Somewhat of an academic point to ponder, now that the encyclical's already out, but in Pope Benedict's 1993 book, The Nature and Mission of Theology, there is this:
Love, the center of Christian reality on which "depend the law and the prophets", is at the same time eros for truth, and only so does it remain sound as agape for God and man.That seems to explain rather succinctly why he chose love as a topic for his first encyclical. Not having read it yet, owing to it not being on the front burner of required readings, I don't know whether or not this sentence reflects the encyclical. I will hopefully find time to answer that for myself in the next week or two.
Posted by Justice at 12:32 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
| You Are a Prophet Soul |
 Selfless and kind, you have great faith in people. Sometimes this faith can lead to disappoinment in the long run. No matter what, you deal with everything in a calm and balanced way. You are a good interpreter, very sensitive, intuitive, caring, and gentle. Concerned about the world, you are good at predicting people's feelings. A seeker of wisdom, you are a life long learner looking for purpose and meaning. You are a great thinker and communicator, but not necessarily a doer. Souls you are most compatible with: Bright Star Soul and Dreaming Soul |
Hmm...for once, a quiz that seems roughly accurate. So long as you don't catch me on a bad day, anyway.
HT: Happy Catholic
Posted by Justice at 4:34 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Pope Benedict XVI's Milestones memoir was quite an enjoyable book, which here and there is sprinkled with passages that make the man seem very down to earth and which made me laugh. Case in point:
Unfortunately I hit upon a typist who was not only slow but who now and then also lost pages and taxed my nerves to the utmost by committing all manner of errors, particularly in connection with the page numbers in the references. The battle to discover and correct all the mistakes sometimes seemed almost endless.The work to which the Pope is referring was rejected (by Schmaus, who was on my reading list last semester, since it ran afoul of his conclusions), although he managed to overcome this by extracting the part Schmaus had not objected to (I suspect the lack of criticism may have been due to Schmaus not completing the book, feeling he had no need), which I think is this book on St. Bonaventure.
The other such line from this week comes from Robert Louis Wilken's Spirit of Early Christianity and was basically a one-liner that had everybody I was sitting with in the library in stitches:
When confronted by the risen Christ, one does not say, "How interesting," but "My Lord and my God!"Anyhow, I think I'm making decent progress through my readings. My plan for the balance of this weekend is to polish off Ratzinger's small book on the nature of theology and the rather sloppy 100 Most Important Events in Christian History (slanted, inaccurate history plus a clearly polemical stance against Rome throughout its analysis makes this a lousy choice for an ecumenical reading).
Posted by Justice at 2:50 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Is there something inherent in the charismatic movement that breeds liturgical abuse? More and more, I have been having doubts about the authenticity of the movement, in part because of questionable practices, especially in the liturgy - and I don't mean the style of music (although I'm no fan).
Tonight in particular, there was a guest priest visiting, who personally identified himself as a charismatic during the homily. At the same time, this Mass was a greater departure from the norms than I've seen in a long time (personal additions and explanations). And that raises the question - if you're being inspired by the Holy Spirit, how does that lead to liturgical abuse? I can't envision the Holy Spirit ever causing infidelity to the Church's liturgy, but this seems to be a problem at almost every charismatic Mass I've experienced. The recent news concerning the Neochatechumenate and their liturgical problems only increase my feeling that something's wrong.
I don't think it's a minor problem either, since charismatics tend to be way more into apparitions and visionaries than usual...and when almost every Mass is done with an emphasis on the Holy Spirit personally speaking (whether by tongues or otherwise), it's not such a stretch that people will have an easier time believing in these things (lex orandi, lex credendi in action). The emphasis of some people I know on all manner of visionaries, apparitions, and the Holy Spirit, to the detriment of the Church's teachings, the Bible, and the other two persons of the Trinity, is troubling. It's not that the latter are denied, but so much energy and focus seems to be put in the unproven periphery and not in the revealed center of the faith.
As if to make the point, not long after this post was originally written, someone asked for help trying to track down a reference to an angel only mentioned in the Book of Enoch, on what can only be described as an ongoing grace-hunting quest, as though specific ones can only be obtained via these obscure sources.
Maybe my experience is an aberration, but more and more, I get the distinct impression that something is fundamentally wrong here. Anyone have thoughts?
NB: Updated Jan 30, 2006
Posted by Justice at 8:31 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
This morning, at 2:24, marks the end of my 23rd year, and the beginning of my 24th. Given I'm such a night owl, odds are I will be awake to celebrate the moment, even as I prepare for class tomorrow morning. In a pleasant sidenote, I managed to end up on the server schedule for tomorrow, a good way to celebrate a birthday.
I'm still the baby of the GNT crowd (many of whom are several years older), but I do share my birthday - and birthyear - with one of the ladies in the community, so that's a decided plus.
Posted by Justice at 2:24 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
On Monday, at the morning Mass for Life, celebrated by Cardinal Justin Rigali, the homily touched upon many aspects of the culture of death. Abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem-cell research, cloning, and the destruction of embryos during IVF were all mentioned in the homily; conspicuously absent was any mention of the death penalty.
To me, that makes sense, as the death penalty is the only one of the above that's not intrinsically evil, and it does no good to cloud the issue by lumping it in as if it were on the same moral level as the others, something that has been repeatedly done by the pro-abortion side.
Lately, I confess, I've been having second thoughts regarding the death penalty, moving back toward a position in favor of it. In part, this is based on a self-reflection that made me realize my motives for supporting its elimination were actually not good motives - I used to favor getting rid of it since life in prison seemed to be a harsher penalty than getting the lethal injection, and I wanted to see them suffer as much as possible. But wishing someone to suffer more is not a morally acceptable reason to support something, and since I'm not convinced the above analysis is incorrect, that has led to doubt.
The other factor is concern over the ability of the government to render harmless those who have committed crimes that would warrant the death penalty. The Tookie Williams circus was the igniting factor here, since it drove home the point that with the media, either in its press or internet forms, it is possible for such people to still have a significant impact on society. Granted, a lot of that was due to the death penalty's existence in the first place, but it doesn't take much to worry about an irresponsible press permitting someone like an Osama bin Laden to get his message out to his followers. As far as I'm concerned, there hasn't been enough thought about how to render these people harmless to society in lieu of death.
It would be nice if theology could help flesh out the situations when it is acceptable to employ a death penalty and when it's not. Much as I respect Pope John Paul II's thoughts here, he was writing in the 1980s in a far different situation than exists in the world today. I don't think you can honestly keep an Osama bin Laden alive in jail after convicting him without him still being able in some way to influence his followers, or risk that they would pull something to try and free him.
The point remains that since the death penalty is not intrinsically evil, it'd help to have a clearer idea of just where the line is. "The only practicable way to defend the lives of human beings effectively against the aggressor" depends on one's definition of "practicable," and in open societies, it is considerably harder to do this than in repressive ones - naturally, if a dictator is going to shut someone up in a prison and give them no outside contact with the world for the rest of their lives, there's no need to kill them, and in fact there may be a sadistic element in keeping them alive; in an open society, particularly in America, it is virtually impossible to cut off contact with society, making the death option seem more viable.
So, now I'm sitting somewhere in the middle of this, not quite sure how to resolve my concerns. At the moment, I'm leaning toward supporting the death penalty where murder was involved and there is no doubt as to guilt. I'm open to reasoned arguments in the other direction, but anyone starting, as is so often the case, with something about how it's never morally acceptable to resort to the death penalty is going to be ignored.
Posted by Justice at 8:28 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The March for Life was pretty good. I think it would have been better had there been better organization, both on our part and on the march organizers' part, since I didn't get a copy of the schedule until we were already in DC (and hence brought too much in terms of food/drink), we were pretty much on our own most of the time there, the march seemed somewhat haphazard (I was chasing the Franciscan banner half the day), and the sound system at the rally was so low, it was all but impossible to hear what the speakers were saying.
But otherwise, it was nice being there for the sake of being there. There wasn't a lot of opposition that I saw, except a small party in front of the Supreme Court itself, so I don't have any tales of combat there. EWTN briefly stopped our group, so it's possible they may have shown us on TV. I was holding a blue Knights of Columbus sign toward the front right of the Franciscan group, if anyone saw us. I also saw a contingent of the Buffalo marchers, which was nice.
Oddly enough, unless I happened to be in a heavily Catholic pocket of the demonstration, I saw very few non-Catholic groups present (Eastern Orthodox, Orthodox Jewish, and traditionalist Catholic groups were the few I did see). Hopefully there was a much broader spectrum present, though it was nice to be among a bunch of rosary and St. Michael prayers. I only noted one dingbat among our ranks Monday (some guy who ripped the idea of pledging to the flag quite loudly), which was also good. Nothing hurts pro-lifers more than our own when they act stupidly.
Posted by Justice at 9:51 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Tomorrow, the University has a holiday (known as President's Day) that allows the entire student body to head over to Washington for the March for Life, if we so choose. I'll be heading over with the school's contingent by bus late tonight, and we should be at the basilica for the Mass tomorrow morning. No word on when we'll be back, though I'm expecting it's going to be quite late.
It's my first time for this event. I'll post about how it went on Tuesday, after I get back. Meanwhile, pray that hearts be changed by our efforts.
Posted by Justice at 4:28 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
This is a spontaneous little project, but I've been having quite a lot of fun with it, and plan on working on it some more this weekend. I've been taking scenes from the Bible, and then parodying them by inserting a theologian into the picture. All of these little rewrites make fun of the theologian based on his profession. Usually, they will read most funny if the theologian is considered to be of the "dissenting" variety. Now, I am of course poking fun at my own course of study, and by extension myself, but laughter is a good medicine, besides a useful way to avoid taking the subject too seriously.
So, what I am looking for is suggestions of Biblical scenes that might plausibly be parodied by sticking a theologian in the mix. These situations should either parallel the text, like this:
And on the eighth day, God created the theologian. His job was to go about the garden and find profound truths. One day, as he was walking in the garden, he thought he had made a great discovery. He took it to Adam, and when Adam saw it, he called it by its name, b------t.
Or rewrite the narrative while achieving roughly the same outcome, like this:
When Joshua came to Jericho, he gave a bullhorn to the theologian, telling him to march around the city for seven days, preaching to the people inside. On the seventh day, the people of the city blew up the walls and ran and slaughtered themselves on the swords of the Israelites, unable to take it anymore.
Posted by Justice at 4:03 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
I haven't seen the televised replay, but according to the announcers, the Buffalo Sabres had a goal scored on them by having an opposing player kick the puck into the net, which is illegal. The referees didn't bother to check it out, despite the players' protest, so it stood. Why does Buffalo seem to have problems with illegal goals being scored on it? First the skate in the crease for the Stanley Cup, a puck shot through the back of the net in the playoffs the following year, and now this.
UPDATE: Well, the NHL confirms this was a screw-up. They tried reaching the arena in Calgary to tell them about it, but weren't able to do so.
Posted by Justice at 10:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Well, they did say grad school would be a lot busier than undergrad. This is markedly true with my 30 books on the list for this term, of which I sadly owned only 1 previously. So while I'm happy I'm going to be compelled to get off my duff and read a lot this semester, I just wish more of the pile would have been on titles I already had, since I'm not going to have time to make any dents in that pile.
I just ran the list against Amazon.com, and realized I could save a grand total of $60 by ordering a dozen books on Amazon, since they're cheaper there. Frustratingly, the three most expensive books on the list ($39, $32, and $27.50) either had no discount over the bookstore, or couldn't be shipped for nearly 2 weeks. I won't feel too bad bringing those dozen books back to the bookstore, since I'm still keeping 17 of them, where Amazon simply was not the way to go. Amazon is a big loser on the deal though, since they offered a free trial of Amazon Prime during checkout - thus losing over $14 I was going to pay anyway for the two-day shipping. And I have absolutely no intention of letting them sign me up for the annual fee either - I frankly don't care how fast my books arive most times, nor do I order enough for it to be worth it.
UPDATE: Well, there were a few changes. The Benedict XVI class (taught by Scott Hahn), had a last minute change. Co-Workers of the Truth has been dropped, and in its place, Milestones has been added, along with the pope's new encyclical, Deus Caritas Est, due out next week. Eschatology has also been added as my choice of book for the final paper in that class. The writings of Merton are optional in Historical foundations, along with Eusebius's History of the Church (not listed).
The books are as follows:
PRINCIPLES OF BIBLICAL STUDY II
- The Writings of the New Testament (Luke Timothy Johnson)
THEOLOGICAL FOUNDATIONS
- The God of Faith and Reason: Foundations of Christian Theology (Robert Sokolowski)
- Scholasticism: Personalities and Problems of Medieval Philosophy (Josef Pieper)
- The Spirit of Early Christian Thought : Seeking the Face of God (Robert Louis Wilken)
THEOLOGY OF BENEDICT XVI
- Behold the Pierced One (Benedict XVI)
- Called to Communion (Benedict XVI)
- Co-Workers of the Truth: Meditations for Every Day of the Year (Benedict XVI)
- Daughter Zion: Meditations on the Church's Marion Belief (Benedict XVI)
- Many Religions, One Covenant: Israel, the Church, and the World (Benedict XVI)
- The Meaning of Christian Brotherhood (Benedict XVI)
- The Nature and Mission of Theology: Essays to Orient Theology in Today's Debates (Benedict XVI)
- The Spirit of the Liturgy (Benedict XVI)
- The Thought of Pope Benedict XVI: An Introduction to the Theology of Joseph Ratzinger (Aidan Nichols)
- Milestones: Memoirs 1927-1977 (Benedict XVI)
- Deus Caritas Est (Benedict XVI)
- Eschatology (Benedict XVI)
HISTORICAL FOUNDATIONS
- The 100 Most Important Events in Christian History (A Kenneth Curtis et al)
- Apologia Pro Vita Sua (John Henry Newman, ed Ker)
- Catholic Church History from A to Z: An Inspirational Dictionary (Alan Schreck)
- Church History: A Complete History of the Catholic Church to the Present Day for High School, College and Adult Reading (John Laux)
- The Compact History of the Catholic Church (Alan Schreck)
- Confessions (St. Augustine, trans Chadwick)
- Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena (St. Catherine of Siena, trans Thorold)
- Early Christian Fathers (Cyril Richardson)
- Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Ven. Bede, ed Farmer)
- The Little Flowers of St. Francis (Raphael Brown)
- On the Love of God and Other Selected Writings (St. Bernard of Clairvaux, ed Dollen)
- Pens'ees and Other Writings (Blaise Pascal, trans Levi)
- Philip Neri: The Fire of Joy (Paul Turks, trans Utrecht)
- The Song of Roland (Trans Sayers)
- Three Treatises (Martin Luther)
- The Wisdom of the Desert (Thomas Merton)
- Your Glory Reflected: 20 Outstanding Christians of the 20th Century (Sheilah Ward-Ling)
N.B. - Other readings are handouts that will be passed out at the appropriate times. They will be added as they come.
Posted by Justice at 10:12 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Freely soliciting opinions on this one...
I am going to have to write on one of five works by Benedict XVI. My options are as follows:
- Eschatology
- Principles of Catholic Theology
- Theology of History in St. Bonaventure
- Pilgrim Fellowship of Faith
- Truth and Tolerance
Of the five, the last is the easiest read (and has the added plus that I already have it), while the Eschatology and Bonaventure works are said to be quite deep. If anyone's read any of these, I'd like your opinion on them.
Posted by Justice at 10:28 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
In today's lecture on the theology of Benedict XVI, we got into a little background that sets the stage. One of the central factors was something called the "via moderna." Despite its name, this is actually something that has its genesis in the 1300s, from William of Ockham, with roots extending back to Blessed Duns Scotus in the 1200s. The basic thrust of the via moderna is an elevation of the will over the intellect - a principle applied to the Trinity as well - known as voluntarism.
From there, a sort of Domino Effect was set up, with the fallout from this idea cascading through the centuries. I've seen this concept before, where nominalism crept into theology, and was never rooted out of it due to the Protestant revolt drawing attention away from correcting it. The rough order of progression:
14th century - Nominalism
15th century - Conciliarism
16th century - Protestantism
17th century - Philosophical Revolt
18th century - Political Revolutions
19th century - Scientific Revolution
20th century - Sexual Revolution
The via moderna introduces a sort of alienation between faith and reason, power and freedom, God and man (a theme echoed in Gunton's coverage of philosophy). In essence, it came to dominate theology by the end of the 14th century, particularly in Germany, and Martin Luther's monastery was involved in it. With a conflict presumed between power and freedom, it first hit theology, and then its sister philosophy, eventually spilling down into the other sciences, politics, and most recently, the nature of the human person.
Benedict XVI has been involved in trying to restore the relationship between "theologia" and "oikonomia," between who God is and what He's done in history (as opposed to the VM's disconnect from the idea that God's actions reflect who God is). It's not an easy task, as the idea has been largely lost since the time of Aquinas - perhaps one reason why the Summa is so difficult for us today.
N.B. - Post may be cleaned up this weekend when I play back the lecture tape and sort out my notes.
Posted by Justice at 7:42 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
An updated post about the library closings in Erie County last year.
Posted by Justice at 6:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
I'm not sure exactly why Medicare Part D is causing such headaches. My grandmother signed up for it, got an award letter that has her paying no more than a $5 copay on any of her medications (cheaper than before), and there were absolutely no problems at the pharmacy the first time she picked them up under the new plan last week. Everyone involved in the process seemed to know what they were doing, and there was relatively little confusion. This was quite unlike the last time health care changes needed to be made, which was not a fun week or two for anyone.
More impressively, this particular plan not only goes through Medicare, but also through New York's EPIC program and Independent Health. Despite that entanglement, things worked just fine. I'd put my bet on the problem being too many people not being prepared for the start of the plan - everything was set on my grandmother's end before the start of the year, and as a result, she's quite satisfied with the whole thing.
Posted by Justice at 5:56 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
I knew I'd have to do another exegesis, but hadn't gotten around to actually looking for a passage. So, thumbing through tonight, I have settled on Romans 2:1-6. Frankly, the topic at issue in that passage on judgment is one that has often driven me crazy, due to its invocation, so I will definitely have some personal motivation on this one.
Therefore you have no excuse, O man, whoever you are, when you judge another; for in passing judgment upon him you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who do such things. Do you suppose, O man, that when you judge those who do such things and yet do them yourself, you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume upon the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience? Do you not know that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But by your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed. For he will render to every man according to his works:
The runner up passage was Revelation 12:1-6 (also a passage I think about from time to time, particularly vis a vis the devil's role). Alert readers will notice there is a very odd pattern in my choice of passages (Sirach 2:1-6 was last semester's project).
Posted by Justice at 12:10 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
You scored as Mathematics. You should be a Math major! Like Pythagoras, you are analytical, rational, and when are always ready to tackle the problem head-on!
What is your Perfect Major? (PLEASE RATE ME!!<3) created with QuizFarm.com |
Well, I was a math major, and largely enjoyed the subject. Psychology is lower, since it was never a terribly passionate subject. Biology is fittingly the lowest.
Posted by Justice at 9:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
After waiting about 2 months for the replacement part for my chair, I was finally able to fix it last night. Ironically, Big Lots Furniture, which sold the chair, is no longer in business here.
The instructions made it look like this was a simple procedure. All I was supposed to do was use a hammer to tap the gas lift out of the base of the chair. About a half hour later, two of us were using the blunt end of a dumbbell trying to get the base loose, and the dumbbell was taking more damage than the pump. In the end, we switched to using a hack saw to saw the plastic base off the pump. We had to saw off more than 3/4 of the central circle before the remainder could be pried off.
Given how resilient that base was to being destroyed - even the legs took blows from the dumbbell without cracking initially - I'm amazed the thing split in the first place. But there is a happy ending, the new base is in now, and the chair will hopefully not break again.
Posted by Justice at 9:46 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The Frappr map, which has been around for about 2 months, has just found its way onto my sidebar. It's a good thing I get work done faster than I work on these little things...
Feel free to stick a pin in the map and let me know you exist. I do get all sorts of interesting locations showing up on Sitemeter - a few weeks ago, someone from the IRS showed up looking for information on Fr. Corapi. And someone from Venezuela looking for something quite apart from what I have here. Help make my map as interesting as my Sitemeter.
Posted by Justice at 12:03 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Queen Latifah's new movie, Last Holiday, was certainly a lot better than I had been expecting. In a way, I'm quite surprised it earned a PG-13 rating, I would have given it a PG myself, since this had some of the least suggestive sexual references and mildest language of any comedy in recent memory.
I thoroughly enjoyed the movie, which was funny, moving, and flowed well. There was really only one part of the film where the plot *really* had to make a stretch, and I think it shows up on screen pretty blatantly. But it's pretty early on and easily forgotten by what follows. It's one of the best films I've seen in a while not based on a classic book.
Posted by Justice at 7:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Mike Mularkey resigned yesterday as the head coach of the Buffalo Bills. It's being billed as a surprise to owner Ralph Wilson, who less than a week ago announced Mularkey was staying, but I don't buy the idea that Wilson was surprised by this, I think he was angling for it all along. Mularkey had three years to go on his contract, and Wilson hates paying coaches he's fired (he sued in 2000 trying to avoid paying the last year of Wade Phillips' contract). But by resigning, Wilson gets out of having to pay Mularkey anything, a situation that no doubt makes the owner happy.
I think it's hard to look at Wilson's actions any other way - he tells the coach that he's the man for next year, yet forces him to dump half his staff, many of whom he personally selected. He must have forgotten that in 2000, Phillips opted to be fired rather than dump one of his assistants; how could he have thought that asking for a whole bunch to be fired wouldn't upset his coach? In addition, it put Mularkey on such weak ground, he would have been hard pressed to find quality assistants for next year, dooming him to what likely would have been another year of dismal failure and further damage to his reputation.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out with the Bills, though Wilson getting more involved in the organization doesn't seem like the best thing if he's going to play these sorts of games with his staff to try and save a few bucks.
Posted by Justice at 1:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Although the federal minimum wage isn't going anywhere, New York is in the process of hiking that wage, which now sits at $6.75 per hour and is set to go up to $7.25 per hour within a year. That means, incidentally, that even the lowest-paid worker in the state now makes more than any student at Franciscan University. $6.75 is also more than I was paid at any of the jobs I held at the University at Buffalo during my 4 years there. Call me crazy, but I expect college students to be adversely affected by New York's move, since we tend to take those positions, and some businesses are already folding up shop because of the higher wages.
I sometimes wonder what the politicians are thinking - if your business happens to rely mostly on jobs near the entry-level, this size hike in wages (31% over federal minimum thus far) is not going to be easy to manage - most businesses do not operate with the profit margin needed to cover that size increase in labor costs, meaning that they have to use some combination of price hikes and job cuts to make it work. Neither of those options are good news for people on the low end of the pay scale who can't afford either to lose work or pay more for products and services.
Posted by Justice at 11:09 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Thinking back on my undergraduate years, something rather interesting stands out - in both my primary major (Mathematics) and my minor (Philosophy), I was never once instructed by a woman (the exception is 2 weeks one filled in when the Calc prof suffered a stroke). In psychology, the other major, there was a largely even split, though the men again win by a 5-4 score. The five honors seminars I ended up taking were all also taught by men.
Kind of a fluke given I was at a large public university, but there were hardly any women professors in the math department, and women just didn't happen to teach the courses I wanted to take most times. Thus far, theology is operating on largely the same track - of 8 courses so far, 8 men. This is not to complain, I've had a very good experience with my set of instructors, it's just probably a rare occurrence these days.
This is kind of funny in a way given the recent blogosphere articles about the vanishing male - my experience has been of the vanishing female with the professors and majors I've chosen.
Posted by Justice at 3:01 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
And what good's a life that leaves nothing behind
Not a thought or a dream that might echo in time?
The years and the hours, the seconds and minutes
And everything my life has placed in it betrayed.
The above is sung by Beethoven in a piece called What is Eternal? in Beethoven's Last Night. It reminds me of a professor of philosophy whom I had in a class entitled The Meaning of Life. The professor's quintessential example of a life with maximal meaning was Beethoven, primarily because his definition was maximization of potential. In this particular song, Beethoven has been visited by the devil and told he can only save his soul if he gives up his life's work - hence the question above.
The scary thing is that the professor (an atheist) and I agreed more often than we didn't, particularly since the extrapolation of his thesis is that actions matter and idle time doesn't contribute much to one's life. Some time, I should scan over the old class recordings and notes, although it was pretty depressing that at least half my peers were willing to buy into the idea that fantasy, if pleasurable, is preferable to reality.
Sidenote - the professor's likely answers to some questions posed by Beethoven elsewhere in that song (it is sort of schizophrenic in its themes):
I stare in the dark, thinking what is eternal?
The man or the moment? The act or the reason?
I can't see him answering anything but the man and the act.
Posted by Justice at 2:11 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
And I thought the reading list was bad for last semester...this time around, there are roughly 30 books on my list for the 4 courses I'm signed up for. Now that I've picked up my jaw from that one, there is some good news, in that I already own some of those titles, and I have read at least one title (Song of Roland) before. I'll see what the syllabi look like, but this looks like it will be challenging on the face of things.
Posted by Justice at 3:17 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The Chronicles of Narnia is now playing at the local theatre, so I figured I'd head on over tonight to grab the Monday dollar-off discount.
Now, this theater is small and normally only has two showings per night on its screen - since Narnia is longer, they only have one per night with a matinee on the weekend - and is several weeks behind the normal release of movies in the larger chains in the area. The upside is that their prices are generally about half what I would pay at the Regal.
You'd have thought this was opening night instead of a Monday night after the film's already been out over a month - I got there 15 minutes early to find the house was already a third full. So many people came, they pushed the start of the film back 10 minutes to clear the line, and by the time those last people got in, they were heading down to the second row for about the only open seats left. I'd guess attendance was nearly 500 people, close to a sell-out.
Maybe there is something to the lower prices. I paid just $3.00 to get in, $2.50 for a medium popcorn, $2.00 for a medium drink, and $1.50 for a medium candy - $9.00 in all. That's barely admission elsewhere.
Posted by Justice at 1:10 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Listening to Beethoven tormented by demons, as envisioned by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, is an interesting way to go about trying to clean up templates, since that's sort of like wrestling with demons. Thankfully, everything seems to look decent now in Firefox. Other browsers are on their own.
Every template got a little face lift at least, and at least all of them are now operating off the same style sheet (I had four previously), and basically readable. Suggestions for further tweaking are welcome.
Posted by Justice at 3:28 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Just when I had the Individual archive almost fully fixed, now Movable Type is acting very weird across the entire system, and most of the archives are down. I hope this isn't a corruption of the database.
UPDATE: This was a server failure.
Posted by Justice at 2:22 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
My old CCD program coordinator has asked me to join a group of "recent graduates" of the program to talk to the current batch about confirmation. It's just a five minute presentation, and there are eight questions that she's asked us to cover in those five minutes. I think she's in for a shock because she's going off my present situation (being at Franciscan University) not realizing that I was a poster child for how NOT to approach Confirmation at the time. Here's the eight questions and the corresponding answers:
1 - What name did you choose and why?
The name was Francis. I don't exactly remember which one, though I tend to think St. Francis of Assisi. The principal motivation here was that I already liked my current middle name, and didn't have it explained well enough to realize that picking out a name at Confirmation did not involve having to legally change your name. This is definitely a point of regret, since in hindsight I would much prefer having looked into the saints instead of going with what I already had, especially since I landed that one in virtue of it being a grandfather's name.
2 - How did you feel about coming to the sessions?
How much longer until it's over? I absolutely hated these things and was bored out of my mind. It didn't help that I didn't want to be there in the first place. The format was someone would speak on some issue for the first part, and then there would be group discussion with a group leader. The speakers made little impact, and I dislike "group work" in general.
3 - Did any of the sessions or speakers impact your life?
No. Couldn't tell you who they were or what they talked about except the one person who tried talking about vocations and did it so badly, they were mocked for quite a time afterward.
4 - Who did you choose as a sponsor and why?
An aunt, primarily because she was literally the only adult Catholic I knew to ask outside of immediate family. I think this was impacted to a great degree by being isolated from parish life - I lived outside the geographic boundary of the parish and consequently knew none of the other kids (with I think 1 or 2 exceptions over the years) and due to personal isolation, didn't really know any adult Catholics outside of the instructors and priests.
5 - What are you doing now?
Studying for a Master's in theology, yet unsure what to do with it. Still not sure whether this will lead into the religious life or not. Presently, the only thing ministry-wise is altar boy, usually a 3-times a month thing, although I might be busier this semester with more of my evenings free for it.
6 - How did you decide on the ministry you are involved in now?
No real better reason than that I wanted to try it, and I signed up for it.
7 - What was your Confirmation service project?
So inconsequential personally that neither I nor my mother remember what it was. On paper, it was supposed to be 10 hours worth of service somewhere in the community, but the people who sign off on these things really aren't that scrupulous about the time involved (I once got 5 hours credit for cheering on a bunch of racers for no more than 30 minutes). I know some things I did do over the years for CCD, I just don't remember which years they're for.
8 - How do you stay "connected" to the Catholic faith?
Yes! Here's my chance to give an answer that doesn't make me seem like a total loser. EWTN, the many blogs of St. Blog's Parish, the discussions at Franciscan, reading Catholic news, and reading up on books are some of the ways I've done this over the years. Hopefully some of these will be things the current crop of kids haven't heard about and will be willing to check out.
As I say, this ought to be an interesting evening, as well as an exercise in humility, since the first 7 questions all have answers that don't exactly cast me in the best light. I'm still debating whether to introduce myself as the person who six years ago "was in your seat, didn't care, didn't want to be there, and was just going through the motions." I'm praying that I go last.
Posted by Justice at 11:58 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
These are two of the better pieces of writing that I've seen in a while.
First is Mark Steyn's piece on the West's demographic suicide, linked to by many on my blogroll.
Second is a piece by Michael Crichton demolishing a lot of misconceptions about the environment, via Polipundit.
Posted by Justice at 5:26 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Having met with the priest involved with this incident last Sunday, his explanation was that there is a homily service that's provided to help out with that and that on the occasion he likes to present ideas in other homilies he feels are worthwhile. That's fair enough, though I still think there was way too much similar between his homily and what was in the homily online for him not to mention a source.
I suppose in a way, this is a back-door argument for keeping priests celibate - if they already don't have the time to come up with their own homilies, they probably don't have the time needed for a wife and kids either. But I do worry about the kind of information that's being put in that homily service, and especially the people running it - if they're the same sort that run the USCCB's hierarchy, or the ones running the intercessions service that might explain part of the problem there.
Posted by Justice at 8:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The blog's design is being tinkered with slightly, as is visible on the main page at the moment. The new format reveals the category each post is filed under and should also make it easier to locate my permalinks - they're indicated by "permalink" now instead of the timestamp. The Archives remain a mess as usual, mostly since I've really never tinkered much with them and I still don't know what I'm doing. Those will take however long it takes me to figure out the coding of those pages.
The side panels have been rearranged in a hopefully more logical fashion than before. I also plan on adding at least some of them to my Archive pages, although Movable Type does not seem to like the idea of using the search function on those pages.
New blogs to be linked are Living Catholicism, Fidei Defensor, and Deo Omnis Gloria.
Franciscan University now has a link, as does the website that provides the cross and dragon backgrounds on the site, Lord Kyl's Realm.
Also for your consideration is the web comic Tittivillus, by the same guy who runs Lord Kyl's. Sort of bizarre, sometimes irreverent, but usually funny and definitely better than half of what they print in the Sunday comics these days. This is one of my personal favorites in the series, coming at the end of a Divine Comedy story line.
Posted by Justice at 11:42 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
You have to look carefully for it, but they left a little clue about their nefarious plot in the Liturgy of the Hours. In the Office of Readings for the Tuesday before Epiphany, this little footnote was left behind:
If this day occurs on Sunday, the Te Deum is said.
So that's the scheme! To make Tuesday into Sunday! Watch out for the Easter Tuesday rebellion, coming soon to a "liturgically-correct" parish near you.
Posted by Justice at 12:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Since I first started using Site Meter over a year ago, there have been 10,000 visits to this blog, most of them of the 0 second variety, though a few brave souls have dared to stay for more than a minute.
The 10,000th visitor was from London, Lambeth in the UK, stayed for 0 seconds, and got here via a blocked referrer. The post they ended up on was this one about Japanese puzzles. Something tells me I wasn't what they were looking for.
Posted by Justice at 11:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Liturgical Dance. During a Mass. In the Cathedral. With the Bishop. Proudly displayed on the front page of the Diocesan Newspaper.
AAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!
And that was the kicker on top of one of the worst Masses in a long time. Coming back home has brought back such fond memories...like how spoiled I've been over in Steubenville, particularly with the homilies. After this latest round of nonsense, I am going to quit grumbling over the comparatively minor problems I have with the Friars (which is admittedly mostly music-related) - I'd rather take them on their worst days than any of what I've been to lately back home.
...And now, while doing a search for a line used in the homily that I thought particularly ironic ("for the forest to be green, the trees must be green" - ironic since I interpret that as meaning if you want world peace, people need to have Christ's peace, which means we need to evangelize, not an item mentioned in the homily), I find out today's homily was taken entirely from Fr. Irvin without attribution.
Beautiful. The rest of the year hopefully goes better than today.
Posted by Justice at 5:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Real Name: Rob
Age: 23
E-mail: justice (at) justiceknight (dot) com
AIM: StBlogsCrusader
Residence: Steubenville, Ohio
Currently: Studying for an MA in Theology
Welcome to my blog! My posting is often erratic and unpredictable, but I hope you find something worth reading here. Feel free to leave me comments.
