Well Said: Death, Be Not Proud

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

John Donne (1572–1631)

I'd often heard the line "Death, be not proud" tossed off but I'd never read the poem. In context, it is very powerful. I especially like "From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be, much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow". It reminds me of what a natural process death is. That might sound perverse or silly of me to have lost that connection but I had. And it was nice to have it restored, especially with Donne's further reminder that death has no power over us ultimately.

I Like Michael Keaton Now More Than Ever

His Golden Globe acceptance speech was humble, touching, and honest. I don't watch a lot of speeches, especially from awards ceremonies but this is worth seeing.

Via Deacon Greg Kandra at The Deacon's Bench.

Worth a Thousand Words: Ice Patterns

Ice Patterns
taken by Remo Savisaar

Weekend Joke: For Jenny and Other Librarians

Many thanks to Doug Savage for allowing me to share this.

Worth a Thousand Words: Basket of Fruit

Basket of Fruit, Caravaggio

I am not usually a fan of still life paintings but this one has something that draws me to it. Must be the Caravaggio factor.

Via Lines & Colors where there are interesting detail close ups and more information.

Worth a Thousand Words: The Winter's Tale

Himmapaan, Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale,
Act V, Scene III (clockwise from left: Perdita, Leontes, Hermione and Paulina).

Northanger Abbey on SFFaudio

I know, a fantasy and science fiction audiobook podcast does seem like a funny place to find Northanger Abbey. But where there's a will (and a funny book about gothic novels), there's a way. Jesse Willis and I discuss this lesser-known classic by Jane Austen at SFFaudio.

These Just In: Interesting Books for the New Year

Two devotionals arrived in a very timely fashion on New Year's Eve. Obviously I haven't had a chance to use either but they are both very appealing to my love of the saints and interest in the desert fathers.

A Daily Catholic Moment: Ten Minutes a Day Alone With God by Peter Celano

Simple, straightforward, and Catholic are the adjectives that might best describe this book of wisdom and spiritual practice. For each day you will find a verse or two from Holy Scripture, followed by a reflection from one of the great saints or writers of the Church and then a short prayer or intention.

Daily inspirations from the saints include Athanasius, Catherine of Siena, Francis of Assisi ... Great writers, poets and theologians past and present include Dr. Benet Tvedten OSB, Enzo Bianchi, G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy Day ...

It's interesting that compiler Peter Celano used a variety of different translations for scripture. I think that might make me look up different translations to see how they compare. That's a good thing in my book.

Here's a sample:

MAY 1

I will proclaim your name to my brethren;
in the assembly I will praise you.
— Psalm 22:23 (NAB)

"I have said that St. Francis deliberately did not see the wood for the trees. It is even more true that he deliberately did not see the mob for the men. What distinguishes this very genuine democrat from any mere demagogue is that he never either deceived or was deceived by the illusion of mass-suggestion. Whatever his taste in monsters, he never saw before him a many-headed beast. He only saw the image of God multiplied but never monotonous."—G. K. Chesterton

Help me today to see every person in the image of You.

A Little Daily Wisdom from the Early Church by Bernard Bangley

Following Christ’s example, many early Christians around the Mediterranean retreated to the desert for contemplation. These were ordinary men and women with a strong spiritual awareness. By the fourth century thousands had endured the rigors of desert survival. While they accepted visitors, they preferred long hours of solitude and quiet. They were not prolific writers. Instead, people jotted down the things they said. These sayings and anecdotes ultimately became parts of written collections. A Little Daily Wisdom from the Early Church gathers the best of this material, expressing it in clear, modern English. Each brief insight becomes a nugget for our own daily meditation throughout a year. With this book we can experience spiritual growth in our own quiet corner of this busy world.

Here's a sample:

6 MAY

The Lord is in his holy temple;

let all the earth keep silence before him!

Habakkuk 2:20

An Egyptian hermit said, "If you desire a spiritual pilgrimage, begin by closing your mouth."

Keep silence before the Lord.

The following two books look very interesting after a quick review of their introductions. Both are somewhat intellectual and I won't be getting through them in a hurry. However, they seem balanced and I wanted to let you know about them. The publisher description accompanies each.

Heaven Can Wait: Purgatory in Catholic Devotional and Popular Culture by Diana Walsh Pasulka

After purgatory was officially defined by the Catholic Church in the thirteenth century, its location became a topic of heated debate and philosophical speculation: Was purgatory located on the earth, or within it? Were its fires real or figurative?

Diana Walsh Pasulka offers a groundbreaking historical exploration of spatial and material concepts of purgatory, beginning with scholastic theologians William of Auvergne and Thomas Aquinas, who wrote about the location of purgatory and questioned whether its torments were physical or solely spiritual. In the same period, writers of devotional literature located purgatory within the earth, near hell, and even in Ireland. In the early modern era, a counter-movement of theologians downplayed purgatory's spatial dimensions, preferring to depict it in abstract terms--a view strengthened during the French Enlightenment, when references to purgatory as a terrestrial location or a place of real fire were ridiculed by anti-Catholic polemicists and discouraged by the Church.

The debate surrounding purgatory's materiality has never ended: even today members of post-millennial ''purgatory apostolates'' maintain that purgatory is an actual, physical place. Heaven Can Wait provides crucial insight into the theological problem of purgatory's materiality (or lack thereof) over the past seven hundred years.

Mary in Scripture, Liturgy, and the Catholic Tradition by René Laurentin

Examines the invigorating presence of Mary in the mystery of the redemption that is the heart of the life of the church. The author contemplates her presence in the course of Scripture, human and ecclesial history, the church fathers, the mystics, and others.

Blogging Around: The Family Edition

Two quick links to stories that are all about the Incarnation (remember we're not done with Christmas yet) because they are about family: the art of marriage and the many loving ways mothers and babies connect.

Master of the Winking Eyes,
Madonna and Child, ca. 1450

Did the Virgin Mary Tickle the Baby Jesus?

This was sent to me by the Reningers and how well they know me! I mentioned last week our priest's meditation on holding baby Jesus. This Dominicana blog post, prompted by the Picturing Mary exhibit, continues to expand our answers to Jesus' question, "Who do you say I am?" Be sure to read it all.

Happily, Pisano and the Master of the Winking Eyes have discovered and shared with us the divine intoxication of God’s true humanity in Jesus Christ, and how radically complete and all-the-way-down that is. When the Word was made flesh, he really became like us in all things but sin; and even then, he took on our sinful nature without suffering its moral brokenness in order to purify, heal, and elevate it, so that through his life, death, and resurrection, every good thing humans do can be a place where they meet Christ. That means that Jesus is as human as it gets: he got exhausted, took naps (although he had nowhere to lay his head), took baths, trimmed his beard, learned to walk and talk, and, as little babies are wont to do, squealed and squirmed with joy during mother-son playtime.

Complementarity of Men and Women as a Pas de Deux of Marriage

A New York Times piece about ballet prompted The Anchoress's thoughts toward complementarity in marriage. Too often we think about the differences between the sexes as something to overcome or battle, like a mountain to conquer together in marriage.  Reading about it in ballet terms shifts our focus to one of completing each other to create something better and new. Beautiful.

This Marina Harss piece is about partnerships in dance, of course, and yet it makes a point about complementarity that, when used with regards to traditional marriage, often inspires a sneer: men and women are different, and they have very different strengths, which allow them to do very different things; those strengths complement each other, permitting each to reach their greatest potentiality and self-expression. She relies on the gentle strength of his lift to help her achieve moments of transcendent, heart-stopping beauty. He gets to share, with his own subdued steadiness, and together they create something, and its totality is a composition of wonder.

Outside of the ballet, a man and woman, partnered, become a similar unit of awesome creation. Within a personal partnership (let’s call it a marriage) there exists a need for different types, different strengths, skills and instincts, and specific roles — with trained and measured responsibilities necessary in order to create that which transcends. One lifts, the other extends; one is the centering pole about which the other may fly and turn and reach, until both are raised to something new.

Weekend Joke: Question

Many thanks to xkcd for allowing me to share this!

2015 Book Challenge (and some movies) - UPDATED

UPDATE - END OF 2015
I wound up getting distracted from a lot of these about halfway through the year. The movies list was especially ignored. Yet, I am glad for this list because it did give me direction and I read books I might have missed otherwise.

==========

I was really delighted to get an email recently from a couple who follow along on my book challenges. They actually have read some of the books that I myself am reading.

This is power indeed! I will try to always use it for good and not evil. Therefore, rest assured that no Dostoevsky will enter these portals again!

You can find my 2014 Book Challenge here, with the results recorded. Overall it was very rewarding with only a few duds in the batch and I actually read most of the books on my list.

As before I'm carrying a few books over. And I may not get through all these. It isn't an assignment but a way to keep from getting distracted from these goals.

FICTION

1. Don Quixote
   I thought I'd read this last year but did what I have done twice before: read the first adventure, put it down "for a little while" and never picked it up again. I have the audiobook narrated by Simon Vance, thanks to the library, and will give this a try that way since audio has opened up so many good books to me which I couldn't get through otherwise.
   REACTION: even with an audiobook I only got through 20 chapters before feeling as if every adventure was a repeat of the one before. More or less. On the other hand, I did get through 20 chapters. I'm willing to admit this is a classic for good reason. Those reasons will just have to remain hidden from me as I'm giving up and moving on.
   
2. The House of Seven Gables
   I love his short stories and enjoyed The Scarlet Letter. Let's see what this lesser known novel is like.
   READ IT: loved this book which is so different from The Scarlet Letter. It almost is like a shorter Dickens novel with the oddball characters and descriptive passages.
3. North and South - Elizabeth Gaskell
   I was intrigued because Rose enjoyed this book and Heather Ordover did it last year at CraftLit. However, I wasn't crazy about the narrator and having seen that Juliet Stevenson has a reading at Audible (voice of Jane Austen, audiobook narrator extraordinaire) I thought I'd mosey along at my own pace.
   
4. Philip K. Dick
   I'm not sure which book I'll choose but I enjoyed The Galactic Pot-Healer so much when I read it a few years ago that I thought I'd try another.
   
5. Poetry
   I'm not sure why I've suddenly gotten interested in poetry but I am going to find a basic classic poetry anthology and read a poem aloud every day. We'll see how that works out.
   
   (Just to clarify I have never cared about poetry and so have ignored it most of my life. I know about the fog on little cat feet and the road less taken, as well as the man who wasn't there ... but that's about the extent of it. Any recommendations to read T.S. Eliot are going to have to wait until I can tell Tennyson from Wordsworth.)
   
   READ IT: 101 Classic Poems edited by Roy Cook - love this book and my poem a day. In fact, I love it so much I'm rereading it, a poem per day.

NONFICTION

1. Art - A New History by Paul Johnson
   I've been taking my time and enjoying this greatly but really would like to finish this book. 2015 is the year! It will happen!
   REACTION: It took me three years but I finished it! What a wonderful book! It is one I could easily see myself leisurely rereading. The intertwining of history outside of the art world made it really come alive and it has come to mind in a variety of contexts since I began reading it. It really enriched my worldview.
2. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien
   It is interesting just how often I am helped in everyday life by The Hobbit, believe it or not. I want to know Tolkien's thoughts in his own words now instead of just reading his fiction.
   REACTION: I really enjoyed the personal letters. Unfortunately there weren't nearly as many of those as I'd have liked. Most of the letters had to do with answering questions about The Lord of the Rings. At the time this book came out that was probably a good choice. People hadn't minded Tolkien's letters for information and no books were available which summed up a lot of that info for us. However, now there is a lot of that information out there and so I eventually wound up skipping over those letters. I'll probably never reread this (as opposed to my feelings about The Habit of Being) but I'm glad to have read them once.
3. Churchill: The Power of Words
   Tom read this and really liked it, except for a few speeches here and there. I'd like to read it but if I don't put it on this list it will never happen.
   ABANDONED: NOT because of the book but because I picked up the audio version of Boris Johnson's The Churchill Factor. That covered Churchill's life and used enough of his speeches that I have had enough Churchill for now. It was a really entertaining way to learn more about that great man. Perhaps some other time for this one.
4. Through a Night of Horrors: Voices from the 1900 Galveston Storm
   Another one that Tom read which I'd like to read. Tom's grandmother survived the great storm when she was 6 and so he's got a natural interest in the event. Flipping through it I was caught up in the immediacy of the voices as the story unfolded via letters, diary entries, and interviews.
5. The King's Good Servant But God's First: The Life and Writings of St. Thomas More by James Monti
   I've been wanting to read about St. Thomas More's life and his writings. This looks tailor-made!

REREAD

For no other reason than I enjoyed them the first time round but want to see if they stand up to rereading.

1. The Making of a Chef by Michael Ruhlman
   REACTION: I loved this book just as much as the first time I read it. I couldn't put it down and read it obsessively until I finished it in a few days. Highly recommended.
2. The Soul of a Chef by Michael Ruhlman—decided I didn't want to reread this after all. One Ruhlman this year was enough.
3. Cruel Beauty

MOVIES

I see that I didn't challenge myself last year. The results - without a list I didn't challenge myself much. So let's queue that baby up again.

1. Sophie Scholl - The Final Days
2. Laura
   REACTION We loved this classic noir film, especially the hard boiled detective investigating the murder.
   

   Mark McPherson: When a dame gets killed, she doesn't worry about how she looks.
   Waldo Lydecker: Will you stop calling her a dame?

3. Deliver Us From Evil
4. Tsotsi
5. City of God
6. The Exorcism of Emily Rose
7. Rashomon
8. Cloud Atlas

2014 Book Awards, Part 2

More awards which should speak for themselves. (Links go to reviews.)

DON'T HATE ME BECAUSE I'M BEAUTIFUL

• S.

A HECKUVA GOOD TIME

• Pretty Good Number One
• Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

IN MY HEAD, EVERY DAY

• A Song for Nagasaki
• The Smile of a Ragpicker
• Jane Austen's books

NOW IT MAKES SENSE!

• Would You Baptize an Extraterrestrial?
• The Narnia Code
• Planet Narnia
• A Jane Austen Education

DEBUTANTE OF THE YEAR

• Ancillary Justice
• The Martian

TILT YOUR HEAD LIKE THIS

• David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants

THE YEAR OF:

• Jane Austen
• C.S. Lewis
• Japanese Catholics

This one I'll explain. The Japanese Catholics and Jane Austen served to make me regularly mindful that I must be mindful of how I treat others. 

Meanwhile, I not only read C.S. Lewis's space trilogy, but began working my way through audiobooks of his theological writing. I'd read Mere Christianity recently but never his other nonfiction. These not only served as practical devotionals but also overlapped with Jane Austen and the Japanese Catholics in how I lived and, interestingly, how I understood the other books in my ken.

It's not a combination I'd have known to choose but one that I am sincerely grateful I fell into. I guess God not only looks out for fools but for those grabbing books at random off of shelves.

2014 Book Awards, Part 1

Rather than take my usual "defined in 10 words" route, these book awards should be self-explanatory. (Links go to my reviews.)

MARRY ME

• The Rosie Project
• Cruel Beauty

IT'S NOT YOU, IT'S ME

• Les Miserables

WORTH BEING CRUSHED IN BED

• The Source

WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE? 

• Nancie McDermott
• Jane Austen

WHY DID I WAIT SO LONG TO READ THIS?

• C.S. Lewis's Space Trilogy: Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, That Hideous Strength

THE END OF THE AFFAIR

• New Watch

More tomorrow!

Worth a Thousand Words: Snow in Germany

Snow in Germany
taken by my brother

This is one of those times when a picture really is worth a thousand words. It conveys a sense of cold, beauty, and winter more tangible than any translation into language.

Blogging Around: The "It's Still Christmas" Edition

We had a really wonderful Christmas, beginning the Saturday before when Rose came home from L.A. to make our joy complete. We entered into a whirlwind of family parties, food, games, and nonstop talking.

Rose has returned to California but in the Catholic liturgical year the Christmas season continues. Here are a few interesting stories to keep us all in the mood.

Nine Reasons Analog Games Are Awesome

The Art of Manliness blog reminds us that board games, card games and the like aren't just for Christmas. It's too easy to fall into playing computer games and watching movies together for entertainment without realizing that we lose a lot of human interaction ... and fun ... by not playing regular games together.

The Good Lord Needs Drama In His Life Too

I swing by The Rhino Times every Thursday to read Orson Scott Card's column, Uncle Orson Reviews Everything. This week I saw Scott D. Yost's piece about Christmas and spiritual warfare. It's a good 'un so be sure you read it all.

... spiritual war is like any other war: We’re all in it together, and we all have to be on high alert, not just for ourselves, but also for those around us. And, especially when it comes to your close friends and family, you really have to always watch out for each other and keep an eye out for when they’re under attack. And sometimes that means you have to give cover fire, or tackle them into a foxhole, or drag them out of harm’s way, and it means that sometimes they have to do that for you.

That’s exactly why God gave us all this almost magical ability to detect, to feel, to know, when our friends or family members are in trouble, even if we’re not around them or talking to them. That’s why, when you have a weak moment, and you need help, the doorbell rings, and it’s your best friend stopping by unexpectedly with a six-pack of beer, just to talk. Or why, at that very moment, your phone rings and it’s someone close to you you haven’t seen in a long time who suddenly got the urge to call you. We have that ability so that we can help protect each other.

Pittsburgh Hospital Sends Christmas Babies Home in Stockings

The Deacon's Bench has the story and the adorable photo.

Celebrating Our First Christmas with Alzheimer’s Disease: Laughter Allowed

A touching story rooted in deep Catholic faith. Via Sticking the Corners.

I cannot count the things that have been moved to the strangest places. ... She has hair curlers that keep vanishing. I have found them in the garage, in the refrigerator, and under the kitchen sink. We had been searching for them and when I found them in the refrigerator I said loudly, “Here they are.”

She was standing nearby and turned to see me lifting the bag from next to the milk. I quickly asked, “Can I use these for curly fries?” I began to laugh and she shook her head and smiled. I gave her a hug, opened the freezer door and tossed the curlers in. “They are not frozen enough,” I said. She began to laugh and so did I and, although shrouded in a dark moment, we laughed our way into the brightness of a new moment.

Favorite Movies of 2014

My favorite movies seen in 2014 with descriptions in 10 words or less. In the approximate order in which I saw them. Links are to reviews.

• Much Ado About Nothing (Joss Whedon, director)
  If all Shakespeare movies were like this, I'd love Shakespeare.
  
  
• Gravity
  Gravity. Not mentioned once in the movie. But integral.
  
  
• Captain Phillips
  Intense. Just remember to breathe.
  
  
• I Confess
  We should all have a priest as good as this.
  
  
• Mud
  Where I learned to not hate Matthew McConaughey.
  
  
• The Guard
  Directed by a McDonagh. Which means clever, humorous, and nuanced.
  
  
• Calvary
  Not for the faint-of-heart. But simply astounding.
  
  
• Spinning Plates
  It's not what you cook. It's why.
  
  
• That Guy ... Who Was in That Thing
  16 faces you recognize but can't name. 16 fascinating stories of Hollywood.
  
  
• Halloween
  It defined a genre. And deservedly so.
  
  
• Mama
  A supernatural thriller I didn't want to love, but couldn't resist.

Worth a Thousand Words: Schumann's Tagesbar

Schumann's Tagesbar in Munich
by Edward B. Gordon

I've said many a time that I love paintings which include modern jobs. Photographs tell one sort of story but it will be lovely for future generations to have paintings which portray our modern age. No one does that better than Edward G. Gordon.

Blogging Around: The Christmas Edition

Via Arts Everyday Living where there is interesting
 information about Dickens and his most famous story

A CHRISTMAS CAROL AT CRAFTLIT
Heather Ordover is sharing a book from her premium feed which she calls "audiobooks with benefits." You get her interesting and insightful commentary before and after the chapters (staves) are read aloud. It really enriches the understanding of the story. The CraftLit iTunes feed has these or you can pick them up here:

• A Christmas Carol 1
• A Christmas Carol 2
• A Christmas Carol 3

SANTA PREPARES YOU FOR BELIEF

... Santa doesn't prepare you for disillusionment—he prepares you for belief. He's a kind of training-wheel Jesus, presenting aspects of faith in a manner that kids can handle.

"If the Santa story is a type of the Jesus story, [it] persists because the Jesus story is true," Dr. Edie wrote."It is true because it reveals that all life ultimately comes to us as a gift. It is true in proclaiming that the receiving of this gift occurs in the sharing of it. It is true in its testimony to the powers above...as benevolent, close at hand, and definitely not us."

In other words, Santa is like a stage set. At a certain point, it is rolled away, revealing a story still more impossible to believe, where the sun shines, the trees glisten, and the presents patiently wait beneath theJohnston's tree.

Rich Cohen, WSJ essay Learning That There's No Santa Taught Me to Believe

I never understood the idea that finding out there was no Santa taught you to distrust grown ups or religion or anything. Perhaps that was because my parents steadfastly denied any claims that they were Santa until we were old enough to let it go ourselves. I was fairly old as such things go before that happened. And then being let in on the secret and allowed to participate in giving that joy to my younger siblings made it a sacred trust. That's why I like this piece which I found a bit meandering in the middle but which brought it home in style.

PAPA PANOV'S SPECIAL CHRISTMAS BY LEO TOLSTOY
I came across this story after having a big success reading The Gift of the Magi to my mother-in-law whose on-again, off-again dementia made it difficult to connect with during visits. She stopped gazing into the air, met my eyes intently for the duration of the tale, and asked me to read to her again when it was done.

Buoyed by my success I went looking for other such simple tales to read. It didn't take long to find Papa Panov's Special Christmas which intrigued me because of the famous author. It quickly became one of our favorite stories and was the last one I read to her before she died.

So it touched me when I saw that The Christmas Stocking podcast is featuring a reading. You don't have to listen. You can read it at Google Books.

THE SNOWMAN 
Joseph Susanka offers us a holiday special: the Oscar-nominated, BAFTA-winning version of Raymond Briggs’ “The Snowman.”

Worth a Thousand Words: Fellas of the Baltic Seas

Fellas of the Baltic Seas
taken by Remo Savisaar

How does Remo Savisaar get these shots? He is a genius at nature photography.

Movie Review: Unbroken

Unbroken (2014)

★★★★½

A chronicle of the life of Louis Zamperini, an Olympic runner who was taken prisoner by Japanese forces during World War II.

This remarkable story takes us through Louis Zamperini's life as a juvenile delinquent, championship runner, and after his plane is shot down in the Pacific during WWII. We learn the source and inspiration of the determination that helps him survive harrowing experiences.

The result is a powerful film which left me pondering the effects of war on both captors and captives, not just in WWII but in every conflict. The situations and lessons are as old as time.

Faith is shown and discussed briefly in the first half of the film but never with a heavy hand. Indeed, much of the last half depended on subtle imagery for us to see the Christ-like parallels being drawn. I applaud director Angelina Jolie for including an element that many would have chosen to eliminate, but which was so important to Zamperini's life.

It is beautifully photographed and directed with great restraint. I saw a review disdainfully mentioning that Jolie was determined to keep the rating PG13. I applaud her decision as working within those guidelines kept the majority of violence offscreen in the creative style of some of our most classic movies. That restraint also was evident in a brief but beautifully effective scene that reminded us of the cost of war to the civilian population.

Jack O'Connell as Louis Zamperini and Miyavi as "The Bird" give masterful performances in their adversarial relationship in the POW camp. Once again, this is where Jolie's restraint pays off. Again and again I expected, even longed for, the movie to take a "Hollywood" plot turn. Just as repeatedly I was answered with the unvarnished truth of how the events really happened.

My one complaint is that it is difficult to follow Zamperini's internal journey in the last third of the film. He has no buddy to chat with, no unguarded utterances to clue us in. Jolie does draw our attention to his gaze, with his fixed attention often giving clues. But we could have done with more help in that regard.

There was a teenage boy next to me at the screening. Early on he leaned forward in his seat, cross-legged, tensely alert. He watched the entire movie that way, leaning back only when it was finished and saying, "Awesome!"

Yes.

Worth a Thousand Words: Young Girl with a Bouquet of Tulips

Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Young Girl with a Bouquet of Tulips, c. 1878
via Arts Everyday Living

Isn't it interesting that everything in this painting is fairly ethereal except the hat which is much more realistically drawn? And it is the hat that made me love this painting.

Worth a Thousand Words: Decorated Alley

Decorated Alley
by Remo Savisaar

Be sure to click through the link and look at this in full size. Simply superb.

"He thought he was being called. I thought he was being brainwashed"

A fascinating snippet of a sister's insight over what priesthood can do for the right man at Humans of New York.

In which we race for silver skates, play with trolls, and put our finger in the dike.

Chapter 2 of Heidi's Alp by Christina Hardyment is up at Forgotten Classics.

Worth a Thousand Words: Hans Brinker or The Silver Skates

Hans Brinker or The Silver Skates. Mary Mapes Dodge. Illustrated by George Wharton Edwards.
via Books and Art

I've been reading the second chapter of Heidi's Alp for Forgotten Classics. They're in Holland and following Hans Brinker's trail. Having read so much about that story, I just couldn't resist this when I saw it pop up.

The War on Christmas is over. Jesus won.

I couldn't resist stealing that from The Washington Post. Talk about grabbing your attention.

It's a perfect way to sum up the new Pew Research Center survey about Americans and Christmas.

That's the implication of a new Pew Research Center survey that finds nearly three-quarters of Americans -- 73 percent -- believe that Jesus was literally born to a virgin. This is especially surprising when you consider that only one third of Americans say that the Bible is the word of God and should be understood literally.

[...]

Another sign that the War on Christmas is over: 72 percent of Americans say nativity scenes should be allowed on government property. 44 percent say nativity scenes should be allowed even if symbols from other religious faiths are prohibited. Only one in five Americans say nativity scenes shouldn't be allowed on government property at all.

In other words, the squeaky wheel was getting all the media coverage while the rest of us were quietly celebrating Christmas because we believe in it.

Read the whole story and find links to the survey results here.

Weekend Joke: Don't Believe

Again, many thanks to Doug Savage for allowing me to share his humor here.

Worth a Thousand Words: Staplehurst Rail Crash

Staplehurst rail crash, 1865, Engraving in Illustrated London News
via Wikipedia

Naturally, I found this picture captivating after reading more about Charles Dickens' experience. The poor man lost his voice for two weeks and his son said he never really recovered from the shock. He died five years to the day after the accident.

Here's an interesting account of Dickens and the accident. A bit to whet your appetite:

The scene was covered with corpses and injured bodies. One young passenger, Mr. Dickenson, later recalled how it was the urging and assistance of Charles Dickens that ultimately helped to free him from a pile of twisted wreckage. Another passenger would later recall how Dickens, with his hat full of water, was "running about with it and doing his best to revive and comfort every poor creature he met who had sustained serious injury."

Worth a Thousand Words: Bill Elliot Swing Orchestra

By the brilliant Belinda Del Pesco who has more to say about this if you click through to her post.

Early Reaction - Unbroken

Unbroken (2014)

★★★★½

I was unaware of this movie until receiving the preview invitation. Which may make the film's marketers weep, but there you have it.

However, I was interested in the fact that the book was written by Laura Hillenbrand, author of Seabiscuit. I enjoyed the movie made from that book. Was this story as good?

I was interested in seeing Domhnall Gleeson, who I first noticed simply because he was Brendon Gleeson's son but whose talent I admired a lot in Calvary.

I was interested in seeing how Angelina Jolie did as a director. We've got those who've done it well like Clint Eastwood and those who can't really pull it off like George Clooney. I had no sense of where she would fall on this scale.

Let's just say this. Angelina Jolie is no George Clooney. And I mean that in the best possible way. World class is what I'd say.

The movie is fantastic and shouldn't be missed.

(I'll do a more complete review when the film opens or when I get the green light from the promoters.)

Worth a Thousand Words: Haystacks at Giverny

Haystacks at Giverny, Claude Monet, 1884
via Wikipedia

I remember seeing a row of Monet's haystacks at the Chicago Art Institute. Standing far back gave the best vantage point. I was fascinated by the schoolchildren sitting before the paintings, sketching their own copies of the art. And by a parent who was painstakingly taking each child in turn, having them move to the back of the room. He pointed out how the painting was better far away, while listing a few things the artist had to keep in mind when being so close to the canvas and painting the scene. Lucky kids! (Whether they realized it or not at the time.)

Review: Father Robert Barron's Priest, Prophet, King

It took a while for my review copy of Priest, Prophet, King to come. And then it took a while for me to watch it. However, once we began we binge-watched all six episodes.

Partly it was because we enjoy Father Barron's style. And this was like a really good Bible study taking us through Biblical history so we really understood how Jesus's fulfilled his titles of "priest, prophet, and king."

Partly it was because we couldn't figure out how he was going to get from "here" to "there." "Here" being Old Testament priests, etc., and "there" being the new evangelization.

Of course, he pulled it off. By the time we finished the sixth episode we had plenty of food for thought. We talked about it the rest of the evening and the next morning.

What's the format? Father Barron gives a series of six connected talks to an audience. Each is around 20 minutes long. This isn't as dull as it sounds because they intercut shots of masterpieces for illustration. This could have been released also in an audio format and I think I'd have gotten just as much from it. However, the video undoubtedly encourages group participation and discussion (there's a study workbook and leadership guide, though I haven't seen those). It did for us.

Was it worthwhile? Yes. Many of the concepts and information presented may be new to viewers and will be eye opening in how they understand Christ. Although we were familiar with a fair amount of it already, Father Barron connected everything in a way that engaged us, made us think, and even had us stopping the dvd mid-episode sometimes to discuss things.

Did it change our lives? Yes and no.

Why no?
Because, as my husband said while we were watching, "The new evangelization is really the old evangelization. It's just that everyone forgot to do it lately."

I myself am always wondering why I can't stick to a resolution to not bring up my Catholic faith. You wouldn't think you'd have to make such resolutions but time and again God's in the conversation. At the grocery store, at my movie group, on my nonreligious podcast. With believers and nonbelievers. All the time. He just ... comes up. I can't help it. And we help with various ministries at our parish as well as a few independent projects. So, as I say, we're already evangelizing just by the way we live our lives.

Why yes?
Father Barron gave us new ways to think about our own culture and where we fit in it as Catholics. Especially valuable and thought provoking were his discussions of:

• The rose window imagery of ordering life
• The devil as scattering, as dis-integration
• Sin as wrongly oriented worship with focus on pleasure, wealth, power, and honor
• Living in a society of accusers
• Rene Girard's ideas about scapegoats and society

These are points resonated so strongly that they've been the focus through which we've discussed local news, politics, and personal relationships in our own lives. It has been very clarifying in a lot of cases.

Do I recommend it? Yes. Definitely yes. 

This is something that will benefit every American Catholic, no matter how involved they are, no matter how well they understand the Bible, no matter how well they feel they have a handle on living their faith.

I'm passing my copy on to our pastor. Hopefully it will be studied in our parish soon.

He was just a humble student in Hobbit Studies at the University of Chicago ...

No one who gets a postgraduate degree in Hobbit Studies ever imagines they’ll be sued by the Estate of J.R.R. Tolkien. I certainly didn’t expect to wind up in court against Christopher Tolkien and his lawyers, like Frodo Baggins facing down the Nazgûl on Weathertop. Little did I know I was heading into a legal and scholarly Midgewater when I wrote and published The Lord of the Rings: A New English Translation.

As anyone who’s read the appendices to The Lord of the Rings knows, both it and The Hobbit are Tolkien’s translations from the so-called “Red Book of Westmarch,” an ancient manuscript written in Late Vulgar Adûni. How Tolkien came to possess the Red Book is a mystery, and the Tolkien Estate has never allowed other scholars access to it.

[...]

I decided to stop feeling sorry for myself and put my research skills to work on my defense. Unfortunately, the case law was sparse. The only similar case I found was The Estate of S. Morgenstern v. William Goldman over the latter’s abridged version of The Princess Bride. It was settled out of court. There was also Lemony Snicket’s lawsuit against Daniel Handler over Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography, though the court ruled that a pseudonym may not sue his own author, no matter how delightfully wicked and meta that would be.

How I Defeated the Tolkien Estate. So funny I read it twice. Enjoy!

Well Said: Through a Spider's Eyes

For years we were taught that a spider spins a new web every day and that certain threads are covered with a sticky substance to catch its lunch. The spider only puts the substance on certain strands so it can move easily and quickly across the web and not get stuck.

That was our vision of the spider and the web until a few years ago when Catherine Craig, an evolutionary ecologist at Yale, wondered if we had been operating under the wrong point of view. We looked at the web as people, but we never looked at the web as if we were insects—the spider’s prey. Insects have a different system of vision than us, and different from spiders. Insects see a different spectrum of light. Scientists decided for the first time to study the web using the insect’s ocular system.
What they found was amazing.

Insects could not see the web at all. The strands vanished, except for the parts of the web that were coated with the sticky stuff. They caught and reflected the sunlight. The scientists were taken aback when they saw that the spiders were not leaving some strands uncoated so they could navigate their webs.
They left them uncoated because they were painting—with sunlight!

The strands that had sticky stuff, when hit by the sun, when viewed through the ocular system and light spectrum visible to an insect, took on the outline of flower petals with the body of the spider in the center of the web becoming the pistil of the flower. It was not science. It was art. And perhaps something more.

A spider has different eyes than an insect. It sees a different world. It is painting something it doesn’t know, that it can’t see, and can only comprehend for itself as a potential dinner. It recreates this painting over and over again. If the spider succeeds and creates the illusion of a flower, she’ll catch a moth and will live. If not—she dies. So the finer artist survives.

Stephen Tobolowsky

What a continual mystery and wonderment creation is. It is discoveries like this that stretch my mind, delight my soul, and make me connect with God in a whole new way.

Still Swingin' at Christmas with Duke Ellington's Nutcracker Suite

Like every family, we've got our standard Christmas albums that begin rotation around this time of year. Admittedly I put it off at least until the middle of  December but if I don't get Christmas music going by then I wind up in a distinctly Grinchy mood by the time the big day rolls around.

As I pointed out a few years ago, our rotation leans heavily on Ella Fitzgerald, the Rat Pack, New Orleans, and Bing Crosby. Never discounting our possible all time favorite, Ringo Starr.

Every year we pick up a new Christmas cd and this weekend we picked a winner that is already livening our house. Last year I had discovered Gordon Vernick's Jazz Insights on iTunes. Poking through past episodes I was intrigued to hear his two-part special on Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn's take on the Nutcracker Suite. Swingin' ain't the word for it.

The Nutcracker Suite is some of Tom's favorite Christmas music and he also loves the Duke so I don't know why it took me this long to remember to look for it.

It is simply terrific. I don't know how they did it but this solid jazz take keeps the original classic front and center while still managing to be unique in its own right.

Weekend Joke: Han Solo in the Confessional

Han: “Forgive me, father, I have sinned. My last confession was before I did the Kessel run in under 12 parsecs.”

Priest: “But parsecs are a measure of distance, not time.”

Han: “What?”

Priest: “Never mind. What do you need to confess?”

Han: “I shot first.”

There are more Star Wars confessions at Acts of the Apostasy and they are all hilarious.

For those who want more, The Curt Jester provides.

Chastity is for Lovers by Arleen Spenceley

Chastity Is for Lovers: Single, Happy, and (Still) a Virgin by Arleen Spenceley

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

For some people, the chaste life can raise a daunting question — a question a friend and fellow blogger brought up once in an interview: “Do you ever worry that one day you’ll wake up and discover you are forty-five, still single, and past your sexual prime?”

I don’t. In order to worry about that, I would need to believe the purpose of sex is pleasure and that we all better get some while the gettin’ is good. I don’t believe either of those things. I believe that whether a person ever has sex isn’t that important. What’s more important is why a person has sex, and in what context. But because I don’t worry about passing my sexual prime doesn’t mean I don’t worry at all. I do worry sometimes, but what I worry about is whether I write about this stuff with enough clarity. If I don’t, and a couple of decades from now I’m still a virgin, I’d guess many people who’ve read what I’ve written will call my single life “proof” that the chaste lifestyle doesn’t work. But the goal of saving sex isn’t marriage. The goal of saving sex is saving sex (not putting it off, but redeeming it). Some people who save sex get married and some don’t.

I'm not the target market for this book but I know lots of young women who are. That's what made me flip through the book. I kept coming across sections that caught my attention and made me want to know the rest of the story. I finally realized that I was going to have to read this book even if it wasn't aimed at me. Which says a lot about how personable this author is. And, let's face it, if I knew people in the target market then I needed to know what this author's saying because it could come up in conversation. Such are the times in which we live.

This point was underlined just a week later when I was at a big party. A friend and I began talking about our daughters, which led naturally to discussing their dating and marriage prospects. A Catholic mother, she confided that one of her daughter's biggest struggles was that she was a 29-year-old who continually was being embarrassed or annoyed by having to defend her decision to remain a virgin until marriage.

"Say no more," I told her. "I will bring you a book that she's going to love."

That made me move from flipping through to reading with interest before I passed the book on. It was just as good as I'd thought. It was funny, interesting, sensible, and written with clarity and grace. I'd also say that you don't have to be Catholic to like it. Most of it is going to be something that any Christian interested in chastity is going to relate to.

Definitely recommended.

EXTRA
Read Sarah Reinhard's interview with Arleen Spenceley at the National Catholic Register.

NOTE
This was a free review book. I read it in spite of that. Liked it (a lot) anyway.

Dickens-Mania: The Pickwick Papers and more

The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


As I continue my discovery of Charles Dickens I thought it would be interesting to go to the book that brought him original acclaim. This was combined with a desire for light reading, which every commenter agrees is what one gets from The Pickwick Papers. I also read G.K. Chesterton's commentary on the novel which points out that, for a comic novel, it has a great deal of truth about people especially after Sam Weller's character is introduced. This goes hand-in-hand with the fact that monthly publication sales really picked up after that point in the story as well.

I traded off between the print and audio versions, as needs dictated. I listened to David Timson's narration which was simply outstanding. I used the Wordsworth print edition because, not only is it inexpensive, it includes the original illustrations, has a good type size, and the book stays open when I leave it on the counter. My needs are few but important.

I was simply astounded at how many seeds of future novels and themes were contained in the Pickwickian adventures. Since I've only read a few of Dickens' novels, I can only imagine how many of these will continue to "echo forward" as I read more of his books.

I was also surprised at how steadily the story line picked up as he went along and at how compelling I found it. I was simply unable to put it down, to the point of reading 3/4 of the book in a week (admittedly I'm a fast reader and it was Thanksgiving weekend so there was a lot of spare time for obsessive reading).

I wouldn't recommend it as the first Dickens book to try but I can definitely say it is worth reading for those times when a lighter book is desired.

NEXT UP

Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens


Having finished The Pickwick Papers with great enjoyment, I now turn to the opposite end of the spectrum with Dickens' last finished novel. I enjoyed David Timson's reading of Pickwick so much that I am going to be accompanying the print edition with his audio. It is exorbitantly expensive but I waited until my monthly Audible credit came up and so, in a sense, it was free.

I'm ready for something more complex and have been eagerly anticipating this book.

First Surprise: I didn't realize this was going to have such an emphasis on reading and books. I'm in the very early chapters but already it is too blatant to miss, from the girl who wishes she could read, to the brother who loves it, to the Boffins who celebrate having extra income by hiring someone to read books to them every night. How interesting ...

Worth a Thousand Words: Forty-Four Hands. Twelve Hundred Udders.

Photo from Eating Asia.
Creative Commons 2.0 license

This photo accompanies a fascinating piece about milking during cheese season in Anatolia. Don't miss it.

Well Said: Distraction and prayer

Sometimes I think I should just try to set aside some time to be distracted and then prayer will intrude.

Jeff Miller (The Curt Jester)

Jeff was being funny but there is a lot of wisdom in what he says. My spiritual director is always making me return to finding a time to simply contemplate without any reading material or other "props." This is completely frustrating.

However, when I am in the backyard, cup of coffee in hand, watching nature and allowing my thoughts to roam, God can intrude in the most surprising ways. Mind you, I always begin with a verse or idea of prayer in mind. It is just that distraction seizes hold and, in a way, that allows God more room to work than when I have my own rigid ideas of how the prayer time should go.

Not always and not often. But He is there amid the distractions, just as Jeff says.

Well Said: Organized Religion

Yes, organized religion is a crutch. You mean you didn't know that you are a cripple?

Peter Kreeft, Practical Theology

Well that is to the point.

And what is most to the point, I never thought to look at it that way. Yes. Yes, I am a cripple. Every time I put my crutch down, thinking I can hobble along well on my own, I find I am soon limping and then crawling.

In which we prepare to live the dream ...

... caravaning around Europe searching for fairy tale origins. Beginning a new book at Forgotten Classics, Heidi's Alp: One Family's Search for Storybook Europe by Christina Hardyment, read with special permission by the author.

Well Said: We are all divorced from life

We are all divorced from life ... Why, we have come almost to looking upon real life as an effort, almost as hard labor, and we are all privately agreed that it is better in books.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

This is even truer today than it was when it was written.

Worth a Thousand Words: The Virgin in Prayer

Giovanni Battista Salvi da Sassoferrato (1609–1685), The Virgin in Prayer
via Lines and Colors

Well Said: The world approves and allows for nearly everything

The world approves and allows for nearly everything. To the squandering of time or fortune or one’s heart, and even to the most blatant acts of foolishness and guilt, it closes its eyes, smiles, or applauds. On the other hand, do not try to consecrate some of yourself or your time or money to God's cause. Such a way of living your life is not pleasing to this superficial world, which considers itself to be deprived of all you give to eternal things and to your brothers and sisters; it will not tolerate such theft. The love of God is the only eccentricity the world does not and will never accept.

Elisabeth Leseur

I never would have thought of turning one's talents or resources to God as "theft" from the world, but that is a powerful point of view. And it rather helps explain some of the vehement responses from the secular world to the religious one.

"How I Pray" Series

 How I Pray is a new series from Thomas L. McDonald at God and the Machine blog. Each Monday he features a different Catholic who tell about their practices and experience of prayer.

It's an interesting series and it's disquieting to consider how inadequate my answers would be. In that way it definitely inspires me to shape up my own prayer life. Of course, there are also some very inspiring thoughts in the posts that go above and beyond examining my own inadequacies!

So far we've seen from McDonald himself, The Curt Jester, and now Jimmy Akin. Fingers crossed he gets Dean Koontz to contribute!

Well Said: Try Monotasking

One thing everyone should do more of is: just drive while you’re driving. I have a custom license-plate holder. It says: “Try monotasking.”

Bill Nye, WSJ interview

Ain't that the truth? We could apply that to our regular lives also. We'd be happier and a lot of things would get done better.

Worth a Thousand Words: Nature's Creation

Nature's Creation
taken by Remo Savisaar

Worth a Thousand Words: Aladdin and Princess Badoura

Aladdin and Princess Badoura. Detail.
By Himmapaan

I foresee that my wish list is going to expand to include anything including Himmapaan's illustrations. Simply superb.

Emmaus Road's 20% - 50% Off Thanksgiving Sale

From Emmaus Road Catholic publisher comes this notice:

Save 20% to 50%

A Special Thanksgiving Offer

We have created a special page for our friends to enjoy great savings on a choice selection of Books, ebooks and Gift items. The sale prices are in effect now through December 5th.

Worth a Thousand Words: Japanese Bantam

Japanese Bantam
by Himmapaan

I'm a sucker for roosters so this caught my attention. I love this naturalist style.

Well Said: Pilgrimage and a blessedness rooted in "the act of seeing"

To the pilgrim Dante, Beatrice explained that the purpose of all human existence is to see God; love itself is a means leading to this end. In analogous fashion, the Holy Years—times particularly dedicated to God—perfect the means and lead to the end. An indiscreet love that, according to Peter Chrysologus, nonetheless has the "ardor of piety" drives millions of people to undertake the pilgrimage to Rome, and at the end of the pilgrimage they want to see something; they have made the trip in order to taste, here on earth, a blessedness rooted in "the act of seeing." This is the logic of the system of great signs that accompany the life of believers—the sacramental system, that is; and it is the logic of pilgrimage, which is a "sacrament" of the individual's search for God.

Timothy Verdon, Art & Prayer

Somehow this makes great sense to me. Connecting the pilgrim's need to "see," to be in a place and experience in the flesh all the art, architecture, sounds, smells, and everything physical ... with the sacred.

Perhaps it is deeply rooted in what I love about Catholicism. The Church takes every chance to connect our bodies and souls with the divine. Pilgrimage takes that experience of finding the sacred through those things at mass and allows us to link it to the wider world, to the other physical things which God has given to help us "see" Him. Fascinating.


NOTE:
Of course, I am drawn right now to pilgrimage meditations because of the proposed pilgrimage to the Holy Land with Diana Von Glahn, The Faithful Traveler. We can't go if enough people don't go with us. Surely that is part of the physical experience for a pilgrim? Fellow travelers on the way? Who bless you, who get in your way, who make you think, and who may carry God's message to you. If you think you might be interested in journeying to "Come and see" the Holy Land, check out the link. And sign up!

Blogging Around: Fun Stuff Edition

First Look at Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell for the BBC

I didn't know they were doing a BBC miniseries but if anyone can do this book justice it will be the BBC. The photo doesn't exactly match my mental image of Strange & Norrell but, on the other hand, I instantly knew who was who. Which is good enough actually.

As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride

I definitely want to hear Cary Elwes' book in audio since it features the heavy hitters from the movie reading the parts about themselves. Brandywine Books has more about the book as well as a link to an article which helps whet your appetite with tidbits.

Turning Corners Into Art

Joseph Susanka has a heads up for an artist on Instagram whose specialty is photographing corners. Which results in some gorgeous art. I myself found the images on his website more compelling than Instragram but then Instagram ain't my thing. Check out Joseph's post for samples and links.