Standard, a reader named Jason summed up Hollywood's dilemma:
Oscar lost all meaning when Shakespeare in Love won BP over Saving Private Ryan. Sort of like when Ty Detmer won the Heisman over Rocket Ismail in 89.
I haev friends named Jan and Alan whom it's fun to watch even meaningless award shows with, but I agree with Jason on both counts.
Dream job
This would be more satisfying in the short-term than as a career (yeah, I read Jerry Mander's Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television), but still-- somolians by the bucketful to watch Daisy Duke and her cousins professionally?
I love this country.
Mahalo to the Palm Tree Pundit for the tip.
I love this country.
Mahalo to the Palm Tree Pundit for the tip.
Friday, February 25, 2005
Unintended (and caffeinated) consequences
Read enough anecdotes like this one from Jackson Kuhl's short but fascinating history of coffee, and you begin to understand why P.J. O'Rourke once wrote a book called Give War a Chance:
In 1511 coffee was banned in Mecca as being too similar to alcohol. (The ban was overturned 14 years later.) A century later, the Turkish sultan Murad IV became alarmed that coffeehouses were centers of political criticism, so he enacted the 1633 version of campaign finance reform: Coffee was banned, cafés destroyed, and drinkers beaten or beheaded...
The former coffeehouse owners of the Ottoman world relocated to the more hospitable climate of Europe. Merchant trade, European travelers, and Turkish diplomats also spread the bean west. But coffee didn’t enter the Continental mainstream until after the Ottoman Turks were routed from their siege of Vienna by the Poles in 1683, when they left 500 bags of coffee beans behind (the sultan’s ban presumably having been reversed). Vienna’s first coffeehouse opened two years later. As the result of a single battle, Ottoman expansion was halted and European café culture was born...
In 1511 coffee was banned in Mecca as being too similar to alcohol. (The ban was overturned 14 years later.) A century later, the Turkish sultan Murad IV became alarmed that coffeehouses were centers of political criticism, so he enacted the 1633 version of campaign finance reform: Coffee was banned, cafés destroyed, and drinkers beaten or beheaded...
The former coffeehouse owners of the Ottoman world relocated to the more hospitable climate of Europe. Merchant trade, European travelers, and Turkish diplomats also spread the bean west. But coffee didn’t enter the Continental mainstream until after the Ottoman Turks were routed from their siege of Vienna by the Poles in 1683, when they left 500 bags of coffee beans behind (the sultan’s ban presumably having been reversed). Vienna’s first coffeehouse opened two years later. As the result of a single battle, Ottoman expansion was halted and European café culture was born...
Starbucks, of course, was not the only or the best result of Polish victory over the Ottoman Turks. But it's a tidbit I'd never heard before.
Always the underdog
Forget what you know about America being a superpower or even a "hyperpower." Victor Davis Hanson, ever the contrarian, says that one American advantage is that we are so frequently misunderestimated, and usually by our fellow citizens. Okay, Hanson doesn't actually use that Bushism. But it's what he's talking about:
The history of the American military and economy in the 20th century is one of being habitually underestimated, even as the United States defeated Prussian imperialism, German Nazism, Italian fascism, Japanese militarism, and Stalinist Communism.
The "feedback loop" that our system of government provides is a source of great national strength.
There's a pop culture angle in here for those who want to find one, and here's my candidate: If you want to understand how America fights, watch the old Road Runner cartoons. Wile E. Coyote is as American as they get-- always down, but never out, and always field-testing a new gadget from the Acme company.
Sooner or later, the road runner will get tired, and the coyote will still have a cave full of bombs, skis, engines, infrared goggles, and other tools. On that fine day, the Looney Tunes soundtrack will include not just "meep! meep!" but also "burp." And the moral of the story is that you should never bet against an animal who enjoys frequent customer discounts from Federal Express, or a company versatile enough to make everything from giant rubber bands to plastic explosives.
The history of the American military and economy in the 20th century is one of being habitually underestimated, even as the United States defeated Prussian imperialism, German Nazism, Italian fascism, Japanese militarism, and Stalinist Communism.
The "feedback loop" that our system of government provides is a source of great national strength.
There's a pop culture angle in here for those who want to find one, and here's my candidate: If you want to understand how America fights, watch the old Road Runner cartoons. Wile E. Coyote is as American as they get-- always down, but never out, and always field-testing a new gadget from the Acme company.
Sooner or later, the road runner will get tired, and the coyote will still have a cave full of bombs, skis, engines, infrared goggles, and other tools. On that fine day, the Looney Tunes soundtrack will include not just "meep! meep!" but also "burp." And the moral of the story is that you should never bet against an animal who enjoys frequent customer discounts from Federal Express, or a company versatile enough to make everything from giant rubber bands to plastic explosives.
Thursday, February 24, 2005
Along the continuum of faith
J. Budziszewski tells the compelling story of his conversion to Catholicism. Hat tip to Amy Welborn for telling me and lots of other people about this.
Driving Darwinists to distraction
Little things mean a lot, says the old saw, and that's true even in the simmering debate between partisans from the Darwinist and "Intelligent Design" camps.
Jonathan Witt over at Wittingshire is an "Intelligent Design" guy who has kind words for biochemist Michael Behe, author of Darwin's Little Black Box, because Behe's notion of "irreducible complexity" continues to give Darwinists fits.
The problem:
"Evolution by mutation and natural selection must proceed by one slight, functional improvement at a time," and yet (per Behe and others) we know that some of what we see around us either with our eyes or with our instruments is irreducibly complex, meaning that, if you take away any part of it, the whole structure collapses.
Some people say that the old-fashioned mouse trap is one example of irreducible complexity. Behe nominated another: the bacterial flagellum, a weensie little molecular motor whose unique precision leaves physicists grinning "like neighborhood mechanics getting a chance to take apart and learn from a NASCAR racing engine," in Witt's summation.
To the Darwinist argument that just because we can't imagine how evolution could have produced something irreducibly complex doesn't mean such an evolutionary leap is impossible, people in the ID camp say, essentially, don't forget the simpler explanation: that what you're looking at works as designed.
There are historical precedents for invoking Ockham's Razor in this case, as Witt reminds the Darwinists:
Every time we know the causal history of an irreducibly complex system (like the NASCAR racing engine or an electronic circuit), it always turns out to have been the product of an intelligent cause.
In other words, although the case for Intelligent Design is at least as old as Moses, it continues to look good. And the best place to track this argument is over at the Center for Science and Culture, which also looms large in the archives of "Wittingshire's Bag End."
Politically speaking, the Intelligent Design crowd is not anti-Darwin: it just wants equal time (often hard to get, as I wrote last month). One the one hand, design. On the other, descent. On neither side do we find those whom Elmer Fudd would call "tweachewous miscweants."
After all, "The transitional life forms that ostensibly occupy the nodes on Darwin's branching tree of life are unobservable, just as the postulated past activity of a Designer is unobservable."
Jonathan Witt over at Wittingshire is an "Intelligent Design" guy who has kind words for biochemist Michael Behe, author of Darwin's Little Black Box, because Behe's notion of "irreducible complexity" continues to give Darwinists fits.
The problem:
"Evolution by mutation and natural selection must proceed by one slight, functional improvement at a time," and yet (per Behe and others) we know that some of what we see around us either with our eyes or with our instruments is irreducibly complex, meaning that, if you take away any part of it, the whole structure collapses.
Some people say that the old-fashioned mouse trap is one example of irreducible complexity. Behe nominated another: the bacterial flagellum, a weensie little molecular motor whose unique precision leaves physicists grinning "like neighborhood mechanics getting a chance to take apart and learn from a NASCAR racing engine," in Witt's summation.
To the Darwinist argument that just because we can't imagine how evolution could have produced something irreducibly complex doesn't mean such an evolutionary leap is impossible, people in the ID camp say, essentially, don't forget the simpler explanation: that what you're looking at works as designed.
There are historical precedents for invoking Ockham's Razor in this case, as Witt reminds the Darwinists:
Every time we know the causal history of an irreducibly complex system (like the NASCAR racing engine or an electronic circuit), it always turns out to have been the product of an intelligent cause.
In other words, although the case for Intelligent Design is at least as old as Moses, it continues to look good. And the best place to track this argument is over at the Center for Science and Culture, which also looms large in the archives of "Wittingshire's Bag End."
Politically speaking, the Intelligent Design crowd is not anti-Darwin: it just wants equal time (often hard to get, as I wrote last month). One the one hand, design. On the other, descent. On neither side do we find those whom Elmer Fudd would call "tweachewous miscweants."
After all, "The transitional life forms that ostensibly occupy the nodes on Darwin's branching tree of life are unobservable, just as the postulated past activity of a Designer is unobservable."
A certain quality of light
Today was a rainbow day in a long season of the raincoat. On the eastbound leg of my drive home, I found myself wishing that the cockpit of my compact sedan had the full bubble canopy of an F-16 rather than standard roof-and-post engineering.
Cumulonimbus clouds with awesome gray keels scudded majestically across a pale blue sky with their towering tops reflecting the popsicle light of the setting sun. Shadows threw the hills that bracket most of my way into sharp relief under a 180-degree rainbow that was briefly visible from end to end, and the sheen of water on asphalt mirrored the sky so completely that even the road ahead of me glowed robin's egg blue for several miles.
Soon enough the color drained from the sky through a rip in the western horizon, and when the full moon sashayed out from behind a cloud on my right as I was turning north, it looked like a Lemon Cooler rising over purple hills.
Above the moon, scraps of cirrus cloud flared pink before fading away. Below the moon, I tried to absorb this imagery through my windshield, and wished again that I could paint even a third of what I chance to see.
You've heard of Riders of the Purple Sage? I am sometimes a Writer of the Purple Page.
Cumulonimbus clouds with awesome gray keels scudded majestically across a pale blue sky with their towering tops reflecting the popsicle light of the setting sun. Shadows threw the hills that bracket most of my way into sharp relief under a 180-degree rainbow that was briefly visible from end to end, and the sheen of water on asphalt mirrored the sky so completely that even the road ahead of me glowed robin's egg blue for several miles.
Soon enough the color drained from the sky through a rip in the western horizon, and when the full moon sashayed out from behind a cloud on my right as I was turning north, it looked like a Lemon Cooler rising over purple hills.
Above the moon, scraps of cirrus cloud flared pink before fading away. Below the moon, I tried to absorb this imagery through my windshield, and wished again that I could paint even a third of what I chance to see.
You've heard of Riders of the Purple Sage? I am sometimes a Writer of the Purple Page.
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Tastes like chicken
This is one of many nuggets in a 1989 collection of short stories by singer/songwriter Jimmy Buffet, featuring retired cowboy Tully Mars and his horse Mr. Twain. Something tells me there's more than a kernel of truth to this "fictional" entry in a journal that Mars calls "One Cowboy's Search for a Better Place:"
I guess I am destined to dine on Bar-B-Q on this leg of the trip [from Wyoming to the Gulf Coast], and I found a great one just outside Kansas City called Haywards. I picked up a couple of extra bottles of sauce for the road.
It's not that I don't like seafood, but I met a guy back in Jackson Hole once who told me that he made a living by cherry bomb fishing. He would drop his mini-depth charges into the Snake River and then gather up the shell-shocked catfish, fillet them and chop them up with a cookie cutter and sell them to the restaurants up in Yellowstone as sea scallops.
I will wait until I can see the ocean and then I will feast on seafood.
I guess I am destined to dine on Bar-B-Q on this leg of the trip [from Wyoming to the Gulf Coast], and I found a great one just outside Kansas City called Haywards. I picked up a couple of extra bottles of sauce for the road.
It's not that I don't like seafood, but I met a guy back in Jackson Hole once who told me that he made a living by cherry bomb fishing. He would drop his mini-depth charges into the Snake River and then gather up the shell-shocked catfish, fillet them and chop them up with a cookie cutter and sell them to the restaurants up in Yellowstone as sea scallops.
I will wait until I can see the ocean and then I will feast on seafood.
Give him a cookie
David "Iowahawk" Buerge and James Lileks aren't the only gifted satirists in the blogosphere. Hat tip to Charles Johnson for pointing me to Tim Blair's you-are-there report on Rove's Brilliant Plan.
Speaking truth to power
The pope has made a career out of speaking truth to power, and in spite of his obvious frailty and Parkinson's disease, he's still going strong (see, for example, the new apostolic letter on the media).
Jeremy Lott, in a wonderfully-titled post ("Peeves make great pets") identifies yet another instance of willful befuddlement among secularists with regard to all things Catholic or papal.
UPDATE, February 24: Hugh Hewitt has some good thoughts on the aforementioned apostolic letter.
Jeremy Lott, in a wonderfully-titled post ("Peeves make great pets") identifies yet another instance of willful befuddlement among secularists with regard to all things Catholic or papal.
UPDATE, February 24: Hugh Hewitt has some good thoughts on the aforementioned apostolic letter.
UPDATE, March 2: Ed Cook weighs in on the matter with typical intelligence.
Spotting the weakness in civil rights leadership
"You never see Jesse Jackson debating anybody. You never see Al Sharpton debating anybody. You see them making pronouncements... And they're very good at rhyming. Maybe they're aspiring poets."
-- Roy Innis, Chairman and CEO of the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE), in an interview on this morning's Laura Ingraham radio show.
-- Roy Innis, Chairman and CEO of the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE), in an interview on this morning's Laura Ingraham radio show.
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Catholic Carnival Number 18
Step right up to the Catholic Carnival now playing at a blog near you. I have a concession stand selling funnel cakes near the Ferris Wheel, but there's lots of good stuff to be found all over the fairgrounds.
Tom Wolfe is wrong
Tom Wolfe is seldom wrong when he says anything about writing, but no way is Hunter S. Thompson a worthy successor to Mark Twain, much less "the century's greatest comic writer in the English language."
As Annalucia asked at the Lucianne.com news forum, "hasn't Wolfe ever heard of P.G. Wodehouse?"
Wodehouse in Ring for Jeeves:
It was a confusion of ideas between him and one of the lions he was hunting in Kenya that had caused A. B. Spottsworth to make the obituary column. He thought the lion was dead, and the lion thought it wasn't.
Wodehouse in Uncle Dynamite:
He blinked, like some knight of King Arthur’s court, who, galloping to perform a deed of derring-do, has had the misfortune to collide with a tree.
Steve at Hog on Ice summed up Mr. Thompson more accurately than Mr. Wolfe did, writing, "He was born with the kind of tools that get people Pulitzers, and he used them to turn his life into an underground comic."
As Annalucia asked at the Lucianne.com news forum, "hasn't Wolfe ever heard of P.G. Wodehouse?"
Wodehouse in Ring for Jeeves:
It was a confusion of ideas between him and one of the lions he was hunting in Kenya that had caused A. B. Spottsworth to make the obituary column. He thought the lion was dead, and the lion thought it wasn't.
Wodehouse in Uncle Dynamite:
He blinked, like some knight of King Arthur’s court, who, galloping to perform a deed of derring-do, has had the misfortune to collide with a tree.
Steve at Hog on Ice summed up Mr. Thompson more accurately than Mr. Wolfe did, writing, "He was born with the kind of tools that get people Pulitzers, and he used them to turn his life into an underground comic."
She might be killed today
Terri Schindler-Schiavo, that is, if her estranged husband succeeds in getting her feeding tube removed. And if you haven't been following the case of that brain-damaged but communicative Florida woman, what it boils down to is whether you believe giving someone food and water constitutes providing "extraordinary means" of life support.
The Catholic answer is "No, of course not." Her parents' answer is "no, of course not."
But her estranged husband is a piece of work. His answer is "How can I miss you when you won't go away?" which in this case would mean he cashes in on an insurance policy worth about eight hundred thousand dollars.
As a few bloggers have figured out, "power-wielding in a democracy can be gerrymandered by determining who counts as a person."
Terri counts.
The Catholic answer is "No, of course not." Her parents' answer is "no, of course not."
But her estranged husband is a piece of work. His answer is "How can I miss you when you won't go away?" which in this case would mean he cashes in on an insurance policy worth about eight hundred thousand dollars.
As a few bloggers have figured out, "power-wielding in a democracy can be gerrymandered by determining who counts as a person."
Terri counts.
The case for saving Hamilton
There are a fair number of well-meaning people who say we should boot Alexander Hamilton off the ten dollar bill to make room for a portrait of Ray Charles, but I'm not one of them, and my new essay in The American Spectator online explains why.
That essay also explains the link in my head between the late, great Ray Charles and the late, great John Candy.
UPDATE, February 23: Followup letters from me and my readers in the AmSpec letters section.
Monday, February 21, 2005
I could give you my word as a Spaniard...
So says Inigo to Dread Pirate Roberts, only to hear "No good. I've known too many Spaniards."
Fortunately for all of us, Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote, and Sancho Panza do what they can to hold up the side (hat tip to Orrin Judd for his analysis, and the link to an essay on Don Quixote by Simon Jenkins).
Fortunately for all of us, Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote, and Sancho Panza do what they can to hold up the side (hat tip to Orrin Judd for his analysis, and the link to an essay on Don Quixote by Simon Jenkins).
Failing toward success
Sparked by an email from a scandalized reader, Amy Welborn defends Graham Greene's novel, The Power and the Glory. I like that book, too (recommended it to a friend only days ago), and I've already thrown my own two cents into the comments box at Open Book.
Thinking about the transfiguration
I mentioned once before that Amy Welborn wants to know what the rest of us hear in church on Sunday. She said she was almost afraid to ask, but I think it's a good idea-- when you want to have something to say on her blog, a sermon is less likely to go in one ear and out the other.
Our homily yesterday was from a circuit-riding priest who substitutes when Fr. Pat and Fr. Tony are out. He's a small guy with a thick mane of fashionably long white hair. Looks like a retired bookie, but knows his theology up, down, and sideways. He preached on Matthew 17:1-9, the story of the transfiguration, emphasizing its unusually rich symbolism.
Jesus' transfigured face shines like the sun, in the same way that Moses' face shone when he came down from Mount Sinai, Father Bookie pointed out. Proximity to God will always do that. And, he reminded us, Catholic theology speaks of Jesus in a threefold role as "priest, prophet, and king," so it's no accident that He converses here with Moses the law giver and Elijah the prophet.
Father Bookie also asked us to think back to the previous time in scripture when God's voice says, "This is My beloved Son" -- it happens first at Jesus' baptism in the Jordan River. This time, the priest noted, there is one difference: Mindful of the fact the Jesus' earthly ministry is drawing to a close, God adds "Listen to Him."
It is also significant, we were told, that when the disciples who witness these wonders throw themselves to the ground in fear for their lives, Jesus touches them and says,"Do not be afraid." That, too, is a recurring New Testament theme-- and for Father Bookie it suggsts that Jesus wants us to be transfigured just as He was. "Do not be afraid" means "Do not be afraid to follow me; do not be afraid to take up my yoke."
Our homily yesterday was from a circuit-riding priest who substitutes when Fr. Pat and Fr. Tony are out. He's a small guy with a thick mane of fashionably long white hair. Looks like a retired bookie, but knows his theology up, down, and sideways. He preached on Matthew 17:1-9, the story of the transfiguration, emphasizing its unusually rich symbolism.
Jesus' transfigured face shines like the sun, in the same way that Moses' face shone when he came down from Mount Sinai, Father Bookie pointed out. Proximity to God will always do that. And, he reminded us, Catholic theology speaks of Jesus in a threefold role as "priest, prophet, and king," so it's no accident that He converses here with Moses the law giver and Elijah the prophet.
Father Bookie also asked us to think back to the previous time in scripture when God's voice says, "This is My beloved Son" -- it happens first at Jesus' baptism in the Jordan River. This time, the priest noted, there is one difference: Mindful of the fact the Jesus' earthly ministry is drawing to a close, God adds "Listen to Him."
It is also significant, we were told, that when the disciples who witness these wonders throw themselves to the ground in fear for their lives, Jesus touches them and says,"Do not be afraid." That, too, is a recurring New Testament theme-- and for Father Bookie it suggsts that Jesus wants us to be transfigured just as He was. "Do not be afraid" means "Do not be afraid to follow me; do not be afraid to take up my yoke."
Movin' on up
It's sure to be a fleeting kind of glory, but this blog, long an "Adorable Little Rodent" in N.Z. Bear's ecosystem rankings, just evolved into a "Marauding Marsupial."
Sincere thanks to my handful of regular readers and to anyone who links to entries made here-- I''ll implement a "trackback" feature when I can spare the brain cells.
Sincere thanks to my handful of regular readers and to anyone who links to entries made here-- I''ll implement a "trackback" feature when I can spare the brain cells.
Sunday, February 20, 2005
Humor me
Some days I feels like lootin'. Some days I feels like plunderin'. Some days I feels like beating someone senseless with me fists and forehead. And some days I just feels, "not so fresh."
But ne'er a day goes by that I don't feel like getting blistering drunk and playing "Full Contact Scrabble!"
Thar be a triple word score and a belayin' pin to the noggin here fer all!
(So says Mark "Cap'n Slappy" Summers, master and commander of the web site devoted to Talk Like a Pirate Day)
Also high on my list of amusing web sites: The Origami Boulder Company, The Somerville Gates, and How to Speak Clouseauese
But ne'er a day goes by that I don't feel like getting blistering drunk and playing "Full Contact Scrabble!"
Thar be a triple word score and a belayin' pin to the noggin here fer all!
(So says Mark "Cap'n Slappy" Summers, master and commander of the web site devoted to Talk Like a Pirate Day)
Also high on my list of amusing web sites: The Origami Boulder Company, The Somerville Gates, and How to Speak Clouseauese
Saturday, February 19, 2005
Your mission, should you choose to accept it...
"As missionaries to a world that takes itself too seriously and not seriously enough, it is our vocation to develop a 'habit of being' that, imbued with sacramental sensibility, points to our ultimate end, the really real world-- and to convince the [troubled] world that this is a wonderful thing."
George Wiegel, as contemplated by Washerwoman Jordan and lightly edited by me (Jordan's tagline -- "when I'm done here, I've got loads to do"-- works on so many levels, it's scary).
MEMO to the secular Left: You might want to re-think that "reality-based" vs. "faith-based" thing that you flirted with for awhile. From where I stand, the only reality-based community is the church. In other words, faith doesn't oppose reason; faith is reasonable. Let's not forget that nearly all older universties were founded as schools of theology.
As Donald Rumsfeld said in a different context using words that apply even here, "There are known knowns. There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns. That is to say, we know there are some things we do not know."
George Wiegel, as contemplated by Washerwoman Jordan and lightly edited by me (Jordan's tagline -- "when I'm done here, I've got loads to do"-- works on so many levels, it's scary).
MEMO to the secular Left: You might want to re-think that "reality-based" vs. "faith-based" thing that you flirted with for awhile. From where I stand, the only reality-based community is the church. In other words, faith doesn't oppose reason; faith is reasonable. Let's not forget that nearly all older universties were founded as schools of theology.
As Donald Rumsfeld said in a different context using words that apply even here, "There are known knowns. There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns. That is to say, we know there are some things we do not know."
Speaking of Presidents' Day
Grover Cleveland and Calvin Coolidge (not the presidents commemorated by the holiday) deserve more credit than they usually get. Washington deserves everything he gets. And Lincoln, who lead America's second Revolution as surely as Washington lead her first Revolution, should forever be remembered after Washington (there's only one true answer to "who was our greatest president?").
Friday, February 18, 2005
Sixty Percent Dixie?
I took this quiz twice. First time through, it pegged me at 48% ("Barely a Yankee"). Second time through it pegged me at 60% Dixie ("Definitively Southern").
Curious, those results. But I'm rather fond of them. It's the south and the west rather than the taciturn northeast that values people who can talk story. Even if you exclude Faulkner, the Southern literary tradition beats the northern literary tradition six ways from Sunday. Take Florence King, Flannery O'Connor, and Margaret Mitchell. Add John Kennedy Toole, Harper Lee, Pat Conroy, and Richard Bradford. Match them up against an equal number of Northern authors, and what have you got? A rout.
But I oughtn't make too much of my own literary favorites in a quiz like this. More likely, people who were born and raised in Hawai'i confuse the software's linguistic algorithm -- we're so far west we're halfway east.
And if you've spent a Lenten Friday night in a church hall at a fish fry hosted by the Knights of Columbus, you can be excused for having crawdads on the brain.
Curious, those results. But I'm rather fond of them. It's the south and the west rather than the taciturn northeast that values people who can talk story. Even if you exclude Faulkner, the Southern literary tradition beats the northern literary tradition six ways from Sunday. Take Florence King, Flannery O'Connor, and Margaret Mitchell. Add John Kennedy Toole, Harper Lee, Pat Conroy, and Richard Bradford. Match them up against an equal number of Northern authors, and what have you got? A rout.
But I oughtn't make too much of my own literary favorites in a quiz like this. More likely, people who were born and raised in Hawai'i confuse the software's linguistic algorithm -- we're so far west we're halfway east.
And if you've spent a Lenten Friday night in a church hall at a fish fry hosted by the Knights of Columbus, you can be excused for having crawdads on the brain.
Dear God, we never had this conversation...
William F. Buckley, Jr., writing earlier this month about the pope:
So, what is wrong with praying for his death? For relief from his manifest sufferings? And for the opportunity to pay honor to his legacy by turning to the responsibility of electing a successor to get on with John Paul's work?
Colby Cosh, musing over Buckley's essay yesterday:
Buckley has fallen into the universal error of equating sickness with suffering. Which is, or may be, the fundamental solecism on which the "culture of death" is founded. Do we lament John Paul II's illness because it makes him uncomfortable, or because it makes us uncomfortable? I'm afraid I believe the answer to be embarrassingly self-evident.
George Weigel, on mental reservations (like Buckley's) about joining other people's prayers:
I particularly dislike the now-widespread custom of jumping immediately from a pro forma prayer for the universal church or the pope to a second, much lengthier petition for some political desideratum, often accompanied by a protracted secondary clause suggesting, not too subtly, that all social goods are to be secured by government action.
[...]
Am I making too big a deal out of this? I don't think so. The worship we offer God, including our intercessory prayer, should arise out of our deepest Catholic convictions. It shouldn't be shaped, and mis-shaped, by the shibboleths of the therapeutic society.
It all fits together. And Colby Cosh isn't even Catholic. But he seems to understand redemptive suffering better than Buckley does (also better than Episcopalian Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold, for that matter).
So, what is wrong with praying for his death? For relief from his manifest sufferings? And for the opportunity to pay honor to his legacy by turning to the responsibility of electing a successor to get on with John Paul's work?
Colby Cosh, musing over Buckley's essay yesterday:
Buckley has fallen into the universal error of equating sickness with suffering. Which is, or may be, the fundamental solecism on which the "culture of death" is founded. Do we lament John Paul II's illness because it makes him uncomfortable, or because it makes us uncomfortable? I'm afraid I believe the answer to be embarrassingly self-evident.
George Weigel, on mental reservations (like Buckley's) about joining other people's prayers:
I particularly dislike the now-widespread custom of jumping immediately from a pro forma prayer for the universal church or the pope to a second, much lengthier petition for some political desideratum, often accompanied by a protracted secondary clause suggesting, not too subtly, that all social goods are to be secured by government action.
[...]
Am I making too big a deal out of this? I don't think so. The worship we offer God, including our intercessory prayer, should arise out of our deepest Catholic convictions. It shouldn't be shaped, and mis-shaped, by the shibboleths of the therapeutic society.
It all fits together. And Colby Cosh isn't even Catholic. But he seems to understand redemptive suffering better than Buckley does (also better than Episcopalian Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold, for that matter).
School lunch
Another in the occasional series I should probably call "things I learn from my children while driving them around."
My wife is helping a mutual friend with some of her move-in chores, so I had drop-off duty this morning, and was quizzing Thomas and Jane on the way to school. Should have done that before we walked out the door towing the puppy, but better late than never.
"Got your lunch money?"
"Yes, dad."
"Got those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in case you want to add to the cafeteria food?"
"Yes, dad."
"How about the banana?"
(Jane): "Ooops. I forgot that."
(Thomas): "She doesn't eat bananas anyway."
"I thought it was a little wierd when you said you were going to use it for show and tell."
(Jane): "Actually, I needed a banana phone."
"What?"
"We use bananas to play banana phone."
"Who's we?"
"Me and Avery."
"You mean you never eat the banana, you only play with it?"
(Thomas): "Yes."
"I want to hear it from Jane."
(Jane): "Yes, daddy."
"How are you going to play banana phone with no banana?"
(Jane): "Avery usually has one. We can pass it back and forth and talk into it."
"Okay. But you you better not waste those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches."
(Thomas): "We won't. But thanks for the lunch money."
(Jane): "Yeah, and thanks for making my sandwich humongous."
"I bet it's the only heart-shaped sandwich at school."
(Jane): "Probably. But making it like that was mommy's idea. She said it means 'mommy loves you.'"
"Well, if daddy makes it like that, then it means daddy loves you, too."
My wife is helping a mutual friend with some of her move-in chores, so I had drop-off duty this morning, and was quizzing Thomas and Jane on the way to school. Should have done that before we walked out the door towing the puppy, but better late than never.
"Got your lunch money?"
"Yes, dad."
"Got those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in case you want to add to the cafeteria food?"
"Yes, dad."
"How about the banana?"
(Jane): "Ooops. I forgot that."
(Thomas): "She doesn't eat bananas anyway."
"I thought it was a little wierd when you said you were going to use it for show and tell."
(Jane): "Actually, I needed a banana phone."
"What?"
"We use bananas to play banana phone."
"Who's we?"
"Me and Avery."
"You mean you never eat the banana, you only play with it?"
(Thomas): "Yes."
"I want to hear it from Jane."
(Jane): "Yes, daddy."
"How are you going to play banana phone with no banana?"
(Jane): "Avery usually has one. We can pass it back and forth and talk into it."
"Okay. But you you better not waste those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches."
(Thomas): "We won't. But thanks for the lunch money."
(Jane): "Yeah, and thanks for making my sandwich humongous."
"I bet it's the only heart-shaped sandwich at school."
(Jane): "Probably. But making it like that was mommy's idea. She said it means 'mommy loves you.'"
"Well, if daddy makes it like that, then it means daddy loves you, too."
Culture of death AND dishonesty
You have perhaps heard the one about how the number of abortions while Bill Clinton was president was lower than the number of abortions while George H.W. Bush was president?
Apologists for the party with the "pro-choice" plank in its platform wheeled that stat out from behind door number one last year, while trying to graft a backbone onto John Kerry's incoherent posturing about how he was "personally opposed" to abortion but couldn't let an "article of faith" interfere with fundraising dinners hosted by Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Rights League.
Their raw numbers were correct, but as some on the pro-life side quickly pointed out, a statistic alone is not enough to prove a cause-and-effect link, especially when that link is counterintuitive, and affected by things with which a president has very little to do, like population demographics and improvements in ultrasound technology.
It turns out that John Kerry's failure to top George W. Bush's sixty million votes sent the whole "babies are safer with Democrats in the Oval Office" argument back to the drawing board, and now we're starting to hear version 2.0, which is "nobody likes abortion, so let's all work together to reduce the need for it."
Here's hoping the new pitch falls equally flat. If nobody likes abortion, why do NOW and NARAL throw a party every year on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade? Why does Planned Parenthood continue making money off this awful "choice"? Why do the usual suspects rail against school programs that encourage abstinence for teenagers? Why do its supporters insist on calling it a right? And why do condoms distributed by Planned Parenthood have a higher rate of failure than other condoms? (I'd link to that study if I remembered where I saw it; the irony involved is almost surreal).
Apart from all that, there is a huge philosophical problem with the "every child a wanted child" mantra. I alluded to that problem while reviewing a book by Leon Kass sometime back, because Kass, although reluctant in that book to talk much about abortion, still saw the Brave New World angle to both abortion and cloning that too many professional lobbyists for "choice" miss:
"Thanks to our belief that all children should be wanted children…sooner or later, only those children who fulfill our wants will be fully acceptable.”
You get the idea. So does James Akin, who gifts the rest of us with an excellent fisking of a letter from NARAL touting the virtues of legislation advanced by the Senate Minority Leader, Mr. Harry "I have all the charisma of a wet dishtowel" Reid.
UPDATE: I remembered, and added a link.
Apologists for the party with the "pro-choice" plank in its platform wheeled that stat out from behind door number one last year, while trying to graft a backbone onto John Kerry's incoherent posturing about how he was "personally opposed" to abortion but couldn't let an "article of faith" interfere with fundraising dinners hosted by Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Rights League.
Their raw numbers were correct, but as some on the pro-life side quickly pointed out, a statistic alone is not enough to prove a cause-and-effect link, especially when that link is counterintuitive, and affected by things with which a president has very little to do, like population demographics and improvements in ultrasound technology.
It turns out that John Kerry's failure to top George W. Bush's sixty million votes sent the whole "babies are safer with Democrats in the Oval Office" argument back to the drawing board, and now we're starting to hear version 2.0, which is "nobody likes abortion, so let's all work together to reduce the need for it."
Here's hoping the new pitch falls equally flat. If nobody likes abortion, why do NOW and NARAL throw a party every year on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade? Why does Planned Parenthood continue making money off this awful "choice"? Why do the usual suspects rail against school programs that encourage abstinence for teenagers? Why do its supporters insist on calling it a right? And why do condoms distributed by Planned Parenthood have a higher rate of failure than other condoms? (I'd link to that study if I remembered where I saw it; the irony involved is almost surreal).
Apart from all that, there is a huge philosophical problem with the "every child a wanted child" mantra. I alluded to that problem while reviewing a book by Leon Kass sometime back, because Kass, although reluctant in that book to talk much about abortion, still saw the Brave New World angle to both abortion and cloning that too many professional lobbyists for "choice" miss:
"Thanks to our belief that all children should be wanted children…sooner or later, only those children who fulfill our wants will be fully acceptable.”
You get the idea. So does James Akin, who gifts the rest of us with an excellent fisking of a letter from NARAL touting the virtues of legislation advanced by the Senate Minority Leader, Mr. Harry "I have all the charisma of a wet dishtowel" Reid.
UPDATE: I remembered, and added a link.
Thursday, February 17, 2005
Pssst....Mr. Defense Attorney?
(an open letter to the young lawyer representing a woman accused of driving under the influence of alcohol when I reported for jury duty yesterday)
Dear Sir,
Neither you nor the Assistant DA chose to impanel me in this case, but because the judge was kind enough to explain the matter at hand to those of us in the jury pool, and because I listened to several rounds of your questions for prospective jurors, I thought I'd offer some free advice.
You and the ADA played to your respective strengths. From her we got the dimpled smile and the compassionate head tilt. From you we got the self-deprecating humor and the direct gaze. Good stuff.
But you both kept asking how we feel-- about police officers, breathalyzer tests, DUI laws, expert witnesses, and the judicial system generally. I hope with more experience you'll both learn to ask potential jurors about what we think, as well. After all, when the judge explained the difference between civil and criminal cases as a difference between "preponderance of evidence" on the civil side and "beyond a reasonable doubt" on the criminal side, he was appealing to our minds rather than to our hearts. We managed to understand him.
I gather from your line of questioning that your strategy in this case will be to present an expert witness or two to contradict the sworn testimony of the police officers who arrested your client.
I understand that cops make mistakes. But my dad was a cop. And had you asked me what you asked nearly every other potential juror -- whether I would assign more weight to the testimony of a man or woman with a badge than to a "civilian," just because of the badge -- I'd have answered differently than most of my peers did.
You'll recall that most of the people to whom you posed that question said they'd be fair to everyone, in uniform or not. We knew better than to assign undue weight to the shield, because you set your favorite question up that way, and rephrased it several times ("If your friend said he saw a white dog and you heard a police officer in court say that it was a black dog, who would you believe, and why?"--- bad example. At least you finally told the woman confused by that story to "forget the dog," though I got the impression the judge was wishing you'd said that sooner. I was all ready to say the dog was an Australian Shepherd--- black and white-- just to punish you).
I get that you were trying to uncover biases. Part of your job. Here's your problem with people like me, however: I would not assign more weight to the word of a cop just because he or she has a badge. The badge itself does not impress me. But I do know what it signifies, and I think it counts for a lot that police officers are trained observers, whereas most civilians are not. Other things being equal, I cut cops some slack for just that reason. There is a difference between people trained in a particular discipline and people who are not.
So if ever you're looking to impanel someone like me for one of your cases, you might rethink some of your questions.
Otherwise, assistant DAs in black plastic glasses and low-end designer suits will leave you and your clients with nothing to show for your courtroom time but a lingering memory of their perfume. Pleasant as that might be in cases like the one you were impaneling jurors for yesterday, it won't help your won-loss record.
Sincerely,
The Paragraph Farmer
Dear Sir,
Neither you nor the Assistant DA chose to impanel me in this case, but because the judge was kind enough to explain the matter at hand to those of us in the jury pool, and because I listened to several rounds of your questions for prospective jurors, I thought I'd offer some free advice.
You and the ADA played to your respective strengths. From her we got the dimpled smile and the compassionate head tilt. From you we got the self-deprecating humor and the direct gaze. Good stuff.
But you both kept asking how we feel-- about police officers, breathalyzer tests, DUI laws, expert witnesses, and the judicial system generally. I hope with more experience you'll both learn to ask potential jurors about what we think, as well. After all, when the judge explained the difference between civil and criminal cases as a difference between "preponderance of evidence" on the civil side and "beyond a reasonable doubt" on the criminal side, he was appealing to our minds rather than to our hearts. We managed to understand him.
I gather from your line of questioning that your strategy in this case will be to present an expert witness or two to contradict the sworn testimony of the police officers who arrested your client.
I understand that cops make mistakes. But my dad was a cop. And had you asked me what you asked nearly every other potential juror -- whether I would assign more weight to the testimony of a man or woman with a badge than to a "civilian," just because of the badge -- I'd have answered differently than most of my peers did.
You'll recall that most of the people to whom you posed that question said they'd be fair to everyone, in uniform or not. We knew better than to assign undue weight to the shield, because you set your favorite question up that way, and rephrased it several times ("If your friend said he saw a white dog and you heard a police officer in court say that it was a black dog, who would you believe, and why?"--- bad example. At least you finally told the woman confused by that story to "forget the dog," though I got the impression the judge was wishing you'd said that sooner. I was all ready to say the dog was an Australian Shepherd--- black and white-- just to punish you).
I get that you were trying to uncover biases. Part of your job. Here's your problem with people like me, however: I would not assign more weight to the word of a cop just because he or she has a badge. The badge itself does not impress me. But I do know what it signifies, and I think it counts for a lot that police officers are trained observers, whereas most civilians are not. Other things being equal, I cut cops some slack for just that reason. There is a difference between people trained in a particular discipline and people who are not.
So if ever you're looking to impanel someone like me for one of your cases, you might rethink some of your questions.
Otherwise, assistant DAs in black plastic glasses and low-end designer suits will leave you and your clients with nothing to show for your courtroom time but a lingering memory of their perfume. Pleasant as that might be in cases like the one you were impaneling jurors for yesterday, it won't help your won-loss record.
Sincerely,
The Paragraph Farmer
Good old Saint Ogg
That's what my friend Brigette once called Augustine of Hippo, if you transcribe speech phonetically. The wily North African remains as relevant as ever. Per the people at "GetReligion," you can sometimes find Augustinian influence even in magazines like GQ. Really.
John Jeremiah Sullivan went to a Christian music festival and found himself moved in unexpected ways, especially after befriending some West Virginians:
The fire had burned to glowing coals, and now it was just we men, sitting on coolers, talking late-night hermeneutics blues. Bub didn't see how God could change His mind, how He could say all that crazy shit in the Old Testament—like don't get tattoos and don't look at your uncle naked—then take it back in the New.
"Think about it this way," I said. "If you do something that really makes Darius mad, and he's pissed at you, but then you do something to make it up to him, and he forgives you, that isn't him changing his mind. The situation has changed. It's the same with the old and new covenants, except Jesus did the making up."
Bub seemed pleased with this explanation. "I never heard anyone say it like that," he said. But Darius stared at me gimlet-eyed across the fire. He knew my gloss was theologically sound, and he wondered where I'd gotten it. The guys had been gracefully dancing around the question of what I believed—"where my walk was at," as they would have put it—all night.
Sullivan wouldn't actually admit to being on a walk with Jesus, because most often he thinks he's not.
But he's an honest writer, and because of that he rediscovers the truth of what Augustine said many years ago. You know the line. It was Aug (or Ogg, if you prefer) in prayer, finally realizing that "you have made us for yourself, O Lord. Our hearts are restless until they rest in you."
Sullivan's paraphrase of Augustine is nearly as good. Writing of Jesus, he says:
Why should He vex me? Why is His ghost not friendlier? Why can't I just be a good Enlightenment child and see in His life a sustaining example of what we can be, as a species?
Because once you've known Him as God, it's hard to find comfort in the man. The sheer sensation of life that comes with a total, all-pervading notion of being—the pulse of consequence one projects onto even the humblest things—the pull of that won't slacken.
And one has doubts about one's doubts.
Exactly.
UPDATE: God in the details? Will Wilkinson is perhaps unclear on the concept.
John Jeremiah Sullivan went to a Christian music festival and found himself moved in unexpected ways, especially after befriending some West Virginians:
The fire had burned to glowing coals, and now it was just we men, sitting on coolers, talking late-night hermeneutics blues. Bub didn't see how God could change His mind, how He could say all that crazy shit in the Old Testament—like don't get tattoos and don't look at your uncle naked—then take it back in the New.
"Think about it this way," I said. "If you do something that really makes Darius mad, and he's pissed at you, but then you do something to make it up to him, and he forgives you, that isn't him changing his mind. The situation has changed. It's the same with the old and new covenants, except Jesus did the making up."
Bub seemed pleased with this explanation. "I never heard anyone say it like that," he said. But Darius stared at me gimlet-eyed across the fire. He knew my gloss was theologically sound, and he wondered where I'd gotten it. The guys had been gracefully dancing around the question of what I believed—"where my walk was at," as they would have put it—all night.
Sullivan wouldn't actually admit to being on a walk with Jesus, because most often he thinks he's not.
But he's an honest writer, and because of that he rediscovers the truth of what Augustine said many years ago. You know the line. It was Aug (or Ogg, if you prefer) in prayer, finally realizing that "you have made us for yourself, O Lord. Our hearts are restless until they rest in you."
Sullivan's paraphrase of Augustine is nearly as good. Writing of Jesus, he says:
Why should He vex me? Why is His ghost not friendlier? Why can't I just be a good Enlightenment child and see in His life a sustaining example of what we can be, as a species?
Because once you've known Him as God, it's hard to find comfort in the man. The sheer sensation of life that comes with a total, all-pervading notion of being—the pulse of consequence one projects onto even the humblest things—the pull of that won't slacken.
And one has doubts about one's doubts.
Exactly.
UPDATE: God in the details? Will Wilkinson is perhaps unclear on the concept.
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
Ride the River (a review)
Louis L'Amour writes like a girl, and when he's telling the story of 16-year-old Echo Sackett, that's an excellent thing to do. Echo leaves her mountain home in 1840 to claim an unexpected inheritance in the City of Philadelphia, and Ride the River is principally about her efforts to outwit and outfight the criminals who want to make sure she doesn't get back to the mountains with what is rightfully hers.
Echo, every inch the lady, has spunk and smarts enough to go with the knife she calls her "Arkansas Toothpick." Being a Sackett, she also has a lively sense of her family history. As in most L'Amour books, the Sackett ethos -- help your kin at any cost -- is on full display here. I also enjoyed the book because it includes a free black man and a gallant city boy, not to mention serious villains. Their adventures, and reactions to them, are true to the time and place of which they're part.
It's also worth noting that the moral code that suffuses this book -- the idea that doing good deeds is like scattering bread on the water -- is L'Amour's version of what author Catherine Ryan Hyde would famously call "Pay it Forward" many years later.
In short, on the river or off of it, Echo Sackett is good company, and not just another pretty face. She reminds me of a family friend who ignored the unspoken navy blue dress code to interview for an elementary school teaching job wearing a lime-green skirt and matching Eisenhower jacket. You'll enjoy her story even if you haven't had the good fortune of knowing a young woman of such character.
Echo, every inch the lady, has spunk and smarts enough to go with the knife she calls her "Arkansas Toothpick." Being a Sackett, she also has a lively sense of her family history. As in most L'Amour books, the Sackett ethos -- help your kin at any cost -- is on full display here. I also enjoyed the book because it includes a free black man and a gallant city boy, not to mention serious villains. Their adventures, and reactions to them, are true to the time and place of which they're part.
It's also worth noting that the moral code that suffuses this book -- the idea that doing good deeds is like scattering bread on the water -- is L'Amour's version of what author Catherine Ryan Hyde would famously call "Pay it Forward" many years later.
In short, on the river or off of it, Echo Sackett is good company, and not just another pretty face. She reminds me of a family friend who ignored the unspoken navy blue dress code to interview for an elementary school teaching job wearing a lime-green skirt and matching Eisenhower jacket. You'll enjoy her story even if you haven't had the good fortune of knowing a young woman of such character.
Taking cudgels to persistent myths
- Popular Mechanics debunks myths about the attacks of September 11, 2001.
- Terri Schindler-Schiavo's friends debunk myths about her condition.
- William J. Dyer, aka "Beldar," explodes myths about Senate treatment of nominees to the federal bench.
- Patrick J. Michaels fillets myths about the Kyoto Protocol on global warming.
Yes, villagers in Blogville are roaming the woods with torches and pitchforks, hoping to apply the business end of their cudgels to conventional wisdom-- and a good thing, too.
UPDATE: Amy Ridenour is all over the Kyoto Treaty.
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
Playing poker in a tough neighborhood
Just when you think posts about education and identity get you a seat at the table for the next hand, someone comes along and ups the ante by posting a simple threefold (dare we say triune?) proof for the existence of God.
Sure, it's derived from Aquinas, but it's deftly put. Well done, Gary!
Kudos to you from "the Jimi Hendrix of pundits."
Sure, it's derived from Aquinas, but it's deftly put. Well done, Gary!
Kudos to you from "the Jimi Hendrix of pundits."
Pondering Catholic manhood
Journalist and Catholic convert Rod Dreher has done yeoman work over the last four years exposing pedophile priests and the "lavender mafia" of bishops who trade them from one diocese to another like baseball cards. Given Dreher's track record, his righteous indignation is understandable, and in a February 8 column for the Dallas Morning News, he opined that it's past time for more Catholic lay men to raise their voices. Borrowing a line from C.S. Lewis, Dreher fears we've become "men without chests:"
Father Matthew Bagert, a Grand Prairie priest, was picked up on child pornography charges last week. Days later, Bishop Charles Grahmann turned up in the parish pulpit, weeping and telling the flock to "welcome him back," as Jesus supposedly would have. Once again, a bishop counsels cheap grace to thwart justice, corrupting the concept of Christian mercy as part of an excuse-making strategy for the clerical class.
And you know what? It works. If the recent past is any guide, Father Bagert's ultimate guilt or innocence won't much matter to most Catholic men, who remain largely mute and accepting as unspeakable things come to light.
Dale Price agrees with Dreher that the prevailing understanding of Christian forgiveness has devolved into "cheap grace:"
The fact is, it's long past time to inter therapeutic Catholicism with every other dead-end heresy Catholics have chased with fervor across the millenia. Anyone incapable of speaking in terms of sin, repentance, restitution, justice and judgment when faced with such crimes against God and man is not speaking as a Christian pastor. Hell, he's not speaking like much of a human being.
Price is not known for his irenic writing style (he runs a blog called "Dyspeptic Mutterings," after all), but he goes back to the "Sergeant's War" portion of the Battle of the Bulge for an analogy-- and why would he do that? Because, in short, Dreher needs a reminder:
American Catholic family men are in a position analogous to those of the men of the 106th on December 18, 1944--we are fighting a sergeants' war. Just what are we supposed to do? My hands are pretty full trying to shepherd my little squad of five to safety in an increasingly-hostile world. In this daunting task, I've had almost no training and virtually no outside help. I went through RCIA, pre-Cana and I was instructed--sorta--on how to receive the sacraments.
[...]
That's where Rod's call for a massive counterattack breaks down--quite literally, there's no division left to do it. As a result, any outrage is necessarily going to be sporadic and locally-organized.
Fortunately, "Catholic guerillas" in the culture wars can learn from evangelical Christians in this regard. And Price has the sense to end on a "better to light one candle than to curse the darkness" note:
If you start equipping Catholic men for the various challenges and calls of Christian life, and mentoring them along the way, you probably won't get much of Rod's demand for righteous outrage.That's because there will be far less call for it.
Lots of people over at Amy Welborn's blog also weighed in the responsibilities of Catholic manhood just after the Dreher column was published. My favorite comment was the first, from a guy named David with a gift for perspective:
Oh, please. It's possible I've been corrupted by too much theology and Augustine, but it's impossible to be surprised at dreadful levels of horrible sin within the church; that's *always* been true, humans being what they are. It's also impossible to be surprised at awe-inspiring levels of impressive holiness; that's always been true, grace being what it is.
Father Matthew Bagert, a Grand Prairie priest, was picked up on child pornography charges last week. Days later, Bishop Charles Grahmann turned up in the parish pulpit, weeping and telling the flock to "welcome him back," as Jesus supposedly would have. Once again, a bishop counsels cheap grace to thwart justice, corrupting the concept of Christian mercy as part of an excuse-making strategy for the clerical class.
And you know what? It works. If the recent past is any guide, Father Bagert's ultimate guilt or innocence won't much matter to most Catholic men, who remain largely mute and accepting as unspeakable things come to light.
Dale Price agrees with Dreher that the prevailing understanding of Christian forgiveness has devolved into "cheap grace:"
The fact is, it's long past time to inter therapeutic Catholicism with every other dead-end heresy Catholics have chased with fervor across the millenia. Anyone incapable of speaking in terms of sin, repentance, restitution, justice and judgment when faced with such crimes against God and man is not speaking as a Christian pastor. Hell, he's not speaking like much of a human being.
Price is not known for his irenic writing style (he runs a blog called "Dyspeptic Mutterings," after all), but he goes back to the "Sergeant's War" portion of the Battle of the Bulge for an analogy-- and why would he do that? Because, in short, Dreher needs a reminder:
American Catholic family men are in a position analogous to those of the men of the 106th on December 18, 1944--we are fighting a sergeants' war. Just what are we supposed to do? My hands are pretty full trying to shepherd my little squad of five to safety in an increasingly-hostile world. In this daunting task, I've had almost no training and virtually no outside help. I went through RCIA, pre-Cana and I was instructed--sorta--on how to receive the sacraments.
[...]
That's where Rod's call for a massive counterattack breaks down--quite literally, there's no division left to do it. As a result, any outrage is necessarily going to be sporadic and locally-organized.
Fortunately, "Catholic guerillas" in the culture wars can learn from evangelical Christians in this regard. And Price has the sense to end on a "better to light one candle than to curse the darkness" note:
If you start equipping Catholic men for the various challenges and calls of Christian life, and mentoring them along the way, you probably won't get much of Rod's demand for righteous outrage.That's because there will be far less call for it.
Lots of people over at Amy Welborn's blog also weighed in the responsibilities of Catholic manhood just after the Dreher column was published. My favorite comment was the first, from a guy named David with a gift for perspective:
Oh, please. It's possible I've been corrupted by too much theology and Augustine, but it's impossible to be surprised at dreadful levels of horrible sin within the church; that's *always* been true, humans being what they are. It's also impossible to be surprised at awe-inspiring levels of impressive holiness; that's always been true, grace being what it is.
Challenging the education lobby
California Teachers' Association President Barbara Kerr, described in CTA promotional literature as "a forceful and passionate advocate for students, public schools and the more than 335,000 members of CTA" makes radio commercials when she's not molding young minds near her Riverside home.
Kerr's "public service announcements" tend to hurt her own causes, not least because airport warnings about unattended baggage sound more personable than Kerr's grouching about attempts to balance state budgets "on the backs of our children."
To read the current CTA script the way Kerr does, you have to sound nasal, tired, and condescending:
It's ironic. Just days after a respected report chastised California for severely underfunding our public schools, the Governor proposes a budget that will cut school funding by billions more. And this is on top of the $9.8 billion in cuts that classrooms have already suffered.
True voiceover talent could help even that pitch, but I'm not telling CTA to throw good money after bad-- I pay property taxes in this state.
Moreover, as many people have noticed, teachers' unions here and elsewhere have been singing the same song for years (even when it doesn't fit):
California Republican Tom McClintock:
According to the Legislative Analyst's Office, the governor's proposed budget provides $9,508 for every pupil in the California public schools. That's $206 per pupil more than last year. That means every classroom of 30 students will receive $6,180 more next year than it did this year -- or a total of $285,240 per classroom.
Wall Street Journal columnist John Fund:
In truth, the governor's just-released budget is a moderate document. Health and welfare spending goes up by about 1% after accounting for inflation and population growth. Per pupil expenditures in public schools will top $10,000 a year for the first time, at the same time that half of the kids in public school are failing to read at their grade level. Elizabeth Hill, the state's nonpartisan legislative analyst, has called teacher union claims that school funding has been cut "technically flawed."
Note the numbers involved and the educrat-style math that interprets a reduced increase as though it were a cut to baseline figures: you'd have to be Kerr-azy to stick with the poormouth script.
UPDATE, February 23: CTA is running new radio commercials, without Barbara Kerr. But evidence of duplicity within her organization continues to roll in. Here's Jill Stewart, who knows California politics better than any other journalist:
[Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's] most controversial broken promise stems from a deal he struck in 2004 to give extra monies to schools this year---under a formula that, due to unexpectedly higher state tax revenues, means schools now expect $4 billion extra. Arnold promised that if the schools would just forgo a couple billion extra back in 2004, he'd lay on the extra money in 2005.
But now Schwarzenegger is offering the schools an extra $2.5 billion---not an extra $4 billion, because costs exploded elsewhere and there‘s no money. The powerful school lobby is using that broken promise to severely hammer the governor.
When a political leader breaks his word, he hands tremendous power to his opponents. Furious school leaders will try to convince voters that Schwarzenegger’s $2.5 billion increase---a very nice 7 percent boost---is actually a fat cut.
Only in Sacramento would $2.5 billion extra be passed off as a cut. But that’s what happens when you break your word---people will say anything, and they’ll lash out like mad.
Kerr's "public service announcements" tend to hurt her own causes, not least because airport warnings about unattended baggage sound more personable than Kerr's grouching about attempts to balance state budgets "on the backs of our children."
To read the current CTA script the way Kerr does, you have to sound nasal, tired, and condescending:
It's ironic. Just days after a respected report chastised California for severely underfunding our public schools, the Governor proposes a budget that will cut school funding by billions more. And this is on top of the $9.8 billion in cuts that classrooms have already suffered.
True voiceover talent could help even that pitch, but I'm not telling CTA to throw good money after bad-- I pay property taxes in this state.
Moreover, as many people have noticed, teachers' unions here and elsewhere have been singing the same song for years (even when it doesn't fit):
California Republican Tom McClintock:
According to the Legislative Analyst's Office, the governor's proposed budget provides $9,508 for every pupil in the California public schools. That's $206 per pupil more than last year. That means every classroom of 30 students will receive $6,180 more next year than it did this year -- or a total of $285,240 per classroom.
Wall Street Journal columnist John Fund:
In truth, the governor's just-released budget is a moderate document. Health and welfare spending goes up by about 1% after accounting for inflation and population growth. Per pupil expenditures in public schools will top $10,000 a year for the first time, at the same time that half of the kids in public school are failing to read at their grade level. Elizabeth Hill, the state's nonpartisan legislative analyst, has called teacher union claims that school funding has been cut "technically flawed."
Note the numbers involved and the educrat-style math that interprets a reduced increase as though it were a cut to baseline figures: you'd have to be Kerr-azy to stick with the poormouth script.
UPDATE, February 23: CTA is running new radio commercials, without Barbara Kerr. But evidence of duplicity within her organization continues to roll in. Here's Jill Stewart, who knows California politics better than any other journalist:
[Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's] most controversial broken promise stems from a deal he struck in 2004 to give extra monies to schools this year---under a formula that, due to unexpectedly higher state tax revenues, means schools now expect $4 billion extra. Arnold promised that if the schools would just forgo a couple billion extra back in 2004, he'd lay on the extra money in 2005.
But now Schwarzenegger is offering the schools an extra $2.5 billion---not an extra $4 billion, because costs exploded elsewhere and there‘s no money. The powerful school lobby is using that broken promise to severely hammer the governor.
When a political leader breaks his word, he hands tremendous power to his opponents. Furious school leaders will try to convince voters that Schwarzenegger’s $2.5 billion increase---a very nice 7 percent boost---is actually a fat cut.
Only in Sacramento would $2.5 billion extra be passed off as a cut. But that’s what happens when you break your word---people will say anything, and they’ll lash out like mad.
Sunday, February 13, 2005
Irish weather
Sure and it must be Bridget and Tommy over in Tramore who've been praying up a bit of a sprinkle such as this part of California seldom sees. By all the saints, it's two days of eiderdown drizzle and fog on the hilltops we've had, and no mistake. A brilliant defense against wild fire it is, too.
Saturday, February 12, 2005
Dostoevsky, Lewis, and Merton
Oh, my. Good thing Loy Mershimer writes from Chicago, because we're not in Kansas any more (particularly if we make the mistake of placing Jesus on the level of ruby red slippers and kindly souls who dispense wisdom from behind checker- and chess boards at the picnic table next to the Dairy Queen).
Follow the link for some Lenten edification. Loy wrote it before Lent, with a little help from Fyodor, Jack, and Thomas, but when he wrote it matters not.
Follow the link for some Lenten edification. Loy wrote it before Lent, with a little help from Fyodor, Jack, and Thomas, but when he wrote it matters not.
Remembering the man in the stovepipe hat
George Washington, not Abraham Lincoln, was our greatest president. To rate Lincoln higher than Washington is to confuse martyrdom and eloquence with the pinnacle of greatness.
The Union armies and the abolitionists did more to free slaves than our sixteenth president. But Lincoln deserves honor for doing a tough job well, backing the forever underrated general Ulysses S. Grant, and striving to heal the Union when states' rights absolutism and war-fueled vindictiveness could have torn it asunder. Lincoln finished the work that the Founding Fathers had deliberately handed to future generations.
[history geek alert: remember the "three-fifths" clause? It was an IOU used to balance political power between slave and free states. Per Susan Boyd's essay linked above:
The Constitution and the Framers were criticized as treating slaves as property, but a careful explanation of this clause will prove the opposite. The allocation of seats in Congress and the number of people to be taxed, although it was only three-fifths of the slaves, acknowledged that slaves were considered human beings and not merely property. They were included as people in the total number of those to be represented and taxed, not as the possession of a master. If they had not been included, they then may have been viewed as property, but since they were included, they were considered humans.]
As the Black Republican blogger put it (with more grace than doctrinaire libertarians seem to manage):
"Lincoln was a case-study in dichotomy. He was an abolitionist willing to maintain the institution of slavery. He was a libertarian who violated some of our most cherished rights under the Constitution. He was a liberal who sought to conserve more than reform. Most of all, he was an idealist with the most overwhelming grasp of practicality our Nation has been fortunate to send to the White House."
Whether we know it or not, we pay tribute to Lincoln every time we say "The United States is..." rather than "the United States are..." Libertarians who blame Lincoln for shredding the Constitution could with equal justice blame janitors for the messes they're paid to clean up-- and that makes no sense.
Abe deserves his accolades and his Old Testament-style Memorial on the national mall.
The Union armies and the abolitionists did more to free slaves than our sixteenth president. But Lincoln deserves honor for doing a tough job well, backing the forever underrated general Ulysses S. Grant, and striving to heal the Union when states' rights absolutism and war-fueled vindictiveness could have torn it asunder. Lincoln finished the work that the Founding Fathers had deliberately handed to future generations.
[history geek alert: remember the "three-fifths" clause? It was an IOU used to balance political power between slave and free states. Per Susan Boyd's essay linked above:
The Constitution and the Framers were criticized as treating slaves as property, but a careful explanation of this clause will prove the opposite. The allocation of seats in Congress and the number of people to be taxed, although it was only three-fifths of the slaves, acknowledged that slaves were considered human beings and not merely property. They were included as people in the total number of those to be represented and taxed, not as the possession of a master. If they had not been included, they then may have been viewed as property, but since they were included, they were considered humans.]
As the Black Republican blogger put it (with more grace than doctrinaire libertarians seem to manage):
"Lincoln was a case-study in dichotomy. He was an abolitionist willing to maintain the institution of slavery. He was a libertarian who violated some of our most cherished rights under the Constitution. He was a liberal who sought to conserve more than reform. Most of all, he was an idealist with the most overwhelming grasp of practicality our Nation has been fortunate to send to the White House."
Whether we know it or not, we pay tribute to Lincoln every time we say "The United States is..." rather than "the United States are..." Libertarians who blame Lincoln for shredding the Constitution could with equal justice blame janitors for the messes they're paid to clean up-- and that makes no sense.
Abe deserves his accolades and his Old Testament-style Memorial on the national mall.
Signs of contradiction
I liked the movie Signs, because it could only have been made by a director with what we Catholics call a "sacramental imagination," however imperfectly realized.
In a thoughtful contribution to a new blog, John Coleman reminds a critic why such movies should be applauded even when they don't reach Lord of the Rings-caliber (as Signs did not):
We are all materialists now. Sure, there are remnants of pagan mysticism, and there are some die-hard believers in theistic deities, but the vast majority of Americans and Europeans believe more in the idea of world peace than in fairies, angels, and aliens; and the world is worse for it. How can you have real theistic faith without a belief in angels or their opposites? How can you profess to true meaning in life without the idea that you can somehow intervene in these otherworldly affairs? How can you make it through an existence in which the kings are despots and fashion designers without some vague notion that they are poor imitations of your own princely soul—a soul that at the will of “Aslan” or “Gandalf” just might rise to help save the worlds of men?
Movies like Signs are essential to our culture because, despite their doctrinal flaws and questionable theology, they remind the average Joe that heroism, beauty, and the supernatural exist. They reach into the brains of Marx-indoctrinated materialists and wrench out some brief inkling of fantasy; and whether or not they ultimately deliver the right message, they get people thinking about things outside this world.
In a thoughtful contribution to a new blog, John Coleman reminds a critic why such movies should be applauded even when they don't reach Lord of the Rings-caliber (as Signs did not):
We are all materialists now. Sure, there are remnants of pagan mysticism, and there are some die-hard believers in theistic deities, but the vast majority of Americans and Europeans believe more in the idea of world peace than in fairies, angels, and aliens; and the world is worse for it. How can you have real theistic faith without a belief in angels or their opposites? How can you profess to true meaning in life without the idea that you can somehow intervene in these otherworldly affairs? How can you make it through an existence in which the kings are despots and fashion designers without some vague notion that they are poor imitations of your own princely soul—a soul that at the will of “Aslan” or “Gandalf” just might rise to help save the worlds of men?
Movies like Signs are essential to our culture because, despite their doctrinal flaws and questionable theology, they remind the average Joe that heroism, beauty, and the supernatural exist. They reach into the brains of Marx-indoctrinated materialists and wrench out some brief inkling of fantasy; and whether or not they ultimately deliver the right message, they get people thinking about things outside this world.
Friday, February 11, 2005
The Righty who helped the Lefty
Playwright Arthur Miller's death now dominates the entertainment segment of the news cycle. This is as it should be, given that Miller wrote two of the best-known plays of all time, Death of a Salesman and The Crucible.
The AP story of Miller's passing contains one fascinating tidbit of information:
“Death of a Salesman,” which took Miller only six weeks to write, earned rave reviews when it opened on Broadway in February 1949, directed by Elia Kazan.
The play was great-- but so was the director. And therein lies the irony. When Kazan died two years ago, applause for him was muted. Actors like Ed Harris sat on their hands throughout the montage of film clips assembled by Oscar producers as a tribute to Kazan's career. Mainstream Hollywood never forgave Kazan for outing Communists in its ranks with his Eisenhower-era testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee.
Miller, Hollywood has no problem with, and not just because he married Marilyn Monroe. After all, The Crucible, while ostensibly about the Salem Witch Trials, is also a none-too-subtle poke at McCarthyism.
Time to step back and applaud God for the who-woulda-thunk it way that a soon-to-be-conservative director helped a leftist playwright get started on Broadway. Miller's success helps vindicate Kazan (even though Kazan's more vociferous critics won't agree).
Death of Salesman is a great play. So is the similarly angst-ridden Picnic, by William Inge, which is from the same era. Life cannot have looked too good to playwrights who were finding their chops while the Soviet Union was overrunning its borders and American schoolchildren were doing nuclear fallout drills under their desks.
But when it's moral seriousness you want, Kazan's On the Waterfront beats the pants off Miller's politically-correct Crucible.
And for every disillusioned Willy Loman, there's an optimistic Homer Hickam. Moreover, Hickam's story is true.
Rest in peace, Arthur. And you, too, Elia.
The AP story of Miller's passing contains one fascinating tidbit of information:
“Death of a Salesman,” which took Miller only six weeks to write, earned rave reviews when it opened on Broadway in February 1949, directed by Elia Kazan.
The play was great-- but so was the director. And therein lies the irony. When Kazan died two years ago, applause for him was muted. Actors like Ed Harris sat on their hands throughout the montage of film clips assembled by Oscar producers as a tribute to Kazan's career. Mainstream Hollywood never forgave Kazan for outing Communists in its ranks with his Eisenhower-era testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee.
Miller, Hollywood has no problem with, and not just because he married Marilyn Monroe. After all, The Crucible, while ostensibly about the Salem Witch Trials, is also a none-too-subtle poke at McCarthyism.
Time to step back and applaud God for the who-woulda-thunk it way that a soon-to-be-conservative director helped a leftist playwright get started on Broadway. Miller's success helps vindicate Kazan (even though Kazan's more vociferous critics won't agree).
Death of Salesman is a great play. So is the similarly angst-ridden Picnic, by William Inge, which is from the same era. Life cannot have looked too good to playwrights who were finding their chops while the Soviet Union was overrunning its borders and American schoolchildren were doing nuclear fallout drills under their desks.
But when it's moral seriousness you want, Kazan's On the Waterfront beats the pants off Miller's politically-correct Crucible.
And for every disillusioned Willy Loman, there's an optimistic Homer Hickam. Moreover, Hickam's story is true.
Rest in peace, Arthur. And you, too, Elia.
Neumayr brings the brimstone
Although he has the perfect surname for a man who stands against the culture yelling "stop," (think "no more" with a sneer) George Neumayr lacks the public profile of Ann Coulter, his female counterpart.
Like the Blonde Bane of Lefties, Neumayr, here addressing the controversy du jour, writes almost everything from a stovetop set between simmer and boil:
Ward Churchill is a faker and liar beyond caricature. But modern academia's notion of "academic freedom" is so hollow and useless that it extends even to him. Notice that the entire discussion about Churchill is framed in terms of "his rights," as if universities exist primarily to provide platforms for jobless grifters to feed students lies. Forming students in truth -- a very quaint notion at this point, I know -- is supposed to be the organizing principle of a university. So shouldn't ensuring that students aren't taught by liars be the first, not the last, consideration here?
That embracing dumb ideas is the cornerstone on which universities are now built explains why those who exercise reason and demand the observance of rational standards are treated as the only real threats to academic freedom.
If you're keeping score, the Rocky Mountain News has more on Churchill's friends in low places.
Not to burn the fry bread at that link, but of what possible value would an endorsement from Muammar Gadhafi have been to the American Indian Movement, back in the day?
Talk about politics making strange bedfellows.
Like the Blonde Bane of Lefties, Neumayr, here addressing the controversy du jour, writes almost everything from a stovetop set between simmer and boil:
Ward Churchill is a faker and liar beyond caricature. But modern academia's notion of "academic freedom" is so hollow and useless that it extends even to him. Notice that the entire discussion about Churchill is framed in terms of "his rights," as if universities exist primarily to provide platforms for jobless grifters to feed students lies. Forming students in truth -- a very quaint notion at this point, I know -- is supposed to be the organizing principle of a university. So shouldn't ensuring that students aren't taught by liars be the first, not the last, consideration here?
That embracing dumb ideas is the cornerstone on which universities are now built explains why those who exercise reason and demand the observance of rational standards are treated as the only real threats to academic freedom.
If you're keeping score, the Rocky Mountain News has more on Churchill's friends in low places.
Not to burn the fry bread at that link, but of what possible value would an endorsement from Muammar Gadhafi have been to the American Indian Movement, back in the day?
Talk about politics making strange bedfellows.
Bernard of Clairvaux asks a question
But to redeem that creation which sprang into being at His word, how much He spake, what wonders He wrought, what hardships He endured, what shames He suffered! Therefore what reward shall I give unto the Lord for all the benefits which He hath done unto me? In the first creation He gave me myself; but in His new creation He gave me Himself, and by that gift restored to me the self that I had lost. Created first and then restored, I owe Him myself twice over in return for myself. But what have I to offer Him for the gift of Himself? Could I multiply myself a thousand-fold and then give Him all, what would that be in comparison with God?
From chapter 5 of On Loving God, by [Saint] Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 to 1153)
From chapter 5 of On Loving God, by [Saint] Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 to 1153)
Thursday, February 10, 2005
Chief Justice Thomas: An idea whose time is coming
Laura Ingraham, writing about the man whom she used to clerk for:
When Chief Justice William Rehnquist steps down, the President should move swiftly to nominate Associate Justice Clarence Thomas to replace him (and simultaneously nominate someone of equal caliber and philosophy for the associate justice vacancy). Why Thomas over Justice Antonin Scalia? Scalia would be an exceptional Chief Justice too, but is perhaps most effective in (and seems to relish) his role as an outspoken -- and sometimes strategically provocative -- guardian of the constitution. We cannot afford to lose that. Justice Thomas's intellect, humility, genuine affection for his colleagues, and keen sense of humor, has won him the respect and friendship of his fellow Justices. His votes and opinions during his 13 years on the Court make him ideally suited to oversee it in a manner that is consistent with conservative principles long after President Bush has retired to Texas.
"Chief Justice Thomas" does have a nice ring to it.
When Chief Justice William Rehnquist steps down, the President should move swiftly to nominate Associate Justice Clarence Thomas to replace him (and simultaneously nominate someone of equal caliber and philosophy for the associate justice vacancy). Why Thomas over Justice Antonin Scalia? Scalia would be an exceptional Chief Justice too, but is perhaps most effective in (and seems to relish) his role as an outspoken -- and sometimes strategically provocative -- guardian of the constitution. We cannot afford to lose that. Justice Thomas's intellect, humility, genuine affection for his colleagues, and keen sense of humor, has won him the respect and friendship of his fellow Justices. His votes and opinions during his 13 years on the Court make him ideally suited to oversee it in a manner that is consistent with conservative principles long after President Bush has retired to Texas.
"Chief Justice Thomas" does have a nice ring to it.
At lunch with my six-year-old
Because my wife had a doctor appointment and my son gets more classroom time than my daughter, Jane and I had lunch together today. I let her choose between a retro-themed "hangerbur" franchise and a fish taco joint. She picked the fish taco place, because she likes the desserts there. Kids' meals at that restaurant are served with churros.
She was the picture of concentration while pulling her churro apart (one fist on each end). She inspected it the way a plumber might look at a length of pipe, especially if that pipe had been dusted with powdered sugar and cinnamon. She wanted to share her churro with me, you see, but only after she'd made very sure that we each got exactly half.
Midway through dessert, she noticed the watercolor hanging behind my right shoulder.
"That bird reminds me of my parakeet," she said.
I twisted my head to follow her look to the print. "You're right; it does look like your parakeet."
"But that bird is a boy."
"How do you know?"
"The sticking-up hair."
"Feathers. Birds don't have hair."
"Dat what I meant."
"So girls don't have sticking up hair?"
"No, silly. Hair gel is for boys."
"Some girls use hair gel, too."
"I know. One time I borrowed Thomas's hair gel. It was sticking-up-hair day at school, and I wanted to look cool. But instead I looked embarrassed. It was a bad hair day."
"Where did you hear that expression?"
She shrugged. Dads ask strange questions sometimes.
She was the picture of concentration while pulling her churro apart (one fist on each end). She inspected it the way a plumber might look at a length of pipe, especially if that pipe had been dusted with powdered sugar and cinnamon. She wanted to share her churro with me, you see, but only after she'd made very sure that we each got exactly half.
Midway through dessert, she noticed the watercolor hanging behind my right shoulder.
"That bird reminds me of my parakeet," she said.
I twisted my head to follow her look to the print. "You're right; it does look like your parakeet."
"But that bird is a boy."
"How do you know?"
"The sticking-up hair."
"Feathers. Birds don't have hair."
"Dat what I meant."
"So girls don't have sticking up hair?"
"No, silly. Hair gel is for boys."
"Some girls use hair gel, too."
"I know. One time I borrowed Thomas's hair gel. It was sticking-up-hair day at school, and I wanted to look cool. But instead I looked embarrassed. It was a bad hair day."
"Where did you hear that expression?"
She shrugged. Dads ask strange questions sometimes.
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Parsing the cultural signals
Air America host Ed Schultz, while interviewing Paul Rieckhoff of the "OpTruth" organization, addressed the recent comments by USMC General Matthis about which I've already blogged.
In the "don't that beat all" tone he reserves almost exclusively for people to his right politically, Shultz asked, "What does that say to the rest of the world?"
The problem (per Shultz): "Condi Rice is over in Europe trying to mend fences, and here we have a general saying it's fun to kill people."
You're talking apples and oranges, Mr. Schultz. Let's diagram this out.
If you really want to know what the general's comments say to the rest of the world, I'd guess that they convey the following:
In the "don't that beat all" tone he reserves almost exclusively for people to his right politically, Shultz asked, "What does that say to the rest of the world?"
The problem (per Shultz): "Condi Rice is over in Europe trying to mend fences, and here we have a general saying it's fun to kill people."
You're talking apples and oranges, Mr. Schultz. Let's diagram this out.
If you really want to know what the general's comments say to the rest of the world, I'd guess that they convey the following:
- Chivalry is not dead
- Warriors do not always talk like diplomats
- The U.S. Marine Corps is still an elite fighting force
- George W. Bush is not the only "cowboy" in the United States
- The American military has heart enough to go with high technology
- "Don't Tread on Me" is not a relic of our revolutionary past
- Old-fashioned men are better friends to feminism than some feminists care to admit
These, Mr. Progresive Radio Host, are not bad messages to send-- to friend or foe.
Get a grip, would ya please? For a guy who played football and calls himself "Big Ed," you worry a lot about what don't need worryin'.
UPDATE, February 11: John Guardiano for the defense is worth reading.
Ash Wednesday thoughts
Dust we are and to dust we shall return-- but that's okay. If I understand the teaching of my own church correctly, the Incarnation (re)sanctified even dust. On that note (on that mote?), time for some wise words from the pope for those who strive to find parallels between Buddhist detachment and Christian mysticism:
In Eastern Asia these classic texts of Saint John of the Cross [i.e., Ascent of Mount Carmel and Dark Night of the Soul] have been, at times, interpreted as a confirmation of Eastern ascetic methods. But this Doctor of the Church does not merely propose detachment from the world. He proposes detachment from the world in order to unite oneself to that which is outside of the world--by this I do not mean nirvana, but a personal God. Union with Him comes about not only through purification, but through love.
Carmelite mysticism begins at the point where the reflections of Buddha end, together with his instructions for the spiritual life. In the active and passive purification of the human soul, in those specific nights of the senses and the spirit, Saint John of the Cross sees, above all, the preparation necessary for the human soul to be permeated with the living flame of love. And this is also the title of his major work--The Living Flame of Love.
Therefore, despite similar aspects, there is a fundamental difference. Christian mysticism from every period--beginning with the era of the Fathers of the Eastern and Western Church, to the great theologians of Scholasticism (such as Saint Thomas Aquinas), to the northern European mystics, to the Carmelite mystics--is not born of a purely negative "enlightenment." It is not born of an awareness of the evil which exists in man's attachment to the world through the senses, the intellect, and the spirit. Instead, Christian mysticism is born of the Revelation of the living God.
In the wrestling match between Being and Nothingness, always bet on Being.
UPDATE: More on the rituals of Ash Wednesday and what they mean, here.
In Eastern Asia these classic texts of Saint John of the Cross [i.e., Ascent of Mount Carmel and Dark Night of the Soul] have been, at times, interpreted as a confirmation of Eastern ascetic methods. But this Doctor of the Church does not merely propose detachment from the world. He proposes detachment from the world in order to unite oneself to that which is outside of the world--by this I do not mean nirvana, but a personal God. Union with Him comes about not only through purification, but through love.
Carmelite mysticism begins at the point where the reflections of Buddha end, together with his instructions for the spiritual life. In the active and passive purification of the human soul, in those specific nights of the senses and the spirit, Saint John of the Cross sees, above all, the preparation necessary for the human soul to be permeated with the living flame of love. And this is also the title of his major work--The Living Flame of Love.
Therefore, despite similar aspects, there is a fundamental difference. Christian mysticism from every period--beginning with the era of the Fathers of the Eastern and Western Church, to the great theologians of Scholasticism (such as Saint Thomas Aquinas), to the northern European mystics, to the Carmelite mystics--is not born of a purely negative "enlightenment." It is not born of an awareness of the evil which exists in man's attachment to the world through the senses, the intellect, and the spirit. Instead, Christian mysticism is born of the Revelation of the living God.
In the wrestling match between Being and Nothingness, always bet on Being.
UPDATE: More on the rituals of Ash Wednesday and what they mean, here.
Another plug for Western Civilization
Mardi Gras beads to Kathy Shaidle for alerting me to this book review by old reliable, Thomas Sowell:
A very readable and remarkable new book that has just been published -- "Bury the Chains" by Adam Hochschild -- traces the history of the world's first anti-slavery movement, which began with a meeting of 12 "deeply religious" men in London in 1787.
[...] Nothing could be more jolting and discordant with the vision of today's intellectuals than the fact that it was businessmen, devout religious leaders and Western imperialists who together destroyed slavery around the world. And if it doesn't fit their vision, it is the same to them as if it never happened.
While lauding Hochschild for not being hornswoggled by "moral equivalency" and "one culture is as good as another" arguments, Sowell also takes a swipe at the "War: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!" crowd. He's a veteran, so he's immune to the "chickenhawk" rebuttal that everyone at Air America seems to think is devastating:
As anti-slavery ideas eventually spread throughout Western civilization, a worldwide struggle pitted the West against Africans, Arabs, Asians and virtually the entire non-Western world, which still saw nothing wrong with slavery. But Western imperialists had gunpowder weapons first and that enabled the West to stamp out slavery in other societies as well as in its own.
A very readable and remarkable new book that has just been published -- "Bury the Chains" by Adam Hochschild -- traces the history of the world's first anti-slavery movement, which began with a meeting of 12 "deeply religious" men in London in 1787.
[...] Nothing could be more jolting and discordant with the vision of today's intellectuals than the fact that it was businessmen, devout religious leaders and Western imperialists who together destroyed slavery around the world. And if it doesn't fit their vision, it is the same to them as if it never happened.
While lauding Hochschild for not being hornswoggled by "moral equivalency" and "one culture is as good as another" arguments, Sowell also takes a swipe at the "War: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!" crowd. He's a veteran, so he's immune to the "chickenhawk" rebuttal that everyone at Air America seems to think is devastating:
As anti-slavery ideas eventually spread throughout Western civilization, a worldwide struggle pitted the West against Africans, Arabs, Asians and virtually the entire non-Western world, which still saw nothing wrong with slavery. But Western imperialists had gunpowder weapons first and that enabled the West to stamp out slavery in other societies as well as in its own.
How would YOU describe the glass?
Michael Savage, dean of what my friend Ann likes to call "Screech Radio," supported war against the Hussein regime in Iraq, but now worries that Iraq and Iran could unite into a "Shia Muslim superstate." Given the Muslim world view, that's a distinct possiblity, in spite of (historical) bad blood between Iraqis and Iranians.
Mark Steyn, columnist extraordinaire, writing in the (United Kingdom) Telegraph, sees more room for hope.
He says eight million Iraqis just showed the world that "they want something other than the opposing cul-de-sacs of secular pan-Arabist dictatorship and death-cult Islamism." What that means on the ground, per Steyn, is that "Ayatollah Sistani isn't like Khomeini and the other old-school mullahs, and the emergence of a moderate pluralist Shia-led federation in Iraq will be as devastating to the Teheran regime's long-term prospects as any Israeli-American strike on their nuke facilities."
Condi Rice, I suspect, agrees more with Steyn than with Savage. But it's nice to see smart people thinking through both "half empty" and "half full" scenarios.
Mark Steyn, columnist extraordinaire, writing in the (United Kingdom) Telegraph, sees more room for hope.
He says eight million Iraqis just showed the world that "they want something other than the opposing cul-de-sacs of secular pan-Arabist dictatorship and death-cult Islamism." What that means on the ground, per Steyn, is that "Ayatollah Sistani isn't like Khomeini and the other old-school mullahs, and the emergence of a moderate pluralist Shia-led federation in Iraq will be as devastating to the Teheran regime's long-term prospects as any Israeli-American strike on their nuke facilities."
Condi Rice, I suspect, agrees more with Steyn than with Savage. But it's nice to see smart people thinking through both "half empty" and "half full" scenarios.
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Runaway Horses and Spanish Angels
I get a kick out of the way that any musician who has ever paid homage to Mother Maybelle Carter knows the joke about how there are two types of music -- country and western.
Musicologists can probably explain even subtle differences between country and western. I like to think the difference between these cousins has something to do with inner and outer landscapes. Good country songs always read the human heart. Good western songs do the same thing, but also evoke a strong sense of place.
Example: The Highway 101 version of "Whiskey, if You Were a Woman" ("I'd fight you and I'd win / Lord knows I would") strikes me as country, through and through. Sultry-voiced Paulette Carlson and her erstwhile bandmates could make that song work in such untypically "country" locales as Gdansk or Honolulu if they wanted to, because the song is about the frustration of loving an alcoholic. Same thing with "Just Like the Weather," which Suzy Bogguss wrote with her husband Doug Crider and then sang to great effect back in the day. It's wise and catchy, an anthem about the virtues of persevering through emotional storms.
Peter Rowan's "Midnight Moonlight," on the other hand, is western rather than country. Even when covered by a dark-eyed beauty like Tish Hinojosa, the song gets much of its punch from its San Antonio setting:
I'll meet you at Alamo Mission
And we can say our prayers
And the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mother will heal us
As we kneel there.
All of the above is prelude for the declaration that the greatest western song of all time is either Leonard Cohen's "Ballad of a Runaway Horse," which was given typically beautiful treatment by Emmylou Harris in 1993, or Eddie Setser and Troy Seals' "Seven Spanish Angels," which Willie Nelson and Ray Charles recorded as a duet for the ages back in the late Eighties.
I lean toward Ballad of a Runaway Horse (by a nose!), because its works-on-many-different-levels lyric is more profound than the Sergio Leone feel that dead gunfighters bring to Seven Spanish Angels. Not to put too fine a point on it, but that tune would suffer if it didn't have Ray, Willie, and some well-placed mariachi trumpets pushing it toward greatness. Ballad of a Runaway Horse does a better job of standing on its own (although, of course, with an Emmylou Harris rendition in the can, it will never have to).
The greatest country song? I have no idea. Or, more accurately, too many ideas. Moreover, most of what I listen to is ten or more years old. Can you tell?
Musicologists can probably explain even subtle differences between country and western. I like to think the difference between these cousins has something to do with inner and outer landscapes. Good country songs always read the human heart. Good western songs do the same thing, but also evoke a strong sense of place.
Example: The Highway 101 version of "Whiskey, if You Were a Woman" ("I'd fight you and I'd win / Lord knows I would") strikes me as country, through and through. Sultry-voiced Paulette Carlson and her erstwhile bandmates could make that song work in such untypically "country" locales as Gdansk or Honolulu if they wanted to, because the song is about the frustration of loving an alcoholic. Same thing with "Just Like the Weather," which Suzy Bogguss wrote with her husband Doug Crider and then sang to great effect back in the day. It's wise and catchy, an anthem about the virtues of persevering through emotional storms.
Peter Rowan's "Midnight Moonlight," on the other hand, is western rather than country. Even when covered by a dark-eyed beauty like Tish Hinojosa, the song gets much of its punch from its San Antonio setting:
I'll meet you at Alamo Mission
And we can say our prayers
And the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mother will heal us
As we kneel there.
All of the above is prelude for the declaration that the greatest western song of all time is either Leonard Cohen's "Ballad of a Runaway Horse," which was given typically beautiful treatment by Emmylou Harris in 1993, or Eddie Setser and Troy Seals' "Seven Spanish Angels," which Willie Nelson and Ray Charles recorded as a duet for the ages back in the late Eighties.
I lean toward Ballad of a Runaway Horse (by a nose!), because its works-on-many-different-levels lyric is more profound than the Sergio Leone feel that dead gunfighters bring to Seven Spanish Angels. Not to put too fine a point on it, but that tune would suffer if it didn't have Ray, Willie, and some well-placed mariachi trumpets pushing it toward greatness. Ballad of a Runaway Horse does a better job of standing on its own (although, of course, with an Emmylou Harris rendition in the can, it will never have to).
The greatest country song? I have no idea. Or, more accurately, too many ideas. Moreover, most of what I listen to is ten or more years old. Can you tell?
A belated birthday present
(This post is especially for Chris)
Dennis Prager has been using his recent Townhall columns to sketch the case for Judeo-Christian values. I'd be shocked if he makes the case as well as Vincent Carroll and Dave Shiflett did (albeit implicitly) in their book, Christianity on Trial: Arguments Against Anti-Religious Bigotry, but Prager is a thoughtful guy.
I've compiled links and representative quotes from Prager's work-in-progress, and will update this post as Prager adds to his welcome opus:
Dennis Prager has been using his recent Townhall columns to sketch the case for Judeo-Christian values. I'd be shocked if he makes the case as well as Vincent Carroll and Dave Shiflett did (albeit implicitly) in their book, Christianity on Trial: Arguments Against Anti-Religious Bigotry, but Prager is a thoughtful guy.
I've compiled links and representative quotes from Prager's work-in-progress, and will update this post as Prager adds to his welcome opus:
- January 4, "Better Answers" : Chesterton was right. The collapse of Christianity in Europe led to the horrors of Nazism and Communism.
- January 11, "Better Answers, Part 2" : To those who counter these arguments for God-based morality with the question, "Whose God?" the answer is the God who revealed His moral will in the Old Testament, which Jews and Christians -- and no other people -- regard as divine revelation.
- January 18, "Judeo-Christian values, Part 3": There are four primary problems with reason divorced from God as a guide to morality.
- February 8, "Judeo-Christian values, Part 4": Belief in human-animal equivalence inevitably follows the death of Judeo-Christian values, and it serves not so much to elevate animal worth as to reduce human worth.
- February 15, "Judeo-Christian values, Part 5": Judeo-Christian values combine the two religions' strengths -- the Jewish emphasis on moral works in this world with the Christian emphasis on keeping God at the center of one's values and works.
- February 22, "Judeo-Christian values, Part 6": With the ascendancy of leftist values that has followed the decline of Judeo-Christian religion, personal feelings have supplanted universal standards. In fact, feelings are the major unifying characteristic among contemporary liberal positions.
Vizzini returns
Cue the theatrical Spanish accent and the puzzled look on the face of the rail-thin swordsman:
"Escuse me, Esenador. You keep using that word. I doona think it means what you think it means."
"Escuse me, Esenador. You keep using that word. I doona think it means what you think it means."
Sunday, February 06, 2005
Domestic tranquility
Feeling poorly, my wife and I decided to retire early last night, so we were asleep by 9:30. Our family cat had not returned from her afternoon wanderings, but I wasn't too worried. She's an elegant little predator who's played hooky before.
11:00 pm: Our daughter walks into the room, crying. She had a nightmare and wants to cuddle mommy. She climbs in bed between me and mommy.
11:30 pm: The puppy yips from her crate. This is a familiar drill. I unlatch the crate door, and take her on a leash to the backyard so she can relieve herself. On return, I eyeball our sleeping son from the doorway of his room. He and the "bearded dragon" in the terrarium next to his bed appear to be fine.
1:30 am: The puppy wants out again. In the backyard this time, we hear a "meow," and see the cat come strolling cautiously up. She follows us back into the house and hops into the master bed, pleased with herself. When I give her a pet before climbing back into the same bed, she bites my hand, but gently. She's situated herself on the covers so that my feet under them won't disturb her.
I dream that my big brother-in-law is using me as a support to climb into the seat of a horse-drawn carriage. Odd, because I like the guy.
Shortly thereafter, I wake to find that what I'd dreamed was Neil's hand pressing on my head is actually my daughter's head wedged into my neck. Jane used to sleep like a stick, but now she sleeps like a pinwheel in a moderate wind.
I carry her back to her room. She wakes up enough to say, "I don't want to sleep in my bed." I say, "You have to, muffet, so I can sleep. You'll be fine." She says, "Okay, daddy." I find her two favorite stuffed animals -- a German Shepherd and a brown horse -- so she can have a little friend in each arm.
Back to bed.
4:30 am: A yip from the crate. This is ridiculous. I try ignoring the puppy, but she yips again. Not kidding. Okay, another safari to the back yard. Good thing I can find my way around the furniture in the dark. I unlock the crate (really an oversize dog carrier that we borrowed from a friend with two Labrador Retrievers). Al Pacino (the puppy) trots ahead of me to our sliding glass door and sits, waiting for her leash.
And what's this? The cat has decided to join us. She and the dog sit side-by-side. Never seen that before. I open the door. The dog and the cat touch noses, then the cat slinks off. Did the two animals plan it this way?
Back in bed, I dream I've been invited to a university classroom as a guest lecturer at the end of a seminar on something or other. I don't remember what I said, but I do remember asking if anyone had questions about editing (of all things). Looking at an inscription over the classroom door that says "Holland celebrates the birthday of the U.S. Constitution," some guy in the back asks "Is that total bullshit?"
I figure the kid deserves an answer, and so say "Probably." Then I think I must be getting paid for this gig, and so say, "Holland has more liberal drug and euthanasia laws than we do, but if some people there recognize our Constitution as an effective blueprint, they might actually celebrate it." Ha. What do I know? Even in the dream, that sounds false.
Once more to sleep, after a fit of coughing and blowing my nose.
6:30 am: The wake-up call from you-know-who. She actually let me sleep in a bit (on weekdays, I take her out of the crate at 6:00). Morning light has seeped into our bedroom, and you can't fool a dog about that.
11:00 pm: Our daughter walks into the room, crying. She had a nightmare and wants to cuddle mommy. She climbs in bed between me and mommy.
11:30 pm: The puppy yips from her crate. This is a familiar drill. I unlatch the crate door, and take her on a leash to the backyard so she can relieve herself. On return, I eyeball our sleeping son from the doorway of his room. He and the "bearded dragon" in the terrarium next to his bed appear to be fine.
1:30 am: The puppy wants out again. In the backyard this time, we hear a "meow," and see the cat come strolling cautiously up. She follows us back into the house and hops into the master bed, pleased with herself. When I give her a pet before climbing back into the same bed, she bites my hand, but gently. She's situated herself on the covers so that my feet under them won't disturb her.
I dream that my big brother-in-law is using me as a support to climb into the seat of a horse-drawn carriage. Odd, because I like the guy.
Shortly thereafter, I wake to find that what I'd dreamed was Neil's hand pressing on my head is actually my daughter's head wedged into my neck. Jane used to sleep like a stick, but now she sleeps like a pinwheel in a moderate wind.
I carry her back to her room. She wakes up enough to say, "I don't want to sleep in my bed." I say, "You have to, muffet, so I can sleep. You'll be fine." She says, "Okay, daddy." I find her two favorite stuffed animals -- a German Shepherd and a brown horse -- so she can have a little friend in each arm.
Back to bed.
4:30 am: A yip from the crate. This is ridiculous. I try ignoring the puppy, but she yips again. Not kidding. Okay, another safari to the back yard. Good thing I can find my way around the furniture in the dark. I unlock the crate (really an oversize dog carrier that we borrowed from a friend with two Labrador Retrievers). Al Pacino (the puppy) trots ahead of me to our sliding glass door and sits, waiting for her leash.
And what's this? The cat has decided to join us. She and the dog sit side-by-side. Never seen that before. I open the door. The dog and the cat touch noses, then the cat slinks off. Did the two animals plan it this way?
Back in bed, I dream I've been invited to a university classroom as a guest lecturer at the end of a seminar on something or other. I don't remember what I said, but I do remember asking if anyone had questions about editing (of all things). Looking at an inscription over the classroom door that says "Holland celebrates the birthday of the U.S. Constitution," some guy in the back asks "Is that total bullshit?"
I figure the kid deserves an answer, and so say "Probably." Then I think I must be getting paid for this gig, and so say, "Holland has more liberal drug and euthanasia laws than we do, but if some people there recognize our Constitution as an effective blueprint, they might actually celebrate it." Ha. What do I know? Even in the dream, that sounds false.
Once more to sleep, after a fit of coughing and blowing my nose.
6:30 am: The wake-up call from you-know-who. She actually let me sleep in a bit (on weekdays, I take her out of the crate at 6:00). Morning light has seeped into our bedroom, and you can't fool a dog about that.
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Affirmation from high places
Our new Secretary of State agrees with me. Or, more likely, I agree with her. Either way, this story in the (UK) Telegraph is heartening:
When Europeans talk of "stability" and "constructive engagement", what they often mean is doing deals with dictators. A case can, of course, be made for such an approach. But, whatever else it is, it is not ethical. Miss Rice, by contrast, talks without embarrassment about exporting liberty.
"There cannot be an absence of moral content in American foreign policy," she says. "Europeans giggle at this, but we are not European, we are American, and we have different principles."
When Europeans talk of "stability" and "constructive engagement", what they often mean is doing deals with dictators. A case can, of course, be made for such an approach. But, whatever else it is, it is not ethical. Miss Rice, by contrast, talks without embarrassment about exporting liberty.
"There cannot be an absence of moral content in American foreign policy," she says. "Europeans giggle at this, but we are not European, we are American, and we have different principles."
In the Moon of Red Ponies (a review)
James Lee Burke is a master of scenic description with a novelist's grasp of the good and bad impulses that motivate people. Having read some of his early fiction about New Orleans detective Dave Robicheaux, I expected In the Moon of Red Ponies to be a satisfying excursion through the world of what might be called "Western Noir," as though this book were the progeny of a mating between Farewell, My Lovely and Lonesome Dove.
I was half-right. The book is "Western Noir," but perhaps its most obvious literary antecedent is John Steinbeck's East of Eden. Yes, that comparison puts Burke in fast company. On the whole, however, I can't recommend In the Moon of Red Ponies, and would have to call it an ambitious failure.
The most significant problem with the book is its protagonist, Billy Bob Holland. Burke makes Holland a Texas Ranger turned Montana lawyer. He's as stubborn as you'd expect. He's also unrelentingly morose, which means he suffers in comparison to the other characters in the book. Psychotic rodeo clown Wyatt Dixon, for example, is painted as an extreme villain who had nearly killed Billy Bob's wife in a previous book. But Dixon -- in spite of the chemical cocktail he drinks on court orders to maintain a semblance of moral and social equilibrium -- proves better and wiser company than Holland.
When two men break into Dixon's rural home while he's having breakfast, he surprises them with a cheerful "howdy doodle, boys" before savaging them with the iron skillet in his hand. Holland, by contrast, broods his way through all 336 pages. In mayhem or in calm, he's more stoic and less accessible than his nemesis or "Johnny American Horse," the American Indian activist whose dreams give the book its title.
Midway through the story, Burke's sermons about the evils of corporations and the perfidy of the federal government begin to wear thin. We get them coming and going: from Billy Bob, from Johnny, and from a lonely cop.
The political angle colors an industrial burglary for which American Indian activists are prime suspects, but it struck me as more heavy-handed than it should have been. To push the book even further from literature and into "beach read" territory, agony aunt Billy Bob Holland crosses paths with a Foghorn Leghorn-type of United States Senator and his hot young blue-eyed daughter (the rebel dating "beneath her station").
Rule of thumb: When a cheerfully deranged psychopath and an activist who never says much make a better impression than the protagonist of your novel, a rewrite may be in order.
I was half-right. The book is "Western Noir," but perhaps its most obvious literary antecedent is John Steinbeck's East of Eden. Yes, that comparison puts Burke in fast company. On the whole, however, I can't recommend In the Moon of Red Ponies, and would have to call it an ambitious failure.
The most significant problem with the book is its protagonist, Billy Bob Holland. Burke makes Holland a Texas Ranger turned Montana lawyer. He's as stubborn as you'd expect. He's also unrelentingly morose, which means he suffers in comparison to the other characters in the book. Psychotic rodeo clown Wyatt Dixon, for example, is painted as an extreme villain who had nearly killed Billy Bob's wife in a previous book. But Dixon -- in spite of the chemical cocktail he drinks on court orders to maintain a semblance of moral and social equilibrium -- proves better and wiser company than Holland.
When two men break into Dixon's rural home while he's having breakfast, he surprises them with a cheerful "howdy doodle, boys" before savaging them with the iron skillet in his hand. Holland, by contrast, broods his way through all 336 pages. In mayhem or in calm, he's more stoic and less accessible than his nemesis or "Johnny American Horse," the American Indian activist whose dreams give the book its title.
Midway through the story, Burke's sermons about the evils of corporations and the perfidy of the federal government begin to wear thin. We get them coming and going: from Billy Bob, from Johnny, and from a lonely cop.
The political angle colors an industrial burglary for which American Indian activists are prime suspects, but it struck me as more heavy-handed than it should have been. To push the book even further from literature and into "beach read" territory, agony aunt Billy Bob Holland crosses paths with a Foghorn Leghorn-type of United States Senator and his hot young blue-eyed daughter (the rebel dating "beneath her station").
Rule of thumb: When a cheerfully deranged psychopath and an activist who never says much make a better impression than the protagonist of your novel, a rewrite may be in order.
Friday, February 04, 2005
Who you gonna call?
Perhaps you've heard about the tempest in a teapot between Brigadier General Jim "Mad Dog" Mattis, USMC, and The Council on American-Islamic Relations. Mattis said some things that CAIR spokespeople thought were insensitive.
Mattis wasn't looking to pick a fight, but many of the reporters now filing stories about him are. Context, people, context.
If you want a summary of the whole incident, you won't find a better one than what Cassandra wrote over at Villainous Company.
UPDATE: I said "Brigadier General." Shoulda said "Lieutenant General."
UPDATE 2: The European Bureau Chief found this column by Ralph Kinney Bennett that also deserves highlighting. See especially the quote from Santayana.
Mattis wasn't looking to pick a fight, but many of the reporters now filing stories about him are. Context, people, context.
If you want a summary of the whole incident, you won't find a better one than what Cassandra wrote over at Villainous Company.
UPDATE: I said "Brigadier General." Shoulda said "Lieutenant General."
UPDATE 2: The European Bureau Chief found this column by Ralph Kinney Bennett that also deserves highlighting. See especially the quote from Santayana.
Looking for messianic dust bunnies
Bet you didn't think there were such things as messianic dust bunnies, huh?
This might also be called "the problem of pain," or "how to defend American foreign policy in conversations with your progressive friends." It's an original essay published earlier today by The American Spectator.
Part of my diagnosis:
Stunned into compliance by the mallet of postmodern cynicism, fish in the "reality-based" community forget what it's like to swim in the open ocean where the powerful current of the American Dream reminds the rest of us of what is possible.
You can read the whole thing here.
This might also be called "the problem of pain," or "how to defend American foreign policy in conversations with your progressive friends." It's an original essay published earlier today by The American Spectator.
Part of my diagnosis:
Stunned into compliance by the mallet of postmodern cynicism, fish in the "reality-based" community forget what it's like to swim in the open ocean where the powerful current of the American Dream reminds the rest of us of what is possible.
You can read the whole thing here.
Thursday, February 03, 2005
Rockin' in the USA
The State of the Union speech rocked. Not a malaprop to be found, other than "nukeler," which is a common mispronunciation.
The president put Iran and Syria on notice, lauded the Iraqis for their courage, spoke well of traditional marriage, called for up or down votes on nominees to the federal bench, reinforced his freedom theme, and explained why Social Security needs fixing. He did all that with a minimum of palaver and a total absence of policy wonkishness.
Social conservatism came through undimmed (much to the chagrin of certain libertarians whom I otherwise respect), and the president's confidence even allowed him to make well-deserved but statesmanlike jabs at his Senate opponents.
Best of all, this speech wasn't marred by obvious concessions to political correctness. Programs for "at risk" youth don't rise to the level of hilarity that ensued after a rare misstep in the Second Inaugural cited the Koran as an influence on the development of American thought.
UPDATE, February 3: Here's a nifty two-part analysis from Rodger Morrow: thing one and thing two. Think "themeless pudding" and "exit strategy" (although, in this case, it would be "strategery").
The president put Iran and Syria on notice, lauded the Iraqis for their courage, spoke well of traditional marriage, called for up or down votes on nominees to the federal bench, reinforced his freedom theme, and explained why Social Security needs fixing. He did all that with a minimum of palaver and a total absence of policy wonkishness.
Social conservatism came through undimmed (much to the chagrin of certain libertarians whom I otherwise respect), and the president's confidence even allowed him to make well-deserved but statesmanlike jabs at his Senate opponents.
Best of all, this speech wasn't marred by obvious concessions to political correctness. Programs for "at risk" youth don't rise to the level of hilarity that ensued after a rare misstep in the Second Inaugural cited the Koran as an influence on the development of American thought.
UPDATE, February 3: Here's a nifty two-part analysis from Rodger Morrow: thing one and thing two. Think "themeless pudding" and "exit strategy" (although, in this case, it would be "strategery").
Remembering an Iraqi hero
This post on the State of the Union over at Little Green Footballs from blogger TallDave deserves more publicity than it is going to get. It was first reported in USA Today:
Policemen guarding a polling station in Baghdad's Mansour neighborhood Sunday recognized the suicide bomber immediately. The young man was wearing Chinese-made high-top tennis shoes, a leather jacket and a red head scarf - the same kind of clothes as worn by an attacker at another site that same day.
Fourteen-year police veteran , Abdul Amir al-Shuwayli, 29, acted without hesitation. The bomber was steps away from a line of voters heading into Al-Zahour Primary School when Shuwayli moved toward him, police Capt. Firaz Mohammed Ali said. According to Ali, Shuwayli yelled, "Let me save the people. Let me save my friends."
Shuwayli threw his arms around the bomber and drove him backward about 50 feet into an intersection. The rush seemed to catch the suicide attacker by surprise. The bomber had a hand grenade but failed to throw it. A second or two passed before he detonated an explosive belt, police Lt. Col. Kadham Abbas said.
The blast shredded Shuwayli, whose body took the brunt of the explosion. It also tore the bomber apart, leaving only his face intact. Shrapnel injured three other officers and perforated walls around the intersection. Windows in nearby homes shattered. Voters continued to line up.
"Suicide bombers are not the only ones willing to give up their lives," said Ali, one of Shuwayli's commanders. "We have some people who are ready to die as well."
Rest in peace, Abdul Amir al-Shuwayli. You did well.
Policemen guarding a polling station in Baghdad's Mansour neighborhood Sunday recognized the suicide bomber immediately. The young man was wearing Chinese-made high-top tennis shoes, a leather jacket and a red head scarf - the same kind of clothes as worn by an attacker at another site that same day.
Fourteen-year police veteran , Abdul Amir al-Shuwayli, 29, acted without hesitation. The bomber was steps away from a line of voters heading into Al-Zahour Primary School when Shuwayli moved toward him, police Capt. Firaz Mohammed Ali said. According to Ali, Shuwayli yelled, "Let me save the people. Let me save my friends."
Shuwayli threw his arms around the bomber and drove him backward about 50 feet into an intersection. The rush seemed to catch the suicide attacker by surprise. The bomber had a hand grenade but failed to throw it. A second or two passed before he detonated an explosive belt, police Lt. Col. Kadham Abbas said.
The blast shredded Shuwayli, whose body took the brunt of the explosion. It also tore the bomber apart, leaving only his face intact. Shrapnel injured three other officers and perforated walls around the intersection. Windows in nearby homes shattered. Voters continued to line up.
"Suicide bombers are not the only ones willing to give up their lives," said Ali, one of Shuwayli's commanders. "We have some people who are ready to die as well."
Rest in peace, Abdul Amir al-Shuwayli. You did well.
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
Groundhog Day belongs to Christ, too
Another instance of Scots-Irish influence on America: Per this groundhog site:
The legend of Groundhog Day is based on an old Scottish couplet: "If Candlemas Day is bright and clear, there'll be two winters in the year."
In other words, Punxsutawney Phil isn't the only one who was presented today, because February 2 on the western liturgical calendar also marks the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple.
When the in-house atheists at the ACLU run out of other material, they'll start suing over today, too. Then Andie MacDowell will wrinkle her beauteous nose at them and Bill Murray will tell them to take a "chill pill."
The legend of Groundhog Day is based on an old Scottish couplet: "If Candlemas Day is bright and clear, there'll be two winters in the year."
In other words, Punxsutawney Phil isn't the only one who was presented today, because February 2 on the western liturgical calendar also marks the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple.
When the in-house atheists at the ACLU run out of other material, they'll start suing over today, too. Then Andie MacDowell will wrinkle her beauteous nose at them and Bill Murray will tell them to take a "chill pill."
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
One-man wrecking ball
That would be James Lileks, here knocking the supports from beneath hack work published by Bill Moyers and a few hapless editors at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune:
Sunday was the day when Americans were watching the Iraqi election, of course. What do you think the Strib’s editorial page had for this weighty day? Well, a lengthy editorial on Ethanol, for those who rise Sunday morn with a healthy appetite for flapjacks, sausages, orange juice and 2000 words on corn subsidies. (“Bold gesture, missed options.” Was ever a more perfect headline for an editorial ever printed?) But the main page had this at the top:
“For the first time in our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power. What that means for the environment is frightening.”
Well, it depends on your perspective. We all remember how 270,000 people were killed in a day when the environment demonstrated that it had a monopoly of power over plate tectonics.
Below the words, a picture of cracked parched earth, which had once no doubt been green & verdant farmland before the Right Rev. Bush got out his joystick and sent his 900 foot tall Jesus robot to blast the crops with his death-beam laser eyes.
The blogosphere is full of merry men and women like James Lileks, and though few can match Lileks for color commentary, it's heartening to see Tim Blair rock the Washington Post while Christopher Johnson continues his Evangelical Lutheran crusade (and I use the word advisedly) on behalf of Christian orthodoxy and common sense.
Sunday was the day when Americans were watching the Iraqi election, of course. What do you think the Strib’s editorial page had for this weighty day? Well, a lengthy editorial on Ethanol, for those who rise Sunday morn with a healthy appetite for flapjacks, sausages, orange juice and 2000 words on corn subsidies. (“Bold gesture, missed options.” Was ever a more perfect headline for an editorial ever printed?) But the main page had this at the top:
“For the first time in our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power. What that means for the environment is frightening.”
Well, it depends on your perspective. We all remember how 270,000 people were killed in a day when the environment demonstrated that it had a monopoly of power over plate tectonics.
Below the words, a picture of cracked parched earth, which had once no doubt been green & verdant farmland before the Right Rev. Bush got out his joystick and sent his 900 foot tall Jesus robot to blast the crops with his death-beam laser eyes.
The blogosphere is full of merry men and women like James Lileks, and though few can match Lileks for color commentary, it's heartening to see Tim Blair rock the Washington Post while Christopher Johnson continues his Evangelical Lutheran crusade (and I use the word advisedly) on behalf of Christian orthodoxy and common sense.
Bay State senators go 0 for 2
It must be something in the water over there. Here's Iraq's interim president, reading the riot act to an idea advanced by Senator Ted Kennedy. In relevant part:
Iraq's interim president said Tuesday it would be "complete nonsense" to ask U.S. and other foreign troops to leave Iraq at this point but some of the 170,000 soldiers could be leaving Iraq by the end of the year.
Ghazi al-Yawer has criticized American efforts -- he's no puppet-- but he also offers this sage advice:
If you do not work, you don't make mistakes. But if you work, you make mistakes.
Meanwhile, the junior senator from Massachusetts confessed Vietnam-era treason to Tim Russert (better late than never?) on national TV. In the disbelieving but pitch-perfect summation over at Just One Minute, Mr. Minuteman observes, "Running guns to the Khmer Rouge? Uhh, Tall Dour One, they were on the other side."
How much do Kennedy and Kerry matter anymore, and why do they insist on marginalizing themselves and the party they allegedly love even further?
(Hat tip on the Kerry item to Instapundit)
Iraq's interim president said Tuesday it would be "complete nonsense" to ask U.S. and other foreign troops to leave Iraq at this point but some of the 170,000 soldiers could be leaving Iraq by the end of the year.
Ghazi al-Yawer has criticized American efforts -- he's no puppet-- but he also offers this sage advice:
If you do not work, you don't make mistakes. But if you work, you make mistakes.
Meanwhile, the junior senator from Massachusetts confessed Vietnam-era treason to Tim Russert (better late than never?) on national TV. In the disbelieving but pitch-perfect summation over at Just One Minute, Mr. Minuteman observes, "Running guns to the Khmer Rouge? Uhh, Tall Dour One, they were on the other side."
How much do Kennedy and Kerry matter anymore, and why do they insist on marginalizing themselves and the party they allegedly love even further?
(Hat tip on the Kerry item to Instapundit)
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