« September 18, 2005 - September 24, 2005 | Main | October 2, 2005 - October 8, 2005 »
September 25, 2005
Did I Happen to Mention. . .
Took Samuel to his first church-driven CCD program meeting (he'd been getting home-schooled, but until recently the diocese had a requirement that to receive communion children had to attend Church-sponsored CCD--thought it was still in place--signed him up--it isn't.). As I had to be there anyway, I figured I would volunteer. Signed the sheet and five minutes later was whisked away into the fourth grade class to serve as teacher-helper. (I suppose I shouldn't mention that I am ambivalent about this policy as I thought they would at least do fingerprinting, etc. as is common here when serving with either children or the elderly. But didn't really want to go through that hassle either.)
So now I'll help out the fourth-grade teacher. Next year I may be teaching CCD. Anyway, the program is so weak that it won't damage Samuel's education and we'll continue with what we have been doing at home. So next year I'll probably teach grade 3. Not bad for a person used to working with Grade 6 and above. (Predominantly college freshmen, sophmores, and 1st year grad. students). Pray for me!
Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:29 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Correcting a Common Misconception
Several times recently, I have seen the Old Testament standard of "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," derided as the draconian face of the "Old Yahweh" (whatever that might mean). And indeed, in terms of our present understanding, the standard is harsh. But in fact, for its time, the standard was enlightened.
The Code of Hammurabi, one of the earliest sets of written laws, set out the rule for the nation. Nearly everything was punishable by death. If a neighbor killed your son, you were entitled to kill his son. If you lied on the witness stand, you were to be executed. If you stole something of great value, you were to be executed. Hammurabi's code was indeed draconian.
The "eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" code is, in fact a moderation of this very strict, very harsh, very difficult code. One could not go from the rule of Hammurabi straight to "turn the other cheek." I suppose if there is development of doctrine among human beings it is because God first led us step by step to the rule of love. As we responded to His gentleness and clear law, we were encouraged to move further, to improve upon it in our behavior. "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," was not the "rule absolute" but rather the absolute limits for what one could justly demand. There is no necessity to demand this from another--but in the transaction of law, no more could be taken than was taken originally.
An eye for an eye is not the way we live today, but it was a considerable improvement over the way we lived in Hammurabi's time.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 3:12 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
September 26, 2005
Neat Idea
Here's an engine that supposedly provides you with a recommendation for what book to read next. Problem is, if you enter only one book, you end up with some bizarro stuff. For example, I entered "Evelyn Waugh, Decline and Fall" and had suggested to me, "H. P. Lovecraft's Dagon and other Macabre Tales." Interesting associations. Of course, I'm guessing that they expect you to compile a list over time which will help the engine hone its recommendations. Anyway, it looks like something fun to go and enjoy.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:59 PM | TrackBack
Learn New Testament Greek
Home Page of InTheBeginning.org
On-line lessons with study sheets, nice slow intro to the letters etc. May have posted this before, but it is cool enough to require another posting.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:13 PM | TrackBack
September 27, 2005
Maria Lectrix
Found via Aliens in this World (thank you!!). A site from a woman who reads public domain e-books for public domain audiobooks--rather like podcasts. And the books she has read!
I saw listed The Sword of Welleran and Annus Mirabilis by John Dryden.
What a wonderful service!!
I just can't use enough exclamation points about this!!!
Seriously, I'll have to plow through the archives of this site and see what all had been produced and then send a very nice thank you letter to the person who produced them all.
Thank you Maria Lectrix if you stop by here. If not, I'll be writing soon.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:10 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
The Spoken Word Archive
Browse Top Level > Audio > Open Source Audio > Spoken Word
At Open Source Audio--A number of readily available books--and thanks to the efforts and contributions of volunteers such as Maria Lectrix noted below, this will only increase. This is the greatest find (for me) since Distributed Proofreaders.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:17 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Anyone Who Says What Peter Singer Really Is. . .
. . . (i.e. misguided and very, very far from brilliant) is a person I need to read more of.
Persons interested in the dignity of the human person might do well to check out the blog listed above. Many thanks to Speculative Catholic.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:41 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Long Ages of Cat's Eyes
Not the title he gave to the poem, but a most remarkable line and a fascinating subject for speculation. Works perfectly with the title. For those who enjoy poetry, go and enjoy this. It has some remarkable, remarkable things in it.
Lofted Nest, why so short on poetry of recent date?
Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:47 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Tyrannosaur Canyon
Okay, let's start by laying the cards on the table. Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child are becoming much like Stephen King and Michael Crichton, particularly the latter. They write too much for anything to be particularly great in terms of the writing. If we accept the awkwardnesses of phrasing and the clunkiness of some plot devices and characters, we'll still find a rip-roaring story somewhere in the debris.
However, this book was very nice. Of course, there isn't much you could write about past life that wouldn't enthrall me. From Julian May's Pliocence series to Brian Aldiss's Cryptozoic I'm a sucker for any story about dinosaurs or time travel into deep time.
Well this one isn't so much about that as it is about dinosaur fossil hunting. And it is a doozy. Chases, murders, mad scientists, not-so-mad scientists, frenzied Benedictines, and a raft of other likely and less likely suspects.
I dare not say too much for fear that it will ruin the entire book for you. But suffice to say that it begins with the murder of a prospector searching for some unknown treasure and ends (quite literally) not with a whimper but a bang.
There is, however, on major oversight that I must comment on, because this is what editors and research are for. At one critical juncture in the book, a mineralogist discovers a "clue" in the presence of a "cenozoic trilobite, such as one could buy for three or four dollars."
Oh really? If there were a cenozoic trilobite it would be as astronomically expensive as some of the relics in this book. The simple reason being that the trilobites became extinct at the Paleozoic/Mesozoic boundary.
We'll forgive Preston his oversight--after all, where else can you find buckeyballs, nanomachines, dinosaurs, and all the sundry and assorted charaters I started this rant with?
For pure, unadulterated bonehead fun, drop everything and run to your library to get this gem.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:23 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 28, 2005
On the Virtues and Pitfalls of Fiction
Some time back I recall reading a post or a comment (I think it was at Video Meliora. . .) in which a person seemed to be coming around to the true importance of fiction in reading. There does tend to be a fairly strong divide between readers of fiction and readers of nonfiction with the former being mostly women and the latter being mostly men. I don't know if this divide has been documented or if it is merely anecdotal. Most of the men of my acquaintance seem to like fiction (at least some fiction) as much as nonfiction and most of the women seem to like some nonfiction as well as fiction. Be that as it may, there is a substantive difference between the two forms that does tend to give fiction pride of place in literature and in formation of a person.
Nonfiction tends to provide information. This can, but often does not, lead to formation of an individual. You read a book, you are informed, and you are or are not changed by the information. There are several difficulties with nonfiction. To wit:
(1) it is often anything but
(2) being factual it presents itself to the intellect as an object for consideration
(3) there is a tendency to argue with notions and theses with which we may be in disagreement.
This difficulties are sometimes part of the satisfaction and sometimes part of the frustration of reading nonfiction. Let's take a moment to consider these points.
(1) A while back I commented that when one finished a book by John Cornwell, which is supposedly nonfiction, one was immediately driven to seek out the primary sources from which it was derived and check all of them--essentially personally rewriting the book in an attempt to gain corroboration for the opinions disguised as fact and for the agenda disguised as narrative. Except for the field of mathematics (in which I am not so broadly read as in other fields) this is true of writers in all of the nonfiction fields, most particularly those in controversial fields. Who could read Dawkins without wanting to check every assertion made? What political history is not rife with sectarian feelings? How many economics books have no certain affection for a given economic system. Our reaction to these books is proportional to our liking of the ideas espoused in them. They may present facts, but they do so very subjectively and very selectively. This is of necessity because art is selective in its detail--but it leads to great complications of how to deal with the material. Whose view of Adams is the correct one? Of Washington? What does a history of the United States written in Great Britain read like? Which is closer to the historical fact? How many of Aquinas's givens do we accept as true and how many must we let pass simply to follow the argument? The list goes on and one. Nonfiction presents facts, but very rarely is it unmixed with opinions and even falsifications that put forward the agenda of the writer.
(2) Nonfiction presents itself to the intellect. The intellect for most of us is the gatekeeper. It effectively weeds out what we do not wish to consider or do not wish to believe. For example, some time back I reviewed a book by Barbara Ehrenreich titled Nickled and Dimed. Some of the response I received to that review was that Ehrenreich was a feminist, she was pro-abortion, she was this, she was that. Few of the comments that derided the book did so on the basis of what was presented there; rather they immediately went to Ms. Ehrenreich's other agendas. Not one of them reflected on the actual experiences recorded and revealed that Ms. Ehrenreich had falsified data, had claimed things that simply weren't true, etc. The intellect had effectively prohibited the commenters from engaging the central thesis of the work because it was uncomfortable--there is an entire class of people who work themselves literally to death simply to make ends meet. We'd prefer to keep our minimum wages low and with them our prices. To attack Ms. Ehrenreich's book on its own merits is one thing, but on the basis of her overall agenda is another entirely.
I will confess that I enjoy movies by actors who have not bombarded me with their political views. I find it difficult to watch a film with George Clooney or most of the Baldwin clan. This is simply because I have rejected their agenda and with it most of their art. It is a similar case of the intellect being the gatekeeper.
(3) Continuing with the intellect as gatekeeper--we have a tendency to reject out of hand anything that does not agree with our core agenda. This is why debate on issues like the Iraq war can be so rancorous--we simply don't listen. We sit and look as though we are listening, but the entire time we listen or read we are planning our response to the argument. This is why "fisking" is so popular. We disassemble an argument either according to logic or according to our own agendas and systematically dismantle anything that might get through the fortifications. (This leads me to wonder whether or not we might benefit from a less martial, more equable stance on both sides. It is difficult to attain in written media and we have a core resistance to it anyway--but what real harm is there in someone holding a different opinion than my own.)
Fiction, on the other hand, is entirely "opinion" or not fact. It slips in beneath the radar--this is both its strength and its danger. Depending upon the payload with which it slips in the results can be good or bad. For example, when I was younger, Tolkien slipped in below the radar with a tale of what was noble, good, and true. I didn't realize at that time, nor do I entirely buy at this time, how "religious" it was--but it was formative. I saw in the narrative, just as I saw in the Arturian legends, something that was good, and true and real. This percolated within below the radar. Well-written fiction will do that. It is one of the reasons why I rant and rave more against Philip Pullman than I do against Dan Brown. The true, serious, horrendous danger of fiction is fiction that moves us to emotion and makes us hunger for something. When we finish Pullman's book, the hunger is dark and deadly. Poorly written or idea-driven fiction on the other hand works largely in the same way as non-fiction--if we were inclined to think that way anyway, then we will be persuaded, otherwise we will reject the notion. Who has been substantively changed in their lives by Cricheton, Clancy, or Grisham. We may have been engaged and entertained, but we haven't really been moved.
On the other hand, who has read Pride and Prejudice and not experienced something of an entirely different world--a better, more noble, more courteous, more considerate world. These kinds of fictions sneak in under the radar, as I have said, and they affect our formation, our core being. I am convinced that this is one of the reasons that Jesus told parables. What could He have said in a parable that He could not equally well told us straight out. In fact, He does tell us most of it straight out--for those who are more moved by fact than by fiction. But who among us remembers the entire last supper portion of the book of John (almost from chapter 14 on) compared with the parable of the sower and the seed, or the prodigal son. Jesus knew that fiction (and poetry with is also artifice) got in below the radar and worked on the human spirit.
Yes, the intellect can still operate as gatekeeper and keep the fiction at a distance so that it does not work any harm--but it is more difficult than when one faces facts.
One final point about fiction is that it is the eternal now. Whenever you pick up the book Elizabeth Bennett is fencing with Mr. Darcy. Whenever you pick up the book Jane Eyre is engaging Mr. Rochester. Whenever you pick up the book, Mr. Bilbo Baggins is about to celebrate his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence. It is changeless--if has not already happened, it happens in the here and now. In that sense, fiction resembles heaven. It is the expreience of the here and now always. It is living with full knowledge of all that happens but experiencing it outside of time over and over again.
Fiction has its serious dangers--bad fiction, by which I mean well-written fiction with a strongly negative agenda can form as easily as good fiction. Because these things touch the heart, they are harder to uproot and weed out than is nonfiction which can be battled with proper facts and good reasoning. But fiction also has its virtues in that we are invited to a more intimate conversation. In the best fiction and poetry, we are transformed. I think particularly of the story of Jonah, which is utterly transformative in its telling, whether one accepts it as fiction or as fact--the least one could say of it is that it is like Truman Capote's In Cold Blood or Gore Vidal's America series--it is "faction." And it changes us utterly if we encounter it on the level of fiction. A certain truth about God is made substantive and complete when we internalize this story.
Fiction can be an experience of heaven in a way that nonfiction often cannot. Nonfiction can delineate heaven and argue its attributes. It can claim to know how many angels there are and what their ranks are and what precisely each is inclined to do, but it cannot really tell me how to talk to an angel.
For me, fiction has consistently provided a keener insight and a more lasting impression of the things that really matter. Certainly, nonfiction has done so in the form of the Bible, but there we get into another discussion entirely--one that I hope to formulate and articulate soon--how the Bible, while factual uses what we view as fictional devices to bypass much of our resistance.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:15 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
Bride and Prejudice
In two words,"See it."
I saw a review on Julie's site after seeing it recommended at Netflix.
A breakthrough film, featuring all that is best in Indian cinema with a western slant that invites us in. There's color and singing and dancing, and a story we all know and can hum along to. Because I am not so concerned with coordination with the original plot line, I think I was able to enjoy this for the real celebration of family and life that it was. (Commenters at Julie's were disturbed by who was whom according to the book.) For those of you not yet acquainted with the original this is a colorful and delightful introduction.
So much so that I am hard pressed as to whether to more highly tout the "cobra dance" or the gospel choir on the beach sequence.
Beautifully filmed, colorful, and uplifting, I can hardly recommend this highly enough to the St. Blog's community. I laughed myself silly at parts and enjoyed the songs and the essential joy that permeated the film.
An enjoyable way to engage other cultures and to get a look at our own through different eyes.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:57 AM | Comments (11) | TrackBack
Podcasts for Christ
Against a dictatorship of relativism
Look at the supercool array of Podcasts found by Mr. Thakur. Thank you sir.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Five Books that Have Influenced You Most
The Anchoress � What 5 Books Inspired You?
The Anchoress, via Julie D., asks the question--other than the Bible, what 5 books have influenced you most?
That's an extremely difficult question because I think through all of the books I have read and I can see so many different influences in so many different directions. But let me make an attempt. These will not necessarily be in order of importance--merely in order of occurrence to me.
1. Thomas Mallory's Morte D'Arthur--which taught me something about what it means to be selfless and devoted to a cause; something about the meaning of nobility; and something about the nature of God.
2. Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glassby Lewis Carroll which taught me something about language, something about the essential absurdity of everyday events, something about the beauty of language perfectly used, and something about how poetry can be used effectively in prose to amplify both.
3. Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain--taught me something about being a boy and something about what romantic inclinations are
4. Story of a Soul St. Therese of Lisieux. Taught me what St. John of the Cross said and how to practically apply it to my own life. (Haven't done it yet, but still, she did show me.)
5. Dubliners (Most particularly "The Dead," the single most perfect story ever composed in English) or Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man or Ulysees James Joyce--all three taught me exactly the same thing--that no matter what Joyce may have come to think of the Church, he was always guided and influenced by it despite himself, and that the truth was there if I would only look for it. This is a very long story, but it was probably one of two or three books most influential in bringing me tot he Catholic Church (the others would be the Poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins, and some of the essays of C.S. Lewis).
Okay, I've listed more than 5,but if I have to choose from the brood at the end, I would probably go with Ulysses in that it taught me that being Catholic doesn't necessarily make you stupid (a prejudice I had to fight hard to overcome due to some influences in early Childhood and some very bad examples of how to be Catholic I experienced early on.)
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:18 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
About Prayer
I loved this passage.
from Ascent to Love Sister Ruth Burrows,
quoting Wendy Mary Beckett, "Simple Prayer," in Clergy ReviewThe simplicity of prayer, its sheer, terrifying, uncomplicatedness, seems to be either the last thing most of us know or want to know. It is not difficult to intellectualise about prayer--like love, beauty and motherhood it quickly sets our eloquence aflow, it is not difficult but it is perfectly futile. In fact those glowing pages on prayer are worse than futile; they can be positively harmful. Writing about prayer, reading about prayer, talking about prayer, thinking about prayer, longing for prayer and wrapping myself more and more in these great cloudy sublimities that make me feel so aware of the spiritual: anything rather than acutally praying. What am I doing but erecting a screen behind which I can safely maintain my self-esteem and hide away from God?
The writing is less than grand, but the idea is perfect. Too often I take any recourse to escape from prayer. What am I afraid of? Perhaps it is the Keatsian, "Being too happy in thy happiness, thou light-winged dryad. . ." Perhaps it is loss of identity, perhaps it is any number of a thousand other possibilities. But the reality is that I use all of these escape mechanisms and more. Do you?
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:19 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Blogging Personality--No Way!
I didn't blog this yesterday when I did it because I thought no way. And since MamaT had the courage to say no way, I thought I could too.
| Your Blogging Type is Artistic and Passionate |
 One moment you may be working on a new dramatic design for your blog... And the next, you're passionately writing about your pet causes. Your blog is very important - and you're careful about who you share it with. |
This is completely true except--since I've settled on a design for the blog I haven't changed it, and likely won't (although I now have some photo swatches of the real blue I want in the background, so I might go that far.)
I don't regard this as anything near my ultimate personal expression, which can only come through prayer.
And, I'm not particularly careful who I share it with. The whole world is welcome to read if they choose to do so, wipe their feet, and behave themselves as civilized individuals when they visit. It's just about the only neat thing in my life at the moment.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:42 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The Quintessential Reality of the Very Young
When I said something to Samuel about David dancing before the Lord, he looked puzzled, was quiet for a moment and then said, "Didn't God know how to dance?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Well, God is older than David and if David danced before He did, then maybe God didn't know how to dance."
Well, what can you say in response to that remarkable chain of reasoning?
Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:02 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Thorne Smith Fan Site
It's entirely possible that I am the only person in the world who cares, but it is the works of This remarkable writer that lead me to decry the Mickey Mouse copyright eterno-extension act of 19whatever.
It seems that his work will not pass into obscurity after all--but I can tell you that it deadly hard to come by some of these. My paperback of The Passionate Witch is circa 1945, my hardback of The Bishop's Jaeger's is a first. I have five Del Rey printings of his more popular/well known works Topper, Topper Takes a Trip, The Stray Lamb, Nightlife of the Gods, and Rain in the Door. I have an ancient paperback of The Glorious Pool and one of scarcely more recent vintage of Skin and Bones. What's the attraction? Think thirties screwball comedies in paperback form. Think Busby Berkeley in paperback. Think Thurber with too much whiskey at hand. The books froth, bubble and boil over. They jaunt along at their own unique pace, never properly captured despite three film adaptations--(the two Toppers, and the Veronica Lake vehicle I Married a Witch a.k.a. The Passionate Witch.
Well, just another of my curious interests. But I will work to overturn the idiocy of that copyright act in any way made available to me. Great works are vanishing because publishers are not keeping alive what will not make a profit and it is all out of public domain so that we can protect Mickey Mouse. (Another one of my big beefs against big business--admittedly a very, very small big beef, but one that I am passionate about.)
Below--Thorne Smith on Thorne Smith:
"The more I think about it the more am I convinced that I'm a trifle cosmic. My books are as blindly unreasonable as nature. They have no more justification than a tiresomely high mountain or a garrulous and untidy volcano. Unlike the great idealists and romancers who insist on a beginning and a middle and an ending for their stories mine possess none of these definite parts. You can open them at any page. It does not matter at all. You will be equally mystified if not revolted. I am myself."
Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:16 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
September 29, 2005
Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus
One of the real advantages to homeschooling is that you needn't listen to the pablum dished out about a student's capabilities. Samuel is NOT extraordinary in his academics. I want to emphasize that. He is a perfectly ordinary little boy more interested in lunch and recess than he is in what part of speech "therefore" is. However, perfectly ordinary little boys accomplish astounding things when it is simply expected of them. Last night as we said our prayers before bedtime, Samuel piped up (after the Our Father) with his Latin lesson:
Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus,
Dóminus Deus Sábaoth.
Pleni sunt caeli et terra glória tua.
Hosánna in excélsis.
Benedíctus qui venit in nómine Domini.
Hosánna in excélsis.
That nomine Domini proved to be quite a tongue twister/challenger (for both of us, as it turns out.) Linda, who has never taken Latin is teaching him Latin with a series called Prima Latina. I, who have taken Latin, hardly understand the pronunciation, so different is it from classical Latin, but I can hear that he is learning it. In fact, it is the lesson he looks forward to. After the Egyptian mummies (and yes, he knows the difference between Upper and Lower Egypt, the red crown and the white and the double, and can tell you more than you ever wished to know about the process of mummification [as I said, he's a perfectly normal little boy--these things are of intense interest]) they do Latin. And if the day has run long and Linda is thinking about cutting it off, the one thing he doesn't want cut out is Latin.
Now we have to find a tutor for him as he wants to learn Spanish, Italian, and French. The last I can teach, though it would be well to have some recordings of a native speaker as my pronunciation is, at best, rusty. But sound and language is his melieu--and as homeschoolers we can recognize that and encourage it. Yes, we have to balance it out with the stuff he doesn't particularly like (aspects of math). But homeschooling has proven successful thus far and I think will continue to be long into the future. Samuel loves it, and we have some considerable input into what he learns and the pace at which it goes. Individualized instruction is the way to go. For anyone who can do so, this is both challenging and rewarding. You can chicken out like we did and let your children get the basics of reading in a private (or public school) and then before their too sucked into education for the test, you can start to teach them at home. It also teaches you a certain amount of respect for what teachers must do every day. When you consider that they must man classrooms of 20, 30, or even 40 children, not all of whom are well-behaved away from their parents, not all of whom may speak English, not all of whom have any support from the family at all, AND they must teach to standards written by people who have never once seen a child in their lifetimes and who have no knowledge whatsoever of what a child is capable of--you begin to get a sense of what courage and loyalty it takes to run a classroom day to day.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:57 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
September 30, 2005
Knocking on the Door
Jesus told us, "Knock and it shall be opened unto you."
Sometimes it feels as though I've knocked on that door until my knuckles are bloody. Was there ever a widow more importunate? Was there ever a person more persistent? Why do I not seem to progress?
I know the answers to those questions. It came to me early this morning. The door opens inward. If you knock on it, expecting it to open, you have to unlock it first. You have to be willing to let it open. And there are so many ways to keep oneself from unlocking the door. I start by ignoring that it needs to be done. Other methods are head knowledge that somehow never makes it to the heart and transforms it.
I now know the answer as to why some times seem so dry and so difficult. What does one do about them? I think the answer lies in simple patience and persistence. I must be patient in my constant application for admission and I must be persistent in pursuing.
But I also have to be patient with myself. I have to recognize that there are things that prevent me from unlocking that door, and I have to ask God what they are. I have to stop jangling the handle fruitlessly. Quite simply, I need to ask God to light up the interior of this great storehouse that is me and I need to oil the hingese, and clear away the cobwebs and chase away the spiders. I say I have to do it--the reality is I must merely be willing to have it happen to me. I must will to do it insofaras I can understanding that it is only the action of grace that accomplishes these things.
So long as I consider my prayer my own, and not a gift from God, I am on the wrong footing. My prayer is my own only as it arises from me. All prayer is God's gift returning to God with interest. The greater interest from those who have already realized what a gift it is and so do not struggle so hard--do not kick against the goad.
None of this is easy for some of us. Particularly those of us who are very interior people, who have grown accustomed to keeping everything inside. People often comment how very open and revealing some of the things I write are--but believe it or not, they don't begin to even scratch the surface. These are the things I am willing to share--the depths, the true reaches that I have yet to thoroughly plumb and acquaint myself with, I dare not even hint at. Such honesty as there is is superficial--whisper thin. But it is helpful for me to articulate that much--it lays out the map of the known territory and from it, I can begin to explore the reaches. And perhaps my map will assist others who are wandering in the same or similar lands. From it they can get a bearing and move forward.
Please pray for me.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:24 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Request for Particular Prayers
I am at a juncture where I am facing crises of sorts in several dimensions of my life--nothing dire, but huge decisions that need more brain-power and heart than I seem to be able to muster. (Probably because they affect so many different aspects of life.) If you would remember particularly in your prayers a need for discernment in at least three modes--vocational, career, and home life, I would greatly appreciate it.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:38 AM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
Now Available
It's not the definitive ICS, and it is from the 1922 redaction known to have been modified for the sake of the living by her sister. Nevertheless, if you need something quick, easy, on-line, and in public domain, here's your text. The words that remain are those of St. Therese. Much of her sister Pauline's editing was merely deletion of personal references and remarks she thought inappropriate. (Thus leading those who have not read the definitive version to think of St. Therese as a little saccharine and a little over-pious. Her sister Pauline was a great fan and a tremendous spin-doctor in the short run, but may have done her damage in the long-run.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:17 PM | TrackBack
Washington Irving
Page images of the 1861 Edition of the Collected Works of Washington Irving. Includes his biography of George Washington, his study of the Alhambra and of Islam, and the Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon, etc.
Nice place to start thinking about the season--"Legend of Sleepy Hollow" is always a nice seasonal treat.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:23 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Science Fiction Studies:Full Texts of Sold-Out Back Issues
For those who take their Science Fiction somewhat more seriously.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 1:35 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
For Fans of Thomas á Kempis
The Chronicle of the Canons Regular of Mount St. Agnes
Not a work that I am familiar with. I'll have to spend a weekend or so with it.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 5:23 PM | TrackBack
October 1, 2005
The Feast of St. Thérèse of The Child Jesus and the Holy Face
I had the great privilege of admitting two members to temporary profession today. The Lay Carmelites have a period of two years of formation before admission to reception and then three additional years of formation before first promises. Final promises are granted three years after that and on rare occasions as granted by the Provincial Delegate, one may take vowa of chastity according to station in life and obedience.
This first profession is an extremely important step and the two people who took it seemed to be no end delighted. All I could think of was how unworthy I was to receive the professions of such people. In myself, I am unworthy, but I am made worthy by the grace of God and by the special delegation of the Provincial Delegate. Still, it is most humbling to stand in the presence of people so afire in the charisms of the order. Even though they were far older than I am, this was rejuvenating for me because I could see my own first fervor and taste once again that taste of newness and light.
It was a good thing at a good time. I thank you all for your prayers. Also a conversation I needed to have in the course of this went well, and I think I may have sparked some thinking on the part of a very capable person as to the appropriateness of a task for which she had been identified. Once again, all of this success is thanks in great part to the support of the community here. Thank you.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 4:05 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
So Who's Surprised?
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My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:
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I may not have been surprised, but I'm very amused. I've seen at least 2 Scipio's around St. Blog's.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 6:41 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack