Huge Breakthrough in Umbilical Cord Stem Cell Research

via the Curt Jester

"First Liver Grown From Stem Cells Offers Hope for Transplant Patients"

It makes you wonder why all those pushing embryonic stem cell research are ignoring this more ethical alternative. For more on umbilical cord stem cells, click here. I wrote more on this topic awhile back.

Bias and History

We had another impromptu apologetics discussion last night with teens from our homeschool co-op on a text assigned in their "literature" class (it was a couple of short chapters from a Protestant history book). We had another good discussion (I think we're going to turn this into some sort of a club once they're done with their class and meet weekly if we can to study history and apologetics). I just had to share a statement from the text they were given that was one of the most arrogant and unsubstantiated statements I've ever seen. I can't imagine making a statement this broad and unsubstantiated about anyone...

The strife was mainly caused by the unlimited ambition of the pope for power. For centuries this sinful strife threw Europe into political disorder and dragged the Church through the mire of darkest crimes.

Hmmm. There certainly have been some bad popes, but it's rather amazing that they can't even conceive of any sort of legitimacy for a pope having a conflict with an emperor. After discussing one (admittedly) very bad pope, they go on to complain that the popes would try to keep bishops from receiving their offices from the hands of laymen. Though politics and religion were certainly mixed up in a complex way, one gets the sense that the author really doesn't think the church has the right to claim any sort of authority over anyone - even those who are a part of the Church leadership.

Two books we're planning to tackle in our club are Pope Fiction by Patrick Madrid and 10 Dates Every Catholic Should Know by Diane Moczar. We read part of a chapter from the latter book as part of our discussion last night - it was quite helpful.

I do want to note that I recommend the latter book with some reservations. Most of it is an historical work and I think it's quite strong in that regard. A thread of it is more theological and some of this is speculative (which she admits) and points in some directions that aren't particularly helpful or pertinent to a study of history (I'm refering to the "chastisement" thread). Part of what concerns me is that, as I understand it, the concept of "chastisement" has to be understood in a certain way to even be theologically plausible since God does not cause evil but allows it to exist. I also don't like the fact that she speculates on future "chastisements" and how much we seem to deserve this in modern times. This to me seems counterproductive to the purposes of studying Catholic history and feeds, however subtly, into "end-times" hype.

Prayer Request

Please pray for a family in our local Catholic homeschool group whose 4 year old son, Sam, died this past weeked from complications relating to the flu. This is a really beautiful, very devout family who have been through a lot. Donations can be made to the family through our homeschool group at this link.

The God in the Cave, Part VII

All this indescribable thing that we call the Christmas atmosphere only hangs in the air as something like a lingering fragrance or fading vapour from the exultant explosion of that one hour in the Judean hills nearly two thousand years ago. But the savour is still unmistakable, and it is something too subtle or too solitary to be covered by our use of the word peace. By the very nature of the story the rejoicings in the cavern were rejoicings in a fortress or an outlaw's den; properly understood it is not unduly flippant to say they were rejoicings in a dug-out. It is not only true that such a subterranean chamber was a hiding-place from enemies; and that the enemies were already scouring the stony plain that lay above it like a sky. It is not only that the very horse-hoofs of Herod might in that sense have passed like thunder over the sunken head of Christ. It is also that there is in that image a true idea of an outpost, of a piercing through the rock and an entrance into an enemy territory. There is in this buried divinity an idea of undermining the world; of shaking the towers and palaces from below; even as Herod the great king felt that earthquake under him and swayed with his swaying palace.

Novena for Life for upcoming Elections

A novena started today will finish up on election day. There are a lot of life issues (especially S.D.'s abortion ban, parental notification laws in several states, embryonic stem cell research issues and lots more) wrapped up in the upcoming election . Here's a suggested novena sent by one of my reviewers...

Novena for the Culture of Life

This year's election offers another opportunity to further the Culture of Life. Please join us in praying a novena for the victory of the Culture of Life at all levels in the upcoming elections, and in the Supreme Court decision on the federal Partial-Birth Abortion ban (hearing scheduled for Nov 8).

The novena begins on Monday, October 30, and ends election day, November 7, 2006. The suggested prayer is the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, but feel free to substitute the Rosary, daily Mass, or another prayer of your choice.

Here's the info on praying the Chaplet of Divine Mercy using a regular rosary:

1. Our Father ...
2. Hail Mary ...
3. I believe in God ... (Apostles' Creed)
4. On the "our Father" beads: "Eternal Father I/we offer you the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of your dearly beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, in atonement for our sins and those of the whole world."
5. On each "Hail Mary" bead: "For the sake of His sorrowful passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world."
6. At the end (after 5 decades), pray 3 times: "Holy God, holy mighty One, holy immortal One, have mercy on us and on the whole world."

Frankly Speaking II

(and my apologies for the multiple posts earlier - Blogger has been really misbehaving)

Frank ran into the house filled with excitement. (It's 50 degrees and sunny today, so they spent a nice afternoon outside carving pumpkins).

"Daddy's got a gun!"

"Daddy's got a gun!"

I must have looked a little stunned, because he turned back after a moment to reassure me.

"He's a good guy!"

What daddy in fact had was a caulking gun to fix the roof.

The Face of Innocence

Speaking of Frank, Ria just came across this picture of herself holding Frank at 9 months old after he had just gotten into a pen.

Still Searching

I've done a LOT of cleaning in the basement this week (St. John Vianney must have figured that it, ahem, needed a little work down there), but no relic yet. :(

Next task to tackle is the Christmas tubs - since it was Christmas time that we moved and I don't get everything out every year it seems. But this will have to come after some work on that project that I'm still waiting to tell you about (I hope it can be soon!) and the Catholic Homeschool Carnival.

Frankly Speaking

I'm really enjoying Frank at this age, even though he's definitely got that 2 year old destructive streak (yesterday he got a hold of Gus's Math book, tore out about 1/4 of the pages and scribbled on some more - for some reason Gus didn't seem too distressed).

I love getting glimpses into what he understands and remembers even though his conversation is somewhat limited. Last night I snuggled up with him to get him to sleep and started to try to find a song he would tolerate me singing. (A number of my kids have had this thing at night that they don't want to be sung to at bedtime, unless you happen upon JUST the right song.) Anyway, the song that he decided he liked was "London Bridge is falling down." He had me sing this over and over (4 or 5 times) before he started talking about a movie and bridges falling down. Then he said something about "big bridges hurt me." I couldn't understand what he meant and explained that big bridges are strong and people can drive cars on them. Still he insisted that big bridges hurt him (and something about a movie again). I finally realized that he had remembered a scene from David Macaulay's Building Big: Bridges DVD (one of our favorites!) with the Tacoma Narrows Bridge twisting and turning violently until it fell apart. Then I was able to explain that that was a "silly bridge" (best term I could come up with) that fell apart a long time ago and that they make big bridges strong now so they can't twist around. He really seemed to get it!

Later on (he didn't settle down very quickly) he was complaining about bad guys getting him and I of course reassured him that he was safe and that there were no bad guys here. He complained a few more times and then called for his sword (he has a plastic sword from Target that he adores). Once he had that in his hand he sighed and said that bad guys wouldn't get him. He fell asleep happily with sword in hand.

There was something else he said today that I wanted to note here so I wouldn't forget, but by the time I got around to this post, I did forget it. Perhaps it will return to me.

A Chocolate Cake Farm?

It all started innocently enough. John got a $10 gift certificate from our local grocery store (believe me, we're big customers) for his birthday. He finally got around to spending it last night (his birthday was some days ago). Naturally, he had to spend part of it on a birthday cake (mix - Terri was enormously delighted to do the baking - I have no idea when I last baked a cake).

So we enjoyed a delightful chocolate cake with rich home-made chocolate frosting after dinner. This started an interesting educational tangent. It had Gus pouring over the encyclopedia set last night to find out what Baking Soda was (and led to some discussion on the Periodic Table and the difference between elements and compounds - it helps that he has a nifty poster of the periodic table in his room so there is already some familiarity - I don't think I knew what it was when I was 11). Anyway, you can read about our tangent here. Dr. Thursday has added his own thoughts here.

Company and a Rosary for Priests

We've had a relative visiting for the past few days. She comes for a few days or a week every month or two and we enjoy her company. She's blind and has been working, one or two classes at a time, on getting her high school diploma through a correspondence school for the blind. Usually when she comes over, she has a school thing she needs help with and we enjoy the challenge of explaining something to her without benefit of illustration on paper (this is especially tricky with Math). The kids usually get caught up in whatever the "lesson" is and it turns out to be a great teaching moment. With Math, we learned that the kids' Montessori-type manipulatives are great for explaining Math concepts to her.

Anyway, this visit, it wasn't a school problem, but a, um, prayer challenge. Someone had given her a set of intentions for priests to pray with each mystery of the Rosary. It was a little on the old side, too long for her to work on memorizing, and didn't include the Luminous Mysteries. So, together, we rewrote it and added appropriate intentions for the Luminous Mysteries. I thought I'd share that here in case anyone is interested (I thought it was a neat concept)...

The Joyful Mysteries

The Annunciation

For future priests, especially those in the womb.

The Visitation

For priests who help the sick and the dying.

The Birth of Our Lord

The priests may promote a culture of Life.

The Presentation in the Temple

For older priests and priests who are suffering.

The Finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple

For young priests and priests who teach the faith to children.

The Luminous Mysteries

Baptism of Our Lord

For young men who are called to the priesthood that they accept their vocation.

Wedding Feast at Cana

That families will foster religious vocations.

Proclamation of the Kingdom

That priests truly represent Christ on Earth.

Transfiguration

That priests help bring us closer to God.

Institution of the Eucharist

That priests have a great devotion to the Blessed Sacrament

The Sorrowful Mysteries

The Agony in the Garden

For priests who are suffering or who are fallen away from the Church.

The Scourging at the Pillar

For priests who are oppressed or persecuted.

The Crowning with Thorns

For priests and bishops to stay true to the Church.

The Carrying of the Cross

For the Holy Father

The Crucifixion

That priests take Mary into their hearts like St. John did.

The Glorious Mysteries

The Resurrection

For hope for priests who are discouraged.

The Ascension

For missionary priests.

The Descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and Mary

That we may have priests who are enthusiastic and on fire with the Holy Spirit.

The Assumption

That priests may spread a devotion to Mary.

The Crowning of Our Lady as Queen of Heaven and Earth

For priests to be faithful and joyful with Mary as their guide.

Sorry - No Chesterton Post Today

Too busy trying to put together one of these nifty all-things-mom binders. I had some slightly-worn blue and white-striped file folders that I cut in halves for the dividers. Made labels and a front cover with some neat pics on the web that I fiddled around with on Paint Shop Pro. (you can search for "blue and white tiles" or "delft blue" at http://images.google.com to get a similar result - my digital camera doesn't work to show you my results).

I'm not following any "recipe" (though the above-linked posts provided some inspiration for sure), but I know I need some more of this kind of organization to keep moving in the right direction!

UPDATE: I added a few of the images to Flickr

Age Quod Agis Gets Around

Ria, circa 1994

My little post about my New Year's Resolution awhile back has taken some interesting turns as several bloggers have recently discussed how they have applied it to their own lives. At the time I didn't even explain what it really meant to me. The picture I have in my head is this:

I had recently discovered this motto in the book Lunch Bag Notes (from Loyola Press). I was at the library by myself - my husband stayed home with the kids. I always have a tendency to feel guilty and rush through these things, (gotta hurry, gotta hurry) but this time I thought "What am I doing?" - I'm running myself ragged. There's nothing wrong with slowing down and enjoying the process a little more of selecting books for my family's education, etc. etc. Do what you are doing!

Anyway, here are some links to other moms' thoughts on Age Quod Agis.

Willa R.
Karen E.
Danielle Bean

The Holy Innocents - God in the Cave Part VI

We all know the story of how Herod, alarmed at some rumour of a mysterious rival, remembered the wild gesture of the capricious despots of Asia and ordered a massacre of suspects of the new generation of the populace. Everyone knows the story; but not everyone has perhaps noted its place in the story of the strange religions of men. Not everybody has seen the significance even of its very contrast with the Corinthian columns and Roman pavement of that conquered and superificially civilised world. Only, as the purpose in his dark spirit began to show and shine in the eyes of the Idumean, a seer might perhaps have seen something like a great grey ghost that looked over his shoulder; have seen behind him filling the dome of night and hovering for the last time over history, that vast and fearful face that was Moloch of the Carthaginians; awaiting his last tribute from a ruler of the races of Shem. The demons also, in that first festival of Christmas, feasted after their own fashion.

Unless we understand the presence of that enemy, we shall not only miss the point of Christianity, but even miss the point of Christmas. Christmas for us in Christendom has become one thing, and in one sense even a simple thing. But like all the truths of that tradition, it is in another sense a very complex thing. Its unique note is the simultaneous striking of many notes; of humility, of gaiety, of gratitude, of mystical fear, but also of vigilance and of drama.

More Prayer Requests

First I've been meaning to ask for prayers for the "Common Room" family who were recently in a serious car accident. All seem to be on the mend, but I'm sure they'd still appreciate additional prayers.

A family on one of my e-mail lists asks prayers for their teenage son who has been hospitalized with psychiatric problems.

Finally, I would like to request your prayers again for my good friend Katrina for whom I shared a novena prayer a little while back. She has had multitudinous health issues and over a million dollars in medical tests. At first she was diagnosed with "Lou Gehrig's Disease" but the diagnosis has since changed (more than once I think). It's a great challenge already to deal with these things and raise her family (she has three young children). Now her husband is scheduled to return to Iraq for another year (really an extra three months on top of that with training and such). Please, please, keep them in your prayers. She has such a good sense of humor and seems to be handling things rather well (and she does credit the prayers for that). She told me today that she asked lots of people to pray the novena to St. Clare for her - even ones who weren't religious or who weren't currently going to church. One of the moms returned to the Church after praying the Novena.

10 Random Facts Meme

I didn't really get tagged, but I felt like memeing (I've really enjoyed reading others' responses) and Amy gave me a perfect excuse. :)

1. I am totally, brings tears-to-my-eyes, crazy about babies, especially newborns.

2. A wonderful lady gave me three years of piano lessons for free when I was in grade school.

3. In high school I took second place in a VFW speech contest on "The Challenge of American Citizenship."

4. I share(d) a birthday with Pope John Paul II. My fondness for him goes way beyond that, of course. He was such a witness of hope and truth - especially in my formative years. I remember in particular going to see him in Monterrey, California in 1987 (I was 17 at the time). When he left in a helicopter everyone was waving and cheering and I felt compelled to climb some sort of scaffolding thing nearby to wave from there. We love the John Paul II movie that was just released by Ignatius Press, by the way. I need to review it soon.

5. "Pocahontas" was my dad's nickname for me when I was little.

6. My parents "found" my name from Donald O'Connor's daughter, Alicia, who was friends with my big sister when my family lived in Los Angeles a few years before I was born.

7. I love organizing things but I am definitely NOT a neat freak.

8. I've never been out of the country before, though I had a passport for many years because I *almost* went with my Mom to Europe just before college. There were two very inexpensive tickets made available to us, but one of them, alas, fell through.

9. My godfather was an Air Force chaplain before he retired to take over a tough parish in the Boston Archdiocese. I've never met him (even when I was a baby), but I hope to some day.

10. I have a quirky sense of humor that sometimes seems to confuse people.

I tag Ria, Suzanne, Nutmeg, Molly, and any of the "love2learn" ladies who happen to see the post.

Catholic Homeschool Carnival Submissions Due Tomorrow

Please submit your favorite post of interest to Catholic Homeschoolers here. Look for the Carnival on the Love2learn Blog on November 3. Thanks!

More on the Wise Men (The God in the Cave, Part V)

The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton, from the chapter "The God in the Cave"

Here it is the important point that the Magi, who stand for mysticism and philosophy, are truly conceived as seeking something new and even as finding something unexpected. That tense sense of crisis which still tingles in the Christmas story and even in every Christmas celebration, accentuates the idea of a search and a discovery. The discovery is in this case, truly a scientific discovery. For the other mystical figures in the miracle play; for the angel and the mother, the shepherds and the soldiers of Herod, there may be aspects both simpler and more supernatural, more elemental or more emotional. But the Wise Men must be seeking wisdom; and for them there must be a light also in the intellect. And this is the light; that the Catholic creed is catholic and that nothing else is catholic. The philosophy of the Church is universal. The philosophy of the philosophers was not universal. Had Plato and Pythagoras and Aristotle stood for an instant in the light that came out of that little cave, they would have known that their own light was not universal. It is far from certain, indeed, that they did not know it already. Philosophy also like mythology, had very much the air of a search. It is the realisation of this truth that gives its traditional majesty and mystery to the figures of the Three Kings; the disocvery that religion is broader than philosophy and that this is the broadest of religions, contained within this narrow space.

We might well be content to say that mythology had come with the shepherds and philosophy with the philosophers; and that it only remained for them to combine in the recognisation of religion.

To me this is SUCH amazing stuff. That there was something sought and I love the part about "finding something unexpected." His statements about the broadness of religion and the church is also fascinating and true, I think. It reminds me a bit of the "10 Rules for Handling Disagreement like a Christian" by Bishop Vigneron of Oakland.

Finding Saint John Vianney

My kids and I really enjoyed Alice's post on visiting the relic (his heart - which is incorrupt) of St. John Vianney in New York. Not the first time I've been jealous of those New Yorkers (I dreamed of finding a good excuse for a road trip to visit the Fra Angelico exhibit at the Met last year).

This got me thinking, though. You see, we are privileged to have in our possession a relic of St. John Vianney. We've never sought out relics on purpose, but we've ended up with a beautiful little collection that really amazes me. They've all been given to us at one time or another (and most connect with family names somehow) - the St. John Vianney was in a box of relics that the priest at John's old parish handed out after daily Mass one day (he seemed to consider them rubbish). For most of the early years of love2learn.net I kept the relic on top of my computer and I considered him one of our patrons.

The really sad thing is that I lost this relic. The time was three years ago - a week before Christmas. I was 39 weeks pregnant with Frank (#6) and we were moving to a larger house (just across town from our old house). The sale was really insane and we didn't know for sure that we were moving until the afternoon of the day we closed. I had been packing a lot of things (and many things were boxed up in our wonderful old shed for showing the house) but we really weren't all the way packed - things were too uncertain. We had to rent and start packing a U-Haul truck that morning we closed, even though we weren't quite sure because otherwise we were going to be stuck without help moving (John's family was going away that weekend). And our timing was tight with Christmas and a new baby coming. The family that bought our old home had major troubles with financing, a number of people involved in the process had thrown extra, unnecessary glitches into the process and we were almost ready to give up, but there was this big hitch - we needed a new car (the old one only held 7) and we really needed to take care of the new mortgage before a new car loan.

Anyway, things worked out, we suddenly found our house full of relatives and friends - we ran off to sign the papers and when we got back I drove the kids right over to the new house (where it was a bit less crazy). So we moved, celebrated Christmas, welcomed a new baby two weeks after Christmas (the one time I was REALLY glad that mine are usually two weeks past due-date), bought a new (used) mega-van and eventually settling in. But the St. John Vianney relic has never turned up. I'm sure there are places it could be, afterall, just a few days ago, while looking for the haircutting scissors I found a torn-up note in a dresser drawer which I recognized as my notes on negotiations regarding the offer made on our old house. So, I have decided to renew my search. He must be around here somewhere!

Milwaukee Catholic Homeschool Conference

Nancy has the latest scoop on the Milwaukee Conference - April 27-28, 2007 - What a fantastic lineup! Fr. Ray Gawronski, Fr. Donald Brick, Rita Munn, Holly Pierlot, Mary Daly, Stanley Schmidt, Maureen Wittmann and Nancy Brown!!!

I'll be doing my "standard" workshop on Getting Started in Catholic Homeschooling. My friend Mary Z and I will again be hosting our love2learn table. Though we will have workshop handouts for sale, we're basically there to show some samples of materials (including homemade materials and samples of kid projects like Gus' Geography Binder) and chat with people about the joys (and challenges) of homeschooling. We usually have a few of our kids on hand to help out and chat too - not sure of the exact line-up yet. Hmmm. We'll have to come up with some new freebie hand-outs too. Should be fun. :)

CCD and Saint Stories

I have a friend who teaches 8th grade CCD. After being surprised and somewhat dismayed at their lack of knowledge and understanding of the faith (most of them didn't know the Hail Mary and didn't attend Sunday Mass) she found something that caught their interest (and serves as an occasion to answer questions as they come up in their natural setting). The kids got very interested in the idea of celebrating patron saints and finding out about their saints. A secondary challenge occured, though, since many weren't named after saints, so she came up with the idea of looking for the saint's day that fell on their birthday.

Anyway, one of the first saints she read about was Saint Wenceslaus who had many family members strongly opposed to his religious beliefs (which was complicated by political situations) and was murdered by his brother.

After hearing the story, one of the boys blurted out "Man! That's worse than Desperate Housewives!"

Terri & Bernie's Favorite "School" Movies

David Macaulay Building Big Series

Rick Steves' Best of Europe (the ones they've seen - not by any means all)

Nature (the ones they've seen)

Pope John Paul II (the "new" one with Cary Elwes - i.e. Westley from The Princess Bride - Bernie says... "I LOVE the Pope movie!")

Jesus of Nazareth

Microcosmos (Terri qualifies - "except for some gross parts")

Amazing Caves (IMAX)

This is America Charlie Brown (Bernie is enthusiastic here, but Terri says "sort of")

March of the Penguins

Song of Bernadette

Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima

Rule of 6 Carnival

Mary G. has invited everyone to come up with their own "Rule of 6 Things to Include in Your Child's Day, Every Day". I really enjoy these things (like Maureens' "7 Habits of Highly Effective New School Years") because they're fun ways to examine our goals and it's so interesting to see how they are looked at from different angles and with different emphasis for each family. By the way, I found Mary's and Lissa's (see sidebar) original lists quite inspiring.

So anyway, here's mine (not quite sure if it's elegantly simple or incomprehensibly cryptic, but it's certainly "vague" enough to be flexible!)...

Faith
Affection
Nature
Formation
Culture
Responsibility

The God in the Cave - Part IV

I love his use of the word "conceived" here (he's still speaking of the Wise Men - especially as representatives of philosophy and of other cultures)...

These learned men would still have the right to say, or rather a new right to say that there was truth in their old teaching. But after all these learned men would have come to learn. They would have come to complete their conceptions with something they had not yet conceived; even to balance their imperfect universe with something they might once have contradicted. Buddha would have come from his impersonal paradise to worship a person. Confucius would have come from his temples of ancestor-worship to worship a child.

We must grasp from the first this character in the new cosmos; that it was larger than the old cosmos. In that sense Christendom is larger than creation; as creation had been before Christ. It included things that had not been there; it also included the things that had been there...The Church contains what the world does not contain.

Clear Creek Monastery Auction, Part II

American Papist has a great write-up on the Clear Creek Monastery Auction and my talented niece's (if I do say so myself - I used to sing her to sleep when she was a baby - I'm so proud!) drawing. You can check out the post here. The auction is ending soon.

The Campaign for Real Beauty

This is an amazing video revealing our sometimes-distorted perception of beauty.

hat-tip Feminine Genius

The God in the Cave - Part III

from The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton - This is such an interesting exposition of history leading up to the Incarnation. I've never seen anyone correlate ancient history and mythology to the advent of Christ quite like this before! This chapter relates the astounding story of Bethlehem and the Birth of Christ. Chesterton has aimed to look at these events that we have grown (perhaps) overly-accustomed to from the outside in order to consider them in all their wonder.

Mythology had many sins; but it had not been wrong in being as carnal as the Incarnation. With something of the ancient voice that was supposed to have rung through the groves, it could cry again, 'We have seen, he hath seen us, a visible god.' So the ancient shepherds might have danced, and their feet have been beautiful upon the mountains, rejoicing over the philosophers. But the philosophers had also heard.

It is still a strange story, though an old one, how they came out of orient lands, crowned with the majesty of kings and clothed with something of the mystery of magicians. That truth that is tradition has wisely remembered them almost as unknown quantities, as mysterious as their mysterious and melodious names; Melchior, Caspar, Balthazar. But there came with them all that world of wisdom that had watched the stars in Chaldea and the sun in Persia; and we shall not be wrong if we see in them the same curiosity that moves all the sages. They would stand for the same human ideal if their names had really been Confucius or Pythagoras or Plato. They were those who sought not tales but the truth of things; and since their thirst for truth was itself a thirst for God, they also have had their reward. But even in order to understand that reward, we must understand that for philosophy as much as mythology, that reward was the completion of the incomplete.

Prayers for a New Project

I have a new project that will be unveiled in the next week or two. It relates to Catholic homeschooling and Catholic radio (not a full show, don't worry!). I'll let you know more very soon - in the mean time I would very much appreciate your prayers! Deo Gratias!

The Series of Unfortunate Events ... Ends

Ria and I read the final book in The Series of Unfortunate Events by "Lemony Snicket" this past weekend. We were introduced to the series by a relative last Christmas, whipped through all twelve books and eagerly awaited the last installment, which was released last Friday. The stories relate the misadventures of three orphaned children who are constantly pursued by an evil villain and constantly let-down by adults who should have helped them but were blinded by various faults and inclined to trust the villain rather than the children. Some great points mixed in here!

They're rather strange stories, but we found a lot to like - particularly the author's love of language and poetry and his funny way with words. The books were fun and interesting on the whole. But the final book was a bit of a let-down - definitely anti-climactic in comparison with Book 12. Mostly some moral wrestling with various points - important, but not particularly well-developed - on the part of the orphans and a number of questions left unanswered. (like the sugarbowl!)

There were a few parts along the way that we didn't care for - particularly a part in the 7th book (if I remember right) that seemed to be an insult to Our Lady - it was impossible to be quite sure what his intentions were, but it still felt like quite a slap in the face.

The final book had some odd symbolism, but the author didn't seem to do anything in particular with it. The one that stood out the most (but nothing like the part in the 7th book I mentioned earlier) was a scene in which a friendly snake brings apples from a forbidden tree to people who needed it as an antidode to poison. This seemed a little strange, and couldn't have been accidental, but it really didn't seem to mean anything at all since the one who made the rules was a rather-flawed leader of a utopia-like (perhaps even cult-like) community.

I suppose there's probably something I missed, but I don't have quite enough interest to go back and re-read all thirteen books again. Sigh. The quite enjoyable process of reading through them and sharing and discussing them with Ria leaves me with no regrets, though.

God in the Cave (Part II)

I'm taking this in smaller chunks now (at the request of Ria)...

Here he's still talking about the shepherds and the concept of mythology as a sort of searching...

And the thing they found was of a kind with the things they sought. The populace had been wrong in many things; but they had not been wrong in believing that holy things could have a habitation and that divinity need not disdain the limits of time and space. And the barbarian who conceived the crudest fancy about the sun being stolen and hidden in a box, or the wildest myth about the god being rescued and his enemy deceived wth a stone, was nearer to the secret of the cave and knew more about the crisis of the world, than all those in the circle of cities round the Mediterranean who had become content with cold abstractions or cosmopolitan generalisations...The place that the shepherds found was not an academy or an abstract republic; it was not a place of myths allegorised or dissected or explained or explained away. It was a place of dreams come true. Since that hour no mythologies have been made in the world. Mythology is a search. (page 209)

Frank Says...

Regarding Gus' Math Book...

"Little peoples don't step on it. Big peoples write on it."

Fun Math Words

mathematical
Pythagorean Theorem
tetrahedron
geometric
trigonometry
Fibonacci
consecutive
convex
icosahedron
dodecahedron
octahedron
stereoscopic
oscillation
symmetrical
abacus
equiangular
polyalphabetic substitution
infinitesimal
calculator
conchoid of Nicomedes
googolplex
transcendental probability
quadrilateral
equilibrium
perpendicular
hypotenuse
Thales of Miletus
Anaximander

Speaking of Movies...

George Stevens is one of my favorite directors for movies like The More the Merrier and I Remember Mama. Looks like there are quite a few more of his movies I'll have to check out some day.

It was interesting to note, in a little introduction to I Remember Mama (I love DVDs with all the extra goodies) that Stevens was good friends with Frank Capra (It's a Wonderful Life You Can't Take it With You, It Happened One Night and many others), William Wyler (Ben Hur, Roman Holiday) and Michael Curtiz (Casablanca, White Christmas). What a pool of talent! Stevens, Capra and Wyler founded Liberty films just after World War II.

Lots o' Movies

I've been pretty negligent about jotting down notes on movies we've seen (and we've seen a LOT), so I'm going to attempt to hit a bunch of movies in nice little chunks...

Cinderella Man (2005 - Russell Crowe, Renee Zellwegger, directed by Ron Howard) We saw this months and months ago and LOVED it. It's based on the true story of a boxer past his prime who makes a huge comeback during the depression (and when his family is in serious need). It's so moving in the way it portrays Braddock's pride and concern for his family. I'll never forget the words "I'm fighting for milk." We found this appropriate for teens and adults (contains some boxing violence and language). Ria enjoyed it too!

God or the Girl This is a reality show about four young men who are trying to decide whether or not God is calling the to the priesthood. We found the show to be fair-minded on the whole and perhaps more honest than we might have expected. This is a show worth watching and discussing for Catholic parents working to understand how to foster vocations in their families. Not all the examples are good ones! (at least one priest and one set of parents are pushy - not a good idea!) There's really a lot to talk about in other places besides. Steve's and Dan's stories were our favorites. Such enthusiasm and emotion and faith!

Because of a Netflix fluke we ended up receiving the 2nd disc first - and went ahead and watched it first. We let Ria and Gus watch it too - lots of positive stuff. Then we watched the first disc - which ended up with a lot more complex things and decided to have them skip that for now. There were a lot of little things worth discussing (when we have time) of varying complexity in the various relationships portrayed in the show. I'm afraid it would take too many lines to explain them all here right now.

Beyond Christmas (originally titled Beyond Tomorrow). This is an oldie (circa 1940) I hadn't seen before that opens wonderfully in a Christmas Eve scene with an interesting and touching premise. Three old gentlemen, finding themselves alone at Christmas, decide to invite some strangers to their table by throwing wallets out into the city street (with ten dollars and a business card in each) and see if anyone returns them. There was a lot to like, but in the end it sort of fizzles as if nothing else could keep up with the interesting starts to the story. Jean Parker (who plays Beth in the 1930s Little Women beside Katharine Hepburn as Jo) plays the leading lady.

Four Chaplains is a recent (and rather short) documentary about the four army chaplains (one priest, two Protestant ministers and one rabbi) aboard the U.S.S. Dorchester, which was sunk by U-Boats near Greenland on February 3, 1943. Their courage and camraderie were inspiring and they ended up going down with their boat and approximatley 600 men, arm-in-arm singing and praying, after giving their life vests to others. Most of the life boats were frozen to the ship and only those aboard the two life boats that were able to launch were saved.

The Caine Mutiny (1954 - Humphrey Bogart, Fred McMurray, Van Johnson) This is a classic we revisited after quite a few years. Humphrey Bogart is an aging Naval officer who takes over an unruly ship with low morale. His mental stability is questioned and strange behaviors lead to a mutiny. Thoughtful stuff and worthy of discussion with teens.

Walk the Line (2006 - Joaquin Phoenix, Reese Witherspoon) This is the quite intense story of country legends Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash. Johnny Cash went through horrible bouts of drug and alcohol abuse before eventually finding his way. The story is painfully honest - a little overwhelmingly so for me at this viewing, so I don't think I appreciated it as much as others have. I was glad I saw it, but it's definitely not for the kids.

The kids have also enjoyed (i.e. I'm running out of energy to review):

This is America Charlie Brown
The Shaggy Dog (with Tim Allen)
The Importance of Being Earnest (1952)

The God in the Cave

Notes on the first chapter of the second part of The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton. I really don't think I can do a fair job at summarizing this whole chapter - just a few highlights here...

This sketch of the human story began in a cave; the cave which popular science associates with the cave-man and in which practical discovery has really found archaic drawings of animals. The second half of human history which was like a new creation of the world, also begins in a cave. There is even a shadow of such a fancy in the fact that animals were again present; for it was a cave used as a stable by the mountaineers of the uplands about Bethlehem; who still drive their cattle into such holes and caverns at night. It was here that a homeless couple had crept underground with the cattle when the doors of the crowded caravanserai had been shut in their faces; and it was here beneath the very feet of the passers-by , in a cellar under the very floor of the world, that Jesus Christ was born.

A mass of legend and literature, which increases and will never end, has repeated and rung the changes on that single paradox; that the hands that made the sun and stars were too small to reach the huge heads of the cattle. Upon this paradox, we might almost say upon this jest, all the literature of our faith is founded. It is at least like a jest in this; that it is something which the scientific critic cannot see. He laboriously explains the difficulty which we have always defiantly and almost derisively exaggerated; and mildly condemns as improbable something that we have almost madly exalted as incredible; as something that would be much too good to be true, except that it is true. When that contrast between the cosmic creation and the little local infancy has been repeated, reiterated, underlined, emphasized, exulted in, sung, shouted, roared, not to say howled, in a hundred thousand hymns, carols, rhymes, rituals, pictures, poems, and popular sermons, it may be suggested that we hardly need a higher critic to draw our attention to something a little odd about it; especially one of the sort that seems to take a long time to see a joke, even his own joke.

Any agnostic or atheist whose childhood has known a real Christmas has ever afterwards, whether he likes it or not, an association in his mind between two ideas that most of mankind must regard as remote from each other; the idea of a baby and the idea of unknown strength that sustains the stars. His instincts and imagination can still connect them, when his reason can no longer see the need of the connection; for him there will always be some savour of religion about the mere picture of a mother and a baby; some hint of mercy and softening about the mere mention of the dreadful name of God. But the two ideas are not naturally or necessarily combined. They would not be necessarily combined for an ancient Greek or a Chinaman, even for Aristotle or Confucius. It is no more inevitable to connect God with an infant than to connect gravitation with a kitten. It has been created in our minds by Christmas because we are Christians; because we are psychological Christians even when we are not theological ones. In other words, this combination of ideas has emphatically, in the much disputed phrase, altered human nature...Omnipotence and impotence, or divinity and infancy, do definitely make a sort of epigram which a million repetitions cannot turn into a platitude. It is not unreasonable to call it unique. Bethlehem is emphatically a place where extremes meet.

If the world wanted what is called a non-controversial aspect of Christianity, it would probably select Christmas. Yet it is obviously bound up with what is supposed to be a controversial aspect...the respect paid to the Blessed Virgin. When I was a boy a more Puritan generation objected to a statue upon my parish church representing the Virgin and Child. After much controversy, they compromised by taking away the Child. One would think that this was even more corrupted with Mariolatry, unless the mother was counted less dangerous when deprived of a sort of weapon. But the practical difficulty is also a parable. You cannot chip away the statue of a mother from all round that of a new-born child. You cannot suspend the new-born child in mid-air; indeed you cannot really have a statue of a new-born child at all. Similarly, you cannot suspend the idea of a new-born child in the void or think of him without thinking of his mother...We must either leave Christ out of Christmas, or Christmas out of Christ, or we must admit, if only as we admit it in an old picture, that those holy heads are too near together for the haloes not to mingle and cross.

It might be suggested, in a somewhat violent image, that nothing had happened in that fold or crack in the great grey hills except that the whole universe had been turned inside out. I mean that all the eyes of wonder and worship which had been turned outwards to the largest thing were now turned inward to the smallest. The very image will suggest all that multitudinous marvel of converging eyes that makes so much of the coloured Catholic imagery like a peacock's tail. But it is true in a sense that God who had been only a circumference was seen as a centre; and a centre is infinitely small. It is true that the spiritual spiral henceforward works inwards instead of outwards, and in that sense is centripical and not centrifugal. The faith becomes, in more ways than one, a religion of little things.

Whether as a myth or a mystery, Christ was obviously conceived as born in a hole in the rocks primarily because it marked the position of one outcast and homeless. Nevertheless it is true, as I have said, that the cave has not been so commonly or so clearly used as a symbol as the other realities that surrounded the first Christmas.

But in the riddle of Bethlehem it was heaven that was under the earth. There is in that alone the touch of a revolution, as of the world turned upside down. It would be vain to attempt to say anything adequate, or anything new, about the change which this conception of a deity born like an outcast or even an outlaw had upon the whole conception of law and its duties to the poor and outcast. It is profoundly true to say that after that moment there could be no slaves. There could be and were people bearing that legal title, until the Church was strong enough to weed them out, but there could be no more of the pagan repose in the mere advantage to the state of keeping it a servile state. Individuals became important in a sense in which no instruments can be important. A man could not be a means to an end, at any rate to any other man's end. All this popular and fraternal element in the story has been rightly attached by tradition to the episode of the Shepherds; the hinds who found themselves talking face to face with the princes of heaven...Men of the people, like the shepherds, men of the popular tradition, had everywhere been the makers of the mythologies. It was they who had felt most directly, with least check or chill from philosophy or the corrupt cults of civilisation, the need we have already considered; the images that were adventures of the imagination; the mythology that was a sort of search; the tempting and tantalising hints of something half-human in nature; the dumb significance of seasons and special places. They had best understood that the soul of a landscape is a story and the soul of a story is a personality...Pan was dead and the shepherds were scattered like sheep. And though no man knew it, the hour was near which was to end and to fulfil all things; and though no man heard it, there was one far-off cry in an unknown tongue upon the heaving wilderness of the mountains. The shepherds had found their Shepherd.

More later...

Favorite Car Songs

We're reverting to a lot more singing in the car (since our radio/CD player broke sometime this summer) though it has a tendency to devolve into everyone singing a different song all at once. One of our wonderful co-op teachers has helped the kids get comfortable with singing rounds and two-part harmonies - which is a lot of fun! I'm found the lyrics and/or music to some of these online (though the lyrics often vary slightly):

Here are a few of our favorites:

Jubilate Deo I think we do this one a little "wrong". I learned it on a campout many years ago and my memory didn't serve me quite precisely. It seems to works o.k., though. :)

Non Nobis Domine (from the movie Henry V with Kenneth Branaugh)

Swinging Along


The Coffee Song (round)

Powdered Milk Biscuits (from Prairie Home Companion)

Dona Nobis Pacem

All Gods Creatures Got a Place in the Choir

The Wild Rover

To Portsmouth, To Portsmouth

Some Words (and Names and Phrases) We Like...

triskaidekaphobia (particularly pertinent today)
micropigmentation
ophthalmologist
permeability
paleomagnetism
fractional crystallization
hydraulic conductivity
Eratosthenes
Copernicus
Archimedes
bioluminescent
dodecahedron
pagination

Leaving room (and time) to take advantage of enthusiasm for learning as it appears in our family, is an important essential part of our homeschool/educational philosophy.

Prayer Requests and Protestant "Literature"

There are a number of Catholic homeschool families who are in need of prayers - families who are suffering through illness or other even greater sufferings. I would be grateful if you could keep them collectively in your prayers.


I'd like to ask for a prayer too for our group of co-op teens. A number of them are taking a literature class (run by a Protestant lady, but one that they've taken in the past without any issues) that is ending up with some unexpectedly anti-Catholic reading materials on the list (red flags went up with the Catholics in the group when the teacher pulled out A Beka's Masterpieces from World Literature text).

We're having a discussion/pizza party tonight to help them with a really tough reading passage from a 14th century figure (John Huss - never heard of him before) who wrote on his particular interpretion of the biblical passage "Thou art Peter and on this Rock I will build my church." The writing is quite convoluted and Huss uses a great deal of tradition while professing to ignore tradition. The parents were initially leaning towards having the girls simply skip this assignment (which they would have every right to do), but they asked me to read through it for my opinion. Together we decided to work through it for the learning experience (and to stand up for their faith) and go ahead and have the girls answer the questions given in the book honestly and sincerely (but, perhaps, um, without expecting a very good grade):

1. Who is the rock and foundation of the church?
2. What was Peter's place in the church?

This project, by the way, followed from a quickly thrown together discussion we had yesterday afternoon (at the request of Gilbertgirl, who is in the class) on a Dante passage that included some commentary that caused concern. We had a fabulous discussion (we all decided that we had witnessed the beginning of some sort of club) and the conversation and flow of ideas was encouraging and filled with enthusiasm. This was one of the (many) days where I thought very gratefully of my TAC years (where I was a rather mediocre student, by the way) that provided me with some helpful intellectual tools that can be readily pulled out to defend the faith and help people turn on their "skeptometers". It also made me very grateful for the gifts of faith, homeschooling and community. God is so good!

Kate and the Little Snow

Kate, whose birthday is in January, and has been eagerly anticipating it for months, woke up this morning and was amazed by the sprinkling of snow on the deck. She eagerly (and with great enthusiasm) announced: "Snow! Today must be my birthday!!!"

Snow! [updated]

I have a new nephew born today!
In other news, we got snow! Sticking to the deck already - unbelievable! We were outside in shorts just two days ago.

New Catholic Mom Site

This looks neat.

hat-tip Danielle Bean

The Roman Empire just before the Birth of Christ

still in the chapter "The End of the World" - on the already declining Roman empire and culture - from The Everlasting Man...

For the shepherds were dying because their gods were dying. Paganism lived under poetry; that poetry already considered under the name of mythology. But everywhere, and especially in Italy, it had been a mythology and a poetry rooted in the countryside; and that rustic religion had been largely responsible for the rustic happiness. Only as the whole society grew in age and experience, there began to appear that weakness in all mythology already noted in the chapter under that name. This religion was not quite a religion. In other words, this religion was not quite a reality...it was not so much immoral as irresponsible; it has no foresight of the final test of time. Because it was creative to an extent it was credulous to any extent. It belonged to the artistic side of man, yet even considered artistically it had long become overloaded and entangled. The family trees sprung from the seed of Jupiter were a jungle rather than a forest; the claims of the gods and demigods seemed like things to be settled rather by a lawyer or a professional herald than by a poet.

The last few sentences above about the family tree especially struck me (as both true and written with great wit). I have a book called The Genealogy of Greek Mythology, which is very handy for studying mythology and culture with my co-op class, but boy is it complicated! As a matter fact, it's not really a book, but a long, fold-out, double-sided chart. They have the mortals on one side and the immortals on the other.

I do not believe that mythology must begin with eroticism. But I do believe that mythology must end in it. I am quite certain that mythology did end in it. Moreover, not only did the poetry grow more immoral, but the immorality grew more indefensible...The psychology of it is really human enough, to anyone who will try that experiment of seeing history from the inside. There comes an hour in the afternoon when the child is tired of 'pretending'; when he is weary of being a robber or a Red Indian. It is then that he torments the cat...The effect of this staleness is the same everywhere; it is seen in all drug-taking and dram drinking and every form of the tendency to increase the dose. Men seek stranger sins or more startling obscenities as stimulants to their jaded sense...They try to stab their nerves to life, if it were the knives of the priests of Baal. They are walking in their sleep and trying to wake themselves up with nightmares.

This next part made me think and wonder a bit. It's always bugged me when people have implied that country living is more moral than city living. But I wonder if what he means here is somethings simpler (and which I could see might be true); that the poor living in the country are happier and more content than the poor living in the city. Perhaps this is because they are naturally surrounded by more of God's beauty that can be shared and enjoyed by all. I remember being shocked, when I lived in San Diego and read about some young people who had grown up in the inner city of San Diego and never been to the ocean!

It is proverbial that what would once have been a peasantry became a mere populace of the town dependent for bread and circuses; which may again suggest to some a mob dependent upon doles and cinemas. In this as in many other respects, the modern return to heathenism has been a return not even to the heathen youth but rather to the heathen old age. But the causes of it were spiritual in both cases; and especially the spirit of paganism had departed with its familiar spirits. The heart had gone out of it with its household gods, who went along with the gods of the garden and the field and the forest. The Old Man of the Forest was too old; he was already dying. It is said truly in a sense that Pan died because Christ was born. It is almost as true in another sense that men knew that Christ was born because Pan was already dead. A void was made by the vanishing of the whole mythology of mankind, which would have aspyxiated like a vacuum if it had not been filled with theology.

You have to understand the word "thought" in the right sense in order to read this next part properly. It's very easy to misread it at first and expect that first sentence to end somewhat differently. Basically, it's used as a noun here, not a verb.

His sense of describing restlessness is really striking. The word "jaded" also comes to mind.

Theology is thought, whether we agree with it or not. Mythology was never thought, and nobody could really agree with it or disagree with it. It was a mere mood of glamour and when the mood went it could not be recovered. Men not only ceased to believe in the gods, but they realised that they had never believed in them. They had sung their praises; they had danced round their altars. They had played the flute; they had played the fool...But with them as with us, the human family itself began to break down under servile organisation and the herding of the towns. The urban mob became enilghtened; that is it lost the mental energy that could create myths. All round the circle of the Mediterranean cities the people mourned for the loss of gods and were consoled with gladiators.

There was nothing left that could conquer Rome; but there was also nothing left that could improve it. It was the strongest thing that was growing weak. It was the best thing that was going to the bad. It is necessary to insist again and again that many civilisations had met in one civilisation of the Mediterranean sea; that it was already universal with a stale and sterile universality. The peoples had pooled their resources and still there was not enough. The empires had gone into partnership and they were still bankrupt. No philosopher who was really philosophical could think anything except that, in that central sea, the wave of the world had risen to its highest, seeming to touch the stars. But the wave was already stooping; for it was only the wave of the world.

Atheism became really possible in that abnormal time; for atheism is abnormality. It is not merely the denial of a dogma. It is the reversal of a subconscious assumption in the soul; the sense that there is a meaning and a direction in the world it sees.

Christianity emerges. I love the unique point-of-view Chesterton helps us look at it from.

A convenient compromise had been made between all the multitudinous myths and religions of the Empire; that each group should worship freely and merely give a sort of official flourish of thanks to the tolerant Emperor, by tossing a little incense to him under his official title of Divus. Naturally there was no difficulty about that; or rather it was a long time before the world realised that there ever had been even a trivial difficulty anywhere. The members of some Eastern sect or secret society or other seemed to have made a scene somewhere; nobody could imagine why. The incident occurred once or twice again and began to arouse irritation out of proportion to its insignficance. It was not exactly what these provincials said; though of course it sounded queer enough. They seemed to be saying that God was dead and that they themselves had seen him die. This might be one of the many manias produced by the despair of the age; only they did not seem particularly despairing. They seem quite unnaturally joyful about it, and gave the reason that the death of God had allowed them to eat him and drink his blood...They were a scratch company of barbarians and slaves and poor and unimportant people; but their formation was military; they moved together and were very absolute about who an what was really a part of their little system; and about what they said, however mildly, there was a ring like iron. Men used to many mythologies and moralities could make no analysis of the mystery, except the conjecture that they meant what they said. All attempts to make them see reason in the perfectly simple matter of the Emperor's statue seemed to be spoken to deaf men. It was as if a new meteoric metal had fallen on the earth; it was a difference of substance to the touch. Those who touched their foundation fancied they had struck a rock.

Wow...

Nobody yet knows very clearly why that level world has thus lost its balance about the people in its midst; but they stand unnaturally still while the arena and the world seem to revolve around them. And there shone on them in that dark hour a light that has never been darkened; a white fire clinging to that group like an unearthly phosphorescence, blazing its track through the twilights of history and confounding every effort to confound it with the mists of mythology and theory; that shaft of light or lightening by which the world itself has struck and isolated and crowned it; by which its own enemies have made it more illustrious and its own critics have made it more inexplicable; the halo of hatred around the Church of God.

10 Rules

by Bishop Vigneron of Oakland

[this is a truly awesome list!]

hat-tip DarwinCatholic

The Roman Meal Soldier

We've bought Roman Meal wheat bread for quite a few years. Seems to be the best combination of healthiness and taste to work for everyone here. We had a first today, though. Frank, our sword and soldier-loving toddler, wanted to know the soldier's name. So we christened him Atticus - the first Roman-sounding name that popped into my head. Now I'm wondering, is that a Roman name?

By the way, Hilda Van Stockum's wonderful little poem on St. Michael from The Angel's Alphabet (now sadly out-of-print) is making a major theological stamp on this little one's heart. In a world in which he's practically obsessed with good guys and bad guys, he's delighted by St. Michael - the good guy with the sword who doesn't hurt us. This is definitely a little guy who, as Chesterton put it, has "known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination".

Back to the Everlasting Man

I'm going to try to start catching up with a few rather long quotes. This is going back to the chapter "The End of the World." (By no means an attempt at a thorough commentary, just highlighting some portions of interest to me.)

The first section is about Virgil (author of the Aeneid, the story of the fall of Troy leading to the founding of Rome)..

The themes of Virgil were specially and notably the normal themes and nowhere more than in morals; piety and patriotism and the honor of the countryside. And we may well pause upon the name of the poet as we pass into the autumn of antiquity; upon his name who was in so supreme a sense the very voice of autumn, of its maturity and its melancholy of its fruits of fulfilment and its prospect of decay. Nobody who reads even a few lines of Virgil can doubt that he understood what moral sanity means to mankind. Nobody can doubt his feelings when the demonds were driven in flight before the household gods. But there are two particular points about him and his work which are particularly important to the main thesis here. The first is that the whole of his great patriotic epic is in a very peculiar sense founded upon the fall of Troy; that is upon an avowed pride in Troy although she had fallen.

In tracing to Trojans the foundation of his beloved race and republic, he began what may be called the great Trojan tradition which runs through medieval and modern history. We have already seen the first hint of it in the pathos of Homer about Hector. But Virgil turned it not merely into a literature but into a legend. And it was a legend of the almost divine dignity that belongs to the defeated. This was one of the traditions that did truly prepare the world for the coming of Christianity and especially of Christian chivalry. This is what did help to sustain civilisation through the incessant defeats of the Dark Ages and the barbarian wars; out of hwich what we call chivalry was born. It is the moral attitude of the man with his back to the wall; and it was the wall of Troy. All through medieval and modern times this version of the virtues in the Homeric conflict can be traced in a hundred ways cooperating with all that was akin to it in Christian sentiment. Our own countrymen, and the men of other countries, loved to claim like Virgil that their own nation was descended from the heroic Trojans. All sorts of people thought it was the most superb sort of heraldry to claim to be descended from Hector. Nobody seems to have wanted to be descended from Achilles. (pgs. 184-185)

This is getting hard - so interesting that I don't know what to simply highlight!

That is why the popularisation of the Trojan origin by Virgil has a vital relation to all those elements that have made men say that Virgil was almost a Christian. It is almost as if two great tools or toys of the same timber, the divine and the human, had been in the hands of Providence; and the only thing comparable to the Wooden Cross of Calvary was the Wooden Horse of Troy. So, in some wild allegory, pious in purpose if almost profane in form, the Holy Child might have fought the Dragon with a wooden sword and a wooden horse. (pgs. 185-186)

I love how Chesterton develops the themes of shepherds and philosophers and then (later in the book) shows us how they relate to the shepherds and Magi in the story of Christmas. This is just a little piece of the theme here.

There is nothing more artificial than the cry of artificiality as directed against the old pastoral poetry. We have entirely missed all that our fathers meant by looking at the externals of what they wrote. People have been so much amused with the mere fact that the china shepherdess was made of china that they have not even asked why she was made at all...

In short, we have only to ask why there is a chian shepherdess and not a china shopkeeper. Why were not mantelpieces adorned with figures of city merchants in elegant attitudes; of ironmasters wrought in iron or gold speculators in gold? ... Because the ancient instinct and humour of humanity have always told them, under whatever conventions, that the conventions of complex cities were less really healthy and happy than the customs of the countryside.

One of those "Duh!" Moments

I had one of those "duh" moments just now - I jumped to a conclusion but rather quickly had a change in my point of view (yes we've been thinking and talking about The Phantom Tollbooth lately).

I have a weather alert set up on my computer since I'm in an area that can occasionally experience severe weather. All day today, it's been popping up with an "Urgent" warning about freezing temperatures. "How ridiculous!" I thought. "It's around 50 degrees right now - where's the desperate urgency?!"

Then I finally clicked on the alert and read what it had to say, ending with this...

"A FREEZE WATCH IS ISSUED WHEN SUB-FREEZING TEMPERATURES ARE POSSIBLE...WHICH COULD KILL CROPS AND OTHER SENSITIVE VEGETATION DURING THE GROWING SEASON."

Duh!

Clear Creek Monastery Auction

My niece has a beautiful charcoal sketching up for auction in a fundraiser for the Clear Creek Monastery in Hulbert, Oklahoma. You can read about how she made this piece here.

UPDATE: Use this link and create an account to enter the auction site and bid on this drawing. My niece informs me that her previous link was problematic. If you've already bid on the item through that link, please make sure that your account is set-up properly.

Music Resources

I just stumbled across the blog of the Church Music Association of America (found it through Stella Borealis). I was surprised to find that Dr. William Mahrt is the president of the association. I was priviledged to sing in Dr. Mahrt's choir during my summers home from college. Looks like this is a good place to do some more digging.

I'm scheduled to do a little music workshop for a parents' meeting for our homeschool group early next year. The main objectives are to promote the importance of helping young people appreciate these treasures of the Church (though I'll only spend a little time on this) and teach everyone to sing perhaps three or four pieces (at least half of them will be Gregorian Chant). Hope to display a selection of useful resources as well. We're inviting teens to attend as well. Hope it'll be a fun evening. Suggestions welcome!

Serious Population Problems in Russia

but not what you might think. The numbers are absolutely astonishing.

Read more here

Book Stack

Here's what I'm reading or have recently finished (can't seem to keep up with the list in the sidebar or with blogging in detail about each book).

On Thursday I finished Danielle Bean's My Cup of Tea - which I REALLY enjoyed! In each short reflection (three or four pages if I remember right), which relate to mothering and family life, she tells a true story (plenty of humor sprinkled in) and reflects on what her life and children mean to her, even when things are frustating and crazy. Even though it's a lot about the foibles and challenges of life, she very thoughtfully leads you to a sense of peace over these things as normal challenges that can lead us to God.

I've made a lot more progress in The Everlasting Man lately, but haven't had a lot of time to blog in detail. I'm in the midst of Chesterton's reflections on the Passion. I'm inclined to catch up on blogging the in-between chapters both because I loved them and because my niece told me that she's now working her way through the same book and has enjoyed the posts.

10 Dates Every Catholic Should Know (Sophia Institute Press) looks like another winner (I'm about half way through - I'm planning on a thorough review for the Winter edition of Heart and Mind). This struck me as a particularly good book for homeschool parents to read to brush up on their history.

I re-read a lot of The Phantom Tollbooth on Thursday night in preparation for last night's teen discussion. We had a wonderful time and I think it was a terrific ice-breaker to get the teens comfortable with the process of discussion. Two hours flew by (and everyone was at the edge of their seat by the end) and we barely skimmed the surface of the book - that's not to say that the discussion was superficial, but the book is so meaty, in a delightful way. It was interesting how each time we discussed a portion of the book in detail, it seemed to naturally take us to the next point on Milo's journey.

This is also our big weekend each year for rummage saling (there's a great one at a local private school that's in its 49th year I think) and I'm completely beat. Lots more great books for future enjoyment (I'm especially looking forward to re-visiting my old friends Calvin and Hobbes and The Far Side) as well as warm necessities like winter coats and fun not-quite-necessities like a real Mexican sombrero (still had the price tag in Pesos, though it was a little worse for the wear) and additional Chinese tea cups for our set (we were a bit short on authentic cups during our teen discussion last night).

The Amazing Amish

I can't help but be in complete awe over how the Amish community in Pennsylvania has been handling this week's tragedy. Today's story of how the Amish have been reaching out to the family of the attacker - and helping Roberts' family mourn his death - particularly amazed me. When was the last time you saw that kind of love and forgiveness?

Carnival Time

The 1st Catholic Homeschooling Carnival is up at the Love2learn Blog.

Details of Amish Girls' Courage and Faith

It looks like it may have had some impact on the attacker as well (from ABC News)...

The oldest of the five Amish girls shot dead in a Pennsylvania schoolhouse is said to have stepped forward and asked her killer to "Shoot me first," in an apparent effort to buy time for her schoolmates.

Rita Rhoads, a midwife who delivered two of the victims, told ABC News' Law and Justice Unit that she learned of 13-year-old Marian Fisher's plea from Fisher's family.

What's more, Fisher's younger sister, Barbie, who survived the shooting, allegedly asked the gunman, Charles Carl Roberts IV, to "Shoot me second," Rhoads said.

"They were amazing," Rhoads said, "absolutely amazing. There was a tremendous amount of calm and courage in that schoolroom."

"Marian, the oldest one, did ask to be shot first," Rhoads said. "The faith of their fathers really was embedded in them. … How many adults are willing to do that? Not many."

Marian Fisher is being buried today, along with Naomi Rose Ebersole, 7, and sisters Mary Liz Miller, 8, and Lena Miller, 7.

Anna Mae Stoltzfus, 12, is to be buried on Friday.

Rhoads' revelations come as the mystery surrounding the alleged motivations behind Roberts' attack deepens.

Roberts entered West Nickel Mines Amish School on Monday and shot a total of 10 girls before turning the gun on himself.

Rhoads said that before killing himself, Roberts uttered three words — "Pray for me."

Her account of Roberts' final words matched an account attributed to another named source in The New York Times.

"He asked the children to pray for him, and that's kind of interesting because he said he hated God," Rhoads said. "He must have recognized the faith in them, God in them."

Foss Baby Arrives!

Congrats to Elizabeth and Mike

Having a Little Fun...

Make your own "motivational" poster here.

Hat-tip Lapped Catholic

Maurice Baring on Leisure in Education

(Wow, that title is really a mouthful.)

I just received my first issue of StAR magazine a few days ago. I was amused to find a reproduction of the same painting of Chesterton, Belloc and Baring as appeared in the last issue of Gilbert Magazine. It was placed in the middle of the first article I read (naturally), which was by Fr. James Schall on "Baring's Eton". Eton is a famous English prep school (even I had heard of it before!) which Baring attended in his teens beginning in the late 1880s.

Schall discovered an essay Baring wrote about his years there and I wanted to share just a little of Schall's thoughts on this essay...

Baring makes a very unexpected conclusion from these reflections on gamesmanship at Eton. "The beauty of the existing system is that the worship and importance of games gives those who did not excel in games, or who are fond, if not of study, of books, the leisure and the opportunity to cultivate their own tastes". Baring included himself in this latter happy group. I particularly like that distinction between "study" and "books" as object of our fondness. We need both "leisure" and "opportunity" to develop our "tastes", itself another very good term that guides what we read and hear and, indeed, play.

This marvelous freedom was well appreciated by Baring. "A boy can spend hours in the school library reading Monte Cristo if he wants to. Nobody cares. But supposing everyone cared and thought it a disgrace not to like Pindar, nobody would be allowed to read Monte Cristo or Sherlock Holmes. The tyranny of the intellect is the worst of all. The rule of the intellectuals is far severer than that of the athletes". Such reflections, drawn from the library and playing fields of Eton, are well worth our intense reflection. One forgets that one of the real dangers of what are called "good schools" is the danger of leaving no time to their students for the important things, among which, no doubt, are Monte Cristo and Sherlock Holmes.

"Thomism in a Catholic College" by Dr. Ronald McArthur

I found this lovely little essay by the founder of Thomas Aquinas College in Ignatius Press' sale rack in the book The Mind and Heart of the Church: Proceedings of the Wethersfield Institute, Volume 4.

Here's a sample:

To study St. Thomas, then, the way he should be studied demands that we see our way through the obstacles that prevent us from taking him seriously as our teacher, as the one who forms our minds. (I take it that we agree that he should form our minds - that we agree, that is, with the advice and commands of all the Popes since his death that we should study him as our master in the intellectual life.)

Our first task, should we be serious, would be to restore genuine liberal education in our Catholic schools, to help our students acquire those arts that are the ways to wisdom and without which the intellectual life is impossible. This means that our students learn to read and write, acquire the basic disciplines in mathematics, and, in sum, learn to think by acquiring the liberal arts. Such a restoration of liberal education is impossible using textbooks, almost all of them written to escape the difficulties involved in any serious thought. Lectures as the basic mode of teaching must go, for they presuppose, if they are to help the student, that he is already educated enough to intelligently consider what is told him. (Aristotle, if you recall, thought that the generally educated man was not one who was expert in any field but one who could listen to any lecture and judge if that lecture were reasonable or not, if it proceeded from principles proper to its subject, and if it proceeded with fitting arguments.)

The antidote to the lecture is a steady diet of discussion of significant texts, whereby the student attempts first to understand what he can and then to discuss his own understanding with his peers and his teacher. In this way the student can come to have some confidence in the use of his intellect.

The talk by Janet Smith on "The Lay Woman in the Church" was also excellent. (I've only read the two essays so far.)

School Violence

I'm completely stunned by the school violence this past week. I keep trying to write something up on this, but I just can't.

Mother of Sorrows, pray for us and all who mourn.

"Day Fire" Fullly Contained

The fire affecting the Thomas Aquinas College campus last weekend (it's been burning since labor day weekend) has now been fully contained. More info here and here. Thanks again for the prayers!

Kate, upon Drawing a Picture...

Mommy, here's a fish for you. Don't you like it? It's the best fish I've never drawn.

Littleness and the Little Way

The topic of littleness has come up in numerous places for me in the last few weeks. A few days ago I actually wrote out a list of the places the idea kept coming up in. Now on the feast of St. Therese, I thought I'd try to pull all these tidbits together. Since we went to Mass at our local Carmelite Monastery today, we also heard special readings appropriate to the feast - including the Gospel from Matthew 18:3 -

"Truly I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."

Anyway, here are some of the pieces from the list I made (in the order I happened to come across them):

"Unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever humbles himself like this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven" (Mt. 18:3-4). This saying is a particularly compact expression of a whole theology of littleness, of the little ones, and of childhood that we find in Jesus. It ultimately has - like this entire series of words - a christological content pointing to the inner biography of Jesus himself. It is Jesus who became totally small (Gospel, Catechesis, Catechism by Cardinal Ratzinger)

The rest of the quotes (all that I have time for tonight - I've been dragging this post out all day) is from The Everlasting Man (the chapter on "The God in the Cave") in which Chesterton is discussing Bethlehem and the Incarnation...

A mass of legend and literature, which increases and will never end, has repeated and rung the changes on that single paradox that the hands that had made the sun and stars were too small to reach the huge heads of the cattle. Upon this paradox, we might almost say upon this jest, all the literature of our faith is founded. (pg. 202)

Any agnostic or atheist whose childhood has known a real Christmas has ever afterwards, whether he likes it or not, an association in his mind between two ideas that most of mankind must regard as remote from each other; the idea of a baby and the idea of unknown strength that sustains the stars. (pg. 203)

It might be suggested, in a somewhat violent image, that nothing had happened in that fold or crack in the great grey hills except that the whole universe had been turned inside out. I mean that all the eyes of wonder and worship which had been turned outwards to the largest thing were now turned inward to the smallest. (pg. 205)

it is true in a sense that God who had been only a circumference was seen as a centre; and a centre is infinitely small. It is true that the spiritual spiral henceforward works inwards instead of outwards, and in that sense is centripical and not centrifugal. The faith becomes, in more ways than one, a religion of little things. (pg. 205)

Extreme Chocolate

We've always known that Frank is particularly fond of chocolate. The last 24 hours have played this out in a rather funny way. Yesterday afternoon he was beyond-the-beyond in the tired department. But all that was on his sleep-deprived mind was chocolate. He was trying to force Kate out of my bedroom rather loudly and with much crying. Kate finally conceded and I heard him lock the door. I quickly unlocked it and stuck my foot in the door to prevent him from locking it again. Why would Frank suddenly want to lock everyone out of the bedroom? This was a little unusual.

A lightbulb went on in my head. I plucked the package of chocolates off the top of the dresser and returned to the hallway. Frank stormed out of the room screaming for the chocolates. He's an excellent climber and must have figured that if he locked the door he'd have enough time to get to that chocolate. (He was asleep within half an hour).

He didn't go to sleep until late (after that big nap), but still woke up in the middle of the night, crying and begging for ten or fifteen minutes for chocolate, (he's hit that "pleeeeeeeeease!!!" stage - even when he's half-asleep) finally giving up and going back to sleep.