Solemnity of the Birth of St. John the Baptist

This feast, a segment of Advent in the season of Ordinary Time, makes us aware of the wonderful inner relationship between the sacred mysteries; for we are still in the midst of one Church year and already a bridge is being erected to the coming year of grace.

The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch, via Catholic Culture

I've always respected John the Baptist's role in salvation history.

But I never really appreciated his role fully until reading this in Magnificat a few years ago.

I want to show you a sun that shone more brightly than all these, a soul that was truly free and detached, cleaving only to the will of God. I have often wondered who is the most mortified of the saints I know, and after some reflection I have come to the conclusion that it was Saint John the Baptist. He went into the desert when he was five years old and knew that our Savior and his came on earth in a place quite close by, one or two days' journey perhaps. How his heart, touched with love of his Savior from the time he was in his Mother's womb, must have longed to enjoy his presence! Yet he spends twenty-five years in the desert without coming to see our Lord even once; and leaving the desert he stays to catechize without visiting him but waiting till our Lord comes to seek him out. Then when he has baptized him he does not follow him but stays behind to do his appointed task. How truly mortified was his spirit! To be so near his Savior and not see him, to have him so close and not enjoy his presence! Is this not a completely detached spirit, detached even from God himself so as to do his will and serve him, to leave God for God, and not to love God in order to love him better? The example of this great saint overwhelms me with its grandeur.

St. Francis de Sales

Zechariah and his son, John the Baptist.
A medieval Georgian fresco from the Monastery of the Cross, Jerusalem.
Credit: National Parliamentary Library of Georgia/public domain. Via The Pillar.

I also really love this from a sermon by St. Augustine that is included in the Office of Readings from the Liturgy of Hours for this feast day. It shows so well the contrasts and parallels between John the forerunner and Jesus the Messiah in their earthly lives.

The Church observes the birth of John as in some way sacred; and you will not find any other of the great men of old whose birth we celebrate officially. We celebrate John’s, as we celebrate Christ’s. This point cannot be passed over in silence, and if I may not perhaps be able to explain it in the way that such an important matter deserves, it is still worth thinking about it a little more deeply and fruitfully than usual.

John is born of an old woman who is barren; Christ is born of a young woman who is a virgin. That John will be born is not believed, and his father is struck dumb; that Christ will be born is believed, and he is conceived by faith. ...

John, it seems, has been inserted as a kind of boundary between the two Testaments, the Old and the New. That he is somehow or other a boundary is something that the Lord himself indicates when he says, The Law and the prophets were until John. So he represents the old and heralds the new. Because he represents the old, he is born of an elderly couple; because he represents the new, he is revealed as a prophet in his mother’s womb. You will remember that, before he was born, at Mary’s arrival he leapt in his mother’s womb. Already he had been marked out there, designated before he was born; it was already shown whose forerunner he would be, even before he saw him. These are divine matters, and exceed the measure of human frailty. Finally, he is born, he receives a name, and his father’s tongue is loosed.

Zachary is struck dumb and loses his voice, until John, the Lord’s forerunner, is born and releases his voice for him. What does Zachary’s silence mean, but that prophecy was obscure and, before the proclamation of Christ, somehow concealed and shut up? It is released and opened up by his arrival, it becomes clear when the one who was being prophesied is about to come. The releasing of Zachary’s voice at the birth of John has the same significance as the tearing of the veil of the Temple at the crucifixion of Christ. If John were meant to proclaim himself, he would not be opening Zachary’s mouth. The tongue is released because a voice is being born – for when John was already heralding the Lord, he was asked, Who are you and he replied I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.

On the road again — back July 6!

Back July 6! 

My husband and I are taking a road trip through Utah. We're going to Zion National Park, Brice Canyon and eventually we'll loop around through Denver.

However, the real reason we're doing this is that my longtime podcasting partner Scott and I have never met — NOW is the itme! We've done the podcast for 16 years. Surely it's time for a couple of face to face recordings at the very least. I'm super excited about this. 

Also, I love road trips together where we have so much time that our thoughts and conversation range much further afield than is ever possible during everyday life.

A few regular posts will show up here for saints' days and suchlike. Comments will be closed while I'm gone. 

I'm going off the grid for a really old fashioned sort of vacation. No phone!

I'll be back online July 6!

Our capacity for patience

The strength of patience hangs on our capacity to believe that God is up to something good for us in all our delays and detours.

John Piper

Amen, amen. My growing ability to do this has made a huge difference in daily life.

Cornflower, National flower of Estonia

Cornflower, National Flower of Estonia, taken by Remo Savisaar

How a gentleman shouldn't go to the devil

Flambeau had known Quinton in wild student days in Paris, and they had renewed the acquaintance for a week-end; but apart from Flambeau’s more responsible developments of late, he did not get on well with the poet now; choking oneself with opium and writing little erotic verses on vellum was not his notion of how a gentleman should go to the devil.

G.K. Chesterton, The Wrong Shape

Chesterton is just so darned funny. And this is just a toss off line in a Father Brown mystery.

Vacation Book Sorting Has Begun

First run

I have begun book sorting — how is it possible to go on vacation without the right combination of books? Answer — it isn't. We're leaving Monday but it's never too soon to consider the options.

My Kindle helps a little. Nevertheless actual, hold in the hand, printed books are necessary. BUT WHICH ONES?!?!?!?!?!?!

It's a delightful problem to have.

(This isn't counting audiobooks — we're taking a road trip so that offers more chances to sort books! What will Tom enjoy?)

Notes on Mark: When the King Comes Into His Own

manuscript Minuscule 544 with text of Mark 8:31–38

MARK 8:38-9:1
I really always think of Jesus as being confident, especially when he is speaking to his disciples. However, I never really associated it with what Barclay speaks of here ... the seemingly insurmountable odds against success.

One thing leaps out of this passage -- the confidence of Jesus. He has just been speaking of his death; he has no doubt that the Cross stands ahead of him; but nonetheless he is absolutely sure that in the end there will be triumph...

The last part of the passage has caused much serious thought. Jesus says that many who are standing there will not die until they see the Kingdom coming with power. What worries some people is that they take this as a reference to the Second Coming; but if it is, Jesus was mistaken, because he did not return in power and glory in the lifetime of those who were there.

But this is not a reference to the Second Coming at all. Consider the situation. At the moment Jesus had only once been outside Palestine, and on that occasion he was just over the border in Tyre and Sidon. Only a very few men in a very small country had ever heard of him. Palestine was only about 120 miles from north to south and about 40 miles from east to west; her total population was 4,000,000 or thereby. To speak in terms of world conquest when he had scarcely ever been outside such a small country was strange. To make matters worse, even in that small country, he had so provoked the enmity of the orthodox leaders and of those in whose hands lay power, that it was quite certain that he could hope for nothing other than death as a heretic and an outlaw. In face of a situation like that there must have been many who felt despairingly that Christianity had no possible future, that in a short time it would be wiped out completely and eliminated from the world. Humanly speaking, these pessimists were right.

Now consider what did happen. Scarcely more than thirty years later, Christianity had swept through Asia Minor; Antioch had become a great Christian church. It had penetrated to Egypt; the Christians were strong in Alexandria. It had crossed the sea and come to Rome and swept through Greece. Christianity had spread like an unstoppable tide throughout the world. It was astonishingly true that in the lifetime of many there, against all expectations, Christianity had come with power. So far from being mistaken, Jesus was absolutely right.

The amazing thing is that Jesus never knew despair. In face of the dullness of the minds of men, in the face of the opposition, in face of crucifixion and of death, he never doubted his final triumph -- because he never doubted God. He was always certain that what is impossible with man is completely possible with him.

The Gospel of Mark
(The Daily Bible Series, rev. ed.)

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Sources and Notes Index 

Fairytale of the Tsar Saltan

Illustration for Alexander Pushkin's 'Fairytale of the Tsar Saltan,' Ivan Bilibin

Hell Spawn by Declan Finn

My name is Officer Thomas Nolan, and I am a saint. I can smell evil. I show mercy to the lesser criminals - the desperate. Even those I’ve put behind bars seem to like me. But now there’s a serial killer bringing darkness beyond imagination to my city. I can smell his stench a mile away. But how can I prove it? How do you do forensics on a killer possessed by a demon?

This is an action thriller in the style of the Dungeon Crawler Carl and Joe Ledger series. Straight forward and no fancy writing while blending honorable intentions with graphic violence usually against monsters. The good are very good and the evil are very evil. They can often be heavy handed. They're not the kind of book you brag about reading like you do Dickens, but you can't stop because they're like popcorn. This one is a Catholic action horror novel.

In this series, Detective Tom Nolan discovers that he can bilocate, smell evil, and is open enough to God's grace to becoming a saint. A saintly warrior, in fact, who is trying to stop a demon-possessed serial killer who has targeted his family and friends. He becomes a Catholic army of one battling the legions of Hell.

The Saint Tommy series is one that will appeal to a very specific audience. Catholic. Especially Catholics who believe in what the Church teaches 100%. So that means conservative Catholics. Lucky for me, I'm one of that crowd! I don't think you have to be Catholic to enjoy it but it will certainly help get some of the jokes.

When Detective Nolan discovers he wasn't killed because a pyx stopped the bullet, you give a little chuckle. When he wants an educated priest and goes to his pal Father Freeman because he's a Dominican (and specifically not a Jesuit), there's that chuckle again.

This story surprised me because the horrific way a serial killer is treating the victims' bodies points back to something that is hidden from the general public in many ways. And which they might not think of as being horrific in the original usage, depending on their political and moral stances. It was a clever way to bring a pointed message home.

The fight sequences are over the top and get increasingly long as the book goes on. However, I really enjoyed the way the Rikers fight action was interspersed with lines of the rite of exorcism. This gave extra meaning to the point and power of those prayers. I have gone on to read more of the series and this often is done with lines of psalms in those books. It gives me a sense of what the psalmist had experienced and was expressing in a way that made the lines very vivid.

Also, I was impressed by Nolan's continual insistence that he is achieving nothing on his own, that he is doing God's will and only by God's grace will anything be accomplished. That also resonated.

I don't care for the way that political broad brushes are applied to certain groups. This becomes even more pointed as the series continues. But I've put up with a number of other series applying similar broad brushes in the other direction so, as I've done with those, I shrug it off and go on.

Surprisingly, this book stuck with me in a way that has affected my faith life as I mentioned above. It's not bad to have that as the takeaway!

Julie wants to ride on top of the stagecoach. Scott wants to stay inside to talk with the nice man about how to be an hombre.

 Join us for Episode 381: Hombre (1967) starring Paul Newman.

Women Preparing Silk

Women preparing silk, Emperor Huizong

Is Burglary a Sport, a Trade or an Art

It is a moot point whether burglary is to be considered as a sport, a trade, or an art.

For trade, technique is scarcely rigid enough, and its claims to be considered an art are vitiated by the mercenary element that qualifies its triumphs. On the whole it seems to be most justly ranked as a sport, a sport for which no rules are at present formulated, and of which the prizes are distributed in an extremely informal manner.

H.G. Wells, The Hammerpond Park Burglary

I don't think of H.G. Wells as being funny so this was a delightful surprise.

I don't like soccer but have discovered that I am enjoying the FIFA coverage

I don't actually care about FIFA but have really been enjoying watching all the stories with people having so much fun — both discovering America and Americans bonding over watch parties. What better way to lead us into our 250th anniversary? 

This video reel gives you an idea of what I'm talking about.

How and why to cook

'Now, just one more question, Mrs. Appleyard,' the Editor said, hoping she would break another cookie. 'I've heard it said that a well-known painter when asked what he mixed his paints with, said "With brains." Now do you feel that--to sum up what you've told me--people should cook with brains? May I quote you?'

Mrs. Appleyard put another batch of cookies into the oven.

'Brains are not enough,' she said. 'You have to like things: the dishes you cook with, the people you buy the butter from, the field where the crows fly over the corn and the wind that blows through their wings. You have to like the table you put the food on, and the people who sit around it. Yes, even when they tip back in your Hitchcock chairs, you have to like them. You don't just like how the food tastes--you like how it looks and smells and how the egg beater sounds. You like the rhythm of chopping and the throb of the teakettle lid. You like to test the frying pan with water and see it run around like quicksilver. You like the shadow in pewter and the soft gleam of silver and the sharp flash of glass. You like the feel of damask napkins and the shadows of flowers on a white cloth. You like people eating in their best clothes in candlelight, and in their dungarees on a beach in the broiling sun, or under a pine tree in the rain.

'You like the last moment before a meal is served when the hollandaise thickens, the steak comes sputtering out of the broiler, the cream is cooked into the potatoes and the last drop of water is cooked out of the peas.' Here she was silent long enough to take the correctly lacy and golden cookies off the pan. 'Not with brains,' she repeated, putting down the spatula. 'With love.'

Louise Andrews Kent, Mrs. Appleyard's Cookbook

A book I love to read over and over. There are recipes — which are fun enough on their own to read — but there are also wonderful pieces like this.

A Gift

A Gift, taken by the amazing Remo Savisaar