« September 10, 2006 - September 16, 2006 | Main | September 24, 2006 - September 30, 2006 »
September 18, 2006
Silence and Presence
In silence is encompassed presence.
Jennifer Egan has this to say:
from The Keep
Jennifer EganHoward: You hear those sounds? Insects, birds, but not even that. Something behind them, you hear it? It's--what? A hum, almost. But not quite. . . .
Danny listened and hear nothing, but it was a different kind of nothing than he was used to. Most quiet was like a pause, a blank spot in the usual noise, but this was thick, like you only hear in New York right after a snowstorm. Even quieter than that.
Howard: I don't want to lose that. I want this place to be about that. Not just some resort. . . .
Danny: You want the hotel to be about silence? . . .
So it'll be like a . . . retreat? Where people come and do yoga or whatever? . . .
Howard: Think about medieval times, Danny, like when this castle was built. People were constantly seeing ghosts, having visions--they thought Christ was sitting with them at the dinner table, they though angels and devils were flying around. We don't see those things anymore. Why? Was all that stuff happening before and then it stopped? Unlikely. Was everyone nuts in medieval times? Doubtful. But their imaginations were more active. Their inner lives were rich and weird.
This sparked a thought. Perhaps Angels do not visit because most people do not make a place for them to visit. Most people move from one event to the next--lives filled with endless clamor--present noise and noise of the future, interior voices shouting the schedules of where one has to be and when. Noise that isn't even perceptible until it dims. And then, in that dome of quiet there is an uneasiness--things to do, people to see, events to plan, future shadows to contend with--there is no time for the present--it is crowded out on both sides by the past and the future. The present is so slender, so tenuous, so subdued itself that it becomes a nothing in the face of the overwhelming tide of what has been and what might never be. These tsunamis crowd out all present thought--they swarm through lives and wash away whatever might be of substance.
And this is the reason that silence is so filled with fear for many. In silence one must face the present, the second hand that ticks along, one tick at a time, one slow stroke that vanishes and becomes the past. Silence encourages presence--both being and being in the present and it is only in the present, the eternal present that salvation is wrought and that Jesus is accessible to us. The Historic Jesus is manufactured for the comfort of speculators and ersatz historians; the Apocalyptic Jesus will be seen when He is present in the linear flow of time. But for us, now, here, at this moment, Jesus is present. He is present when the torrent of sound and event that is used to block him out is dimmed for a moment, when minds are released from the flood of cares to look clearly for a single moment--the eternal benediction of the Present in His Presence.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
A Poet and a Novelist
I'm glad that All the King's Men has had another screen attempt (although I must admit I'm dubious about the casting) because from a reading in 9th or perhaps 10th grade, the book has remained with me in quotations and images. For example, I remember clearly Jack Burden's dictum that "Life is motion toward knowledge." I also remember the image of the great desk in the empty room and its small pond of green carpeting with the tagline "Mentre che la speranza ha fior del verde."
However, the mavens of literature, the High-Priests of the politically correct and the important would have you know that All the King's Men is NOT an important work. It is a half-novel, and mostly-not-there novel, a novel of unfulfilled promised. This despite the fact that one group of journalists felt it important enough to pattern their own title after it.
Let us leave aside the squawking caw of the crows of the literary world--let them preside over the death and funeral of the novel, and let us take ourselves for just a moment into the world of All the King's Men. I will share the very beginning of the novel, another image seared into my literary imagination and into my way of thinking about the world. From the very beginning of the novel.
from All the King's Men
Robert Penn WarrenMason City.
To get there you follow Highway 59, going northeast out of the city, and it is a good highway and new. Or was new, that day we went up it. You look up the highway and it is straight for miles, coming at you, with the black line down the center coming at and at you, black and slick and tarry-shining against the white of the slab, and the heat dazzles up from the white slab so that only the black line is clear, coming at you with the whine of the tires and if you don't quit staring at that line and don't take a few deep breaths and slap yourself hard on the back of the neck you'll hypnotize yourself and you'll come to just at the moment when the right front wheel hooks over into the black dirt shoulder off the slab, and you'll try to jerk her back on but you can't because the slab is high like a curb, and maybe you'll try to reach to turn off the ignition just as she starts the dive. But you won't make it, of course. The a n***** chopping cotton a mile away, he'll look up and see the little column of black smoke standing up above the vitriolic, arsenical green of the cotton rows, and up against the violent metallic, throbbing blue of the sky, and he'll say, "Lawd God, hit's a-nudder one done done hit!"
(Please forgive me over delicacy with language, a glance at the photograph in the upper left will tell you instantly why I might be a bit squeamish about some word usage. I don't object to it in literature, but I have a real problem thinking through how I'm going to talk to Sam about it.)
This is the language of a poet steeped in the motion of a novel without slowing it down. This is where the best of both worlds comes together in a way that amplifies both. The poetry of this passage makes it indelible. I've never tried to remember it, but I remember the image of the car on the white concrete highway with the black median line and it associates with very early days in Pensacola driving to the beach. He captures both the motion of the vehicle and the hypnotic effect of the line coming out of infinity-gorgeous language to certain purpose. The scene is set and the ending is forecast in the very beginning. You're in a speeding car and you're going to hook over that curb-like shoulder by the time you're done. And you don't know it yet.
One more little observation from later in the novel--not one I recall, but one of many that struck my eye as I thumbed through the novel:
He wasn't the real thing, but he sure was a good imitation of it, which is frequently better than the real thing, for the real thing can relax but the imitation can't afford to and has to spend all the time being just one cut more real that the real thing, with money no object. He took us to a night club where they rolled our a sheet of honest-to-God ice on the floor and a bevy of "Nordic Nymphs" in silver gee-strings and silver brassières came skating out on real skates to whirl and fandango and cavort and sway to the music under the housebroke aurora borealis with the skates flashing and the white knees flashing and the white arms serpentining in the blue light, and the little twin, hard-soft columns of muscle and flesh up the backbones of the bare backs swaying and working in a beautiful reciprocal motion, and what was business under the silver brassières vibrating to music, and the long unbound unsnooded silver innocent Swedish hair trialing and floating and whipping in the air.
It took the boy from Mason City, who had never seen any ice except the skim-ice on the horse trough. "Jesus," the boy from Mason City said, in unabashed admiration. And then, "Jesus." And he kept swallowing hard, as though he had a sizable chunk of dry corn pone stuck in his throat.
It was over and Josh Conklin said politely, "How did you like that, Governor?"
"They sure can skate," the Governor said.
And so you can almost see Huey Long, Lyndon, or William Jefferson with their cronies at some place where neither politicians nor their cronies really ought ever to be and yet always seem to find themselves. And there is a certain touching naivete in the Governor's response (please pardon the violation of the third Commandment).
Poetry and power, the twin rails of this magnificent book, and the third rail--pride, ambition, gluttony, the panoply of the Capital Sins that end in the way of all such. One doesn't touch the third rail with impunity.
An intimate glimpse of the political world which has only gotten darker since the time of its writing. Powerful, prolonged and ultimately true about many things--the book is worth your time in a way the film probably will not be. We await the news.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:10 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Christ, Altogether Lovely
Periodically I'm reminded of the magnificence of the beauty of Jesus Christ. And so, I offer once again this set of reflections on John Flavel's sermon: "Christ Altogether Lovely." It starts in early November and continues through December.
When you need a reminder, just stop in and look. And be thankful for the Puritan divines and Anglican ministers who have given such substantive reflections. As ultimately harmful to the Body as the reformation was, it was not without certain things of value--the diversity of views and the understandings that resulted, the depth of our understanding of the beauty of Christ have all been enhanced. Indeed, God may write straight with crooked lines.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 12:08 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
From the Vaults--A Meditation on the Shema
Shema
Hear, O Israel
the Lord your God--
the Lord is One.There is no seam or division,
His will is one will, His direction is one direction
with no shadow of turning.
He is the eternal ascendant.He is the garment of hope and love,
the prop and the mainstay
at the center of life
with Him life is hollow
with Him there is only
one way, eternally homeward.
Love Him
and you lean on Him.
Turn away from Him
and still he hold the place at the center,
eternally patient,
ever-loving and kind.
He knows no deceit--
He is all love.(from 17 November 1991)
Posted by Steven Riddle at 12:47 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 19, 2006
Apples and Pumpkins
As much as I love Florida, there are several things I miss about fall--the changing colors, certainly. But having spent much of my life in Virginia and Ohio, what I most miss is apple season. I was astonished and appalled by the narrow and uninteresting selection of apples that the grocery stores here in Florida have. Normally this time of year the apples were rolling into the stores--Stamen, Winesap, and Jonathan being the three favored varieties. So, instead of sending cash to my pay-pal account, if you are a resident of VA or OH, you can amply repay me by shipping me any of these three varieties of apples, in almost any quantity (so long as it is large.)
And for the residents of Columbus--TSO in particular, there is an event in Circleville, which approaches asymptotically close to heaven--yes, the world-renowned Circleville Pumpkin festival in which one can obtain, pumpkin soup, pumpkin bread, pumpkin cakes, pumpkin donuts, cooked pumpkin twelve ways, and, of course pumpkin Ice Cream. There is no way to ship Circleville or the pumpkin festival to me, but go or send an emissary to enjoy it for me. Eat a pumpkin donut or pumpkin ice cream. It's the very least you can do for a blogging pal.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:39 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
September 20, 2006
Stealing Joy
There are some, probably all unaware of it, who spend their time being Satan's Willing Executioners. They steal joy.
Some of the joy stealers are undoubtedly aware of it, but because their own lives are too small and too unhappy, they only feel camaraderie only in the misery they can spread. These are very, very few in number.
More often than not, those who would steal joy do so out of very good motives. They want to improve things for everyone, they want to return reverence to the Mass, they want things to be like they were when everyone was pious, reverent, silent (and every bit as involved or uninvolved as they are today).
The people I refer to are those who tell us everything that is wrong with the present Mass. Those who write treatises about why this, that, or the other hymn is inappropriate. Why the only good ways are the old ways.
After reading enough of this I go to Mass with a mass of interior griping. I open my hymnal and see the name of Michael Joncas and nearly slam it shut--now there's charity for you. I have echoing in my head all the critiques of "I Am the Bread of Life." In short, I am paying attention to everything except the most important thing. I have Martha'ed away the Mass in a toil of concerns that really do not affect the central action of the Mass. If I sing "I Am the Bread of Life," I am not undoing what the Priest has done. Nor, contrary to some, am I claiming to be Jesus himself. I read one critique that made the nonsensical claim that never before the twentieth century did we sing or pray in the person of God, all song were written "from the outside" as it were. And then I turn to Psalm 95, which I recite every morning:
"Do not grow stubborn in the wilderness
as your Fathers did at Meribah and Massah
although they had seen all of my works.
Forty years I endured that generation,
I said, "They are a people whose hearts go astray
and they do not know my ways,"
So I swore in my anger, they shall not enter my rest."
Seems like we pray in the person of God as we recite this, and yet I haven't seen generations of confused monks convinced that they are God.
This is not to say that everything is perfect, nor to say that every selection chosen for Mass is always the most appropriate. It is to say that if one finds it necessary to make a complaint, it should be to the Priest or the liturgy committee and one's discontentment should be kept for oneself--a vintage not to be shared with all. We all have enough gripes about the way things go in our parishes. Last weekend, I thought I'd become apoplectic at a "liturgical motion" that consisted for a pair of barefoot young ladies in red carrying pots of incense through the congregation. (Our parish is Holy Cross, so we deferred the celebration to the weekend at which time we had a big blowout.). And then, I realized that I wasn't there to critique what was going on. That this motion did not detract from the Mass, and for some it might even have acted as a moment of beauty to bring them in to the main course. Apoplexy was conditioned by what I had read and participated in with various Catholic Blogs. It was time to divorce myself from the griping, complaining, and communal unhappiness that typified some sectors of the community. And so, I could happily sing along with "Our God is an Awesome God," well aware that a great many would frown upon it and wonder what place it had in the Holy Sacrifice of Mass. But if they choose to steal their own joy with such ruminations, it is none of my business. It only becomes my business when they make it their business to steal the joy of others.
Less griping, more working with the liturgy committee, with the Priest to effect the changes you would like to see in the Parish. And then sit for a while in the seat of those who receive the complaints, because every change made provokes complaints from one group or another.
Frankly, I don't understand how our good and great Priests endure the panoply of nonsense and complaint that they must be subject to from all of their parishioners-- different ones at different times. Indeed, they have a special grace and a leg up on the way to heaven simply sitting in the seat of authority and hearing all that they must hear.
If you are one--stop stealing joy. Register your complaint, let the liturgy committee know how you'd like to see things change. My guess about the likelihood of change involves an accumulation of solid state atmospheric precipitation and a very warm environment; nevertheless, that is the appropriate venue for discussion of the matters. In a sense, it is their job to receive and assimilate feedback. But it is not the job of the congregation at large, nor any particular member of it outside of those concerned with the planning of liturgy--and it is a form of detraction that can lead many astray--it cultivates unseemly anger and derails concentration on what is truly important.
Or, more likely, I'm simply exposing my own weakness. In which case, so be it.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:09 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Saying the Same Thing
Now that this morning's concerns have been expressed in a way that allows me some reprieve, let me restate them in a way that is more universal, more, if you will, Catholic.
Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. (KJV-Phil 4:8)
If what we are thinking about does not reflect things, then it is time spent in purgatory. It is so terribly easy to find fault with anything or anyone and so very difficult to articulate praise. But the better part is to look upon those things worthy of praise while working hard to correct those things that we would otherwise complain about. This is the Martha-and-Mary principle. Mary's better part always informs Martha's better work. As people living in the real world, in the secular world, in the world outside the cloister, our meditations upon worthy things prepare us for action bringing those real things to the people around us. Contemplation isn't an end in itself, or at least not entirely, for contemplation in the world must lead to works that change the world. As James would note, "Faith without works is dead." Prayer without works is equally dead. But works without faith are useless and futile--building a house upon sand. The two walk hand-in-hand supporting and informing one another.
So, rather than posting my complaints, as I did this morning, I should rather choose to post those things that will build up the body of Christ and allow all to see what a beautiful, loving, kind, and merciful God and Father we have who gave us so great a Savior as our guide and friend.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:07 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
September 21, 2006
There Is Comfort in the Thunder
Comfort in the ThunderIn the dark of dawn
the double thunder signals
they are safely home.
Okay a bad haiku, but being awakened at 6:21 by the double sonic boom of the returning shuttle provides some small comfort to those of us who live nearby. Or perhaps, for some, just a momentary annoyance. I can only speak for myself.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:45 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Dance Classes and Writing and Other Samuel Stuff
After his success last year as "Little Boy Blue" (ballet) and "Snoopy" (tap), Samuel changed his mind about the dance classes he would take this year. We thought we were going to be down to tap. However, he decided that he wanted to continue on to jazz, which meant he had to continue ballet, he also wanted to do tap and we added acro. The net sum of this is that we cart around a bag with four different kinds of shoes to two different venues on three different nights of the week. One lass each Monday and Tuesday and two classes on Wednesday.
Last year, I simply foisted most of this off on Linda allowing her the home-school mom privilege of this extended education. But with his decision to continue, I felt that he needed his Dad's presence and support through these classes. I want him to know that if he is committed to doing it, I'm 100% behind him. So each night I spend 1-1 1/2 hours watching him as he goes through his steps. The good side of this is that I can now help him with parts of the routines that need practice. The single downside, you may have noticed, is that there is less time for blogging.
But there's another upside. Because most of a dance class consists of waiting for you turn, there is plenty of time for the observing parent with his pocket keyboard and PDA to write or record and consider old writing and transform it into new. Of recent date, I've been typing in older poetry--poetry from 1980, at present. And I have to admit to being occasionally astounded by a line or two the gleams out from the mass of rubbish that surrounds it. There is some good poetry hidden under the pretension of youth, just waiting to be dug out.
It also puts me in mind of my real strengths as a poet--and as you may have noted by now, they don't consist of "message" poetry. Where the poetry really speaks to me is where it approaches imagist in its detail and its message is ambiguous and open. That's pretty much how I live life--one large rolling and shifting mass of ambiguity. I'd like to feel bad about that, but I can't because it has served me well thus far.
Anyway. for those who have noted a shortage of content, just be aware that I have about six-to-eight hours less a week to visit with y'all. Which doesn't mean I won't visit, just that the visits will be shorter and more intense as they come.
In the meantime, please pray for Samuel's continued success. The other day at Mass we read the petitions. We received the petitions on Sunday morning, the two of us read them. After he read, I pointed out some of the finer points of punctuation and grammar and told him how to deal with them in reading. We practiced again, and he did a little better and I was satisfied. However, when we got to Mass that evening, he did his reading and we aren't talking "a little better" here, we're talking leaps and bounds--pure, clear, slow, smooth, a better reader than many of our adults. (And I am not one to give idle praise, even though I will give lot's of encouragement.) This is one of those moment when you realize that Samuel needs his audience. It is in front of an audience that he excels. The audience fires him up and gets him ready to go. And as the surfers say, he is stoked. He came back from the readings and he knew that he had hit it square on the head.
The other day Linda called me and said that while Samuel was taking one of his several "imagination breaks" in the course of the day, she heard him singing. She said that she thought it sounded familiar, and given that the usual "imagination break" consists of running around making jet or swooshing sounds, this was unusual. She went away and came back laughing and said that he was singing the Priest's part at Mass. (He's recently begun to take classes to be an alter-server.) So our present Pope may play piano and enjoy classical music, but watch out world as we unleashed the first Jazz-balletic-pianist-tapper Pope!
Prayers for Samuel's continued growth and dedication to God's purposes would be greatly appreciated.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:26 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
This Day in 1823
The Angel Moroni appeared to Joseph Smith and told him to reestablish God's Church on Earth.
I've always found this and the golden tablets to be of particular interest along with the doctrine of blood atonement, invoked by Brigham Young to justify the Mountain Meadows Massacre. (Typified here as the first 9/11.)
Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:22 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
September 22, 2006
Powerful Advice
I snatch the quotation below from a very fine piece by TSO:
Reminds me of what a bishop (I think it was a bishop) once said. He said he usually prays for three minutes. But it takes thirty minutes of prayer to get there.
A lot of encouragement in very few words. Persistence, another face of humility.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:05 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Bartram's Travels
Available in a glorious transcribed html edition with all of the plates.
William Bartram was one of the first "naturalists" to do extensive tours and studies through the Southern United states. His Travels, published in 1791 records the people, the plants, and the animals he encountered during a tour of the Carolinas, Georgia and Northern Florida. A neglected masterpiece of observation.
PERHAPS, to a grateful mind, there is no intellectual enjoyment, which regards human concerns, of a more excellent nature, than the remembrance of real acts of friendship. The heart expands at the pleasing recollection. When I came up to his door, the friendly man, smiling, and with a grace and dignity peculiar to himself, took me by the hand, and accosted me thus: "Friend Bartram, come under my roof, and I desire you to make my house your home, as long as convenient to your self; remember, from this moment, that you are a part of my family, and, on my part, I shall endeavour to make it agreeable," which was verified during my continuance in, and about, the southern territories of Georgia and Florida; for I found here sincerity in union with all the virtues, under the influence of religion. I shall yet mention a remarkable instance of Mr. M'Intosh's friendship and respect for me; which was, recommending his eldest son, Mr. John M'Intosh, as a companion in my travels. He was a sensible virtuous youth, and a very agreeable companion through a long and toilsome journey of near a thousand miles.
And, for a moment, let us consider the rattlesnake:
BUT let us again resume the subject of the rattle snake; a wonderful creature, when we consider his form, nature and disposition, it is certain that he is capable by a puncture or scratch of one of his fangs, not only to kill the largest animal in America, and that in a few minutes time, but to turn the whole body into corruption; but such is the nature of this dreaded reptile, that he cannot run or creep faster than a man or child can walk, and he is never known to strike until he is first assaulted or fears himself in danger, and even then always gives the earliest warning by the rattles at the extremity of his tail. I have in the course of my travels in the Southern states (where they are the largest, most numerous and supposed to be the most venemous and vindictive) stept unknowingly so close as almost to touch one of them with my feet, and when I perceived him he was already drawn up in circular coils ready for a blow. But however incredible it may appear, the generous, I may say magnanimous creature lay as still and motionless as if inanimate, his head crouched in, his eyes almost shut, I precipitately withdrew, unless when I have been so shocked with surprise and horror as to be in a manner rivetted to the spot, for a short time not having strength to go away, when he often slowly extends himself and quietly moves off in a direct line, unless pursued when he erects his tail as far as the rattles extend, and gives the warning alarm by intervals, but if you pursue and overtake him with a shew of enmity, he instantly throws himself into the spiral coil, his tail by the rapidity of its motion appears like a vapour, making a quick tremulous sound, his whole body swells through rage, continually rising and falling as a bellows; his beautiful particoloured skin becomes speckled and rough by dilatation, his head and neck are flattened, his cheeks swollen and his lips constricted, discovering his mortal fangs; his eyes red as burning coals, and his brandishing forked tongue of the colour of the hottest flame, continually menaces death and destruction, yet never strikes unless sure of his mark.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:40 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Consider Her Ways
A phrase in the post before, put me in mind of another, which I share here:
Proverbs 6:6-8
6 Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise:
7 Which having no guide, overseer, or ruler,
8 Provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.
I was so reminded because of this remarkable little short story by John Wyndham, who was also kind enough to give us the cinematic frisson of Night of the Triffids and The Midwich Cuckoos (known in filmdom as Village of the Damned--do attempt to avoid John Carpenter's atrocious remake--the early black and white version is quite creepy and atmospheric).
And I suppose we need to give him remote credit for some of the high points of intro theme of The Rocky Horror Picture Show:
And I really got hot
When I saw Janette Scott
Fight a Triffid that spits poison and kills
I remember watching this remarkable film when I was quite young and still have a reluctance to enter a saw-palmetto patch (for more reasons than the Triffids might provide.)
Wow, talk about stream of consciousness--rattlesnakes to Proverbs to Triffids. What a scary place my mind must be to visit--I'll have to go there sometime.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:51 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Catholic Essays and Other Finds
A Book I had not encountered before with a leading essay on Juliana of Norwich:
The Faith of Millions by George Tyrrell S.J.
The Complete works of Charles and Mary Lamb for Children
A Compendium of Poets of the 18th Century
Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:01 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 23, 2006
E-Books Galore!
Bill at Summa Minutiae has a whole slew of them. Start with the referenced post and then look at all of 22 September. Thanks Bill!
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:27 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Following Mr. White's Most Gracious Lead
I offer the following finds--
Carmel in England: A History of the English Mission of the Discalced Carmelites, 1615 to 1849
Carmel in Ireland: A Narrative of the Irish Province of Teresian, Or Discalced Carmelites
What is most remarkable is that given present concerns, these arrive at a most propitious time.
Now here's one for engendering humility:
egends of the Monastic Orders as Represented in the Fine Arts Anna Jameson. From which, this excerpt:
"Neither as an Order, nor as individuals, are the Carmelites interesting or important in their relation to art."
The Library of Historic Characters and Famous Events of All Nations and All Ages For those famaliar with Dumas, this recounts the life of Louise de la Vallière; Mother, Duchess, first mistress of King Louis XIV, and eventually, cloistered Carmelite nun. Certainly a candidate for Saints Behaving Badly--only it would have to be Latter-Day Holy People Who Don't Have a Cause Behaving Badly.
Spanish Mystics by Marguerite Tollemache
Also to be found on the site are complete biographies of St. Josemaria Escrive, In Converstation with God, various volumes of the Navarre Bible, and other Opus Dei and Sceptre publications.
Santa Teresa: Being Some Account of Her Life and Times, Together with Some Pages from the History Gabriela Cunninghame Graham
Anyone care for the works of Orestes Brownson?
Complete on-line edition of Charles Carroll of Carrollton: Faithful Revolutionary--Scott McDermott
A list of Publications related to Charles Carroll of Carrollton
This could go on forever, but you take a try at it. Amazing things available.
Once again, deep appreciation to Bill White who not only first alerted me to the resource, but who continues to mine its treasures.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:52 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
More E-Books
A History of Twelve Jesuit Martyrs, including Father Campion
Memoirs of Missionary Priests by Bsp. Richard Challoner--Includes biographies of both Fr. Edward Campion and Father Robert Southwell, among other British and Welsh Martyrs.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack