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February 27, 2007
A Request for Prayers
A gift for Lent--I offer you good causes to pray for, thus practicing one of the three staples and foundations of Lenten discipline.
The people where I work are "living in interesting times." We are up for sale for the second time in five years and that has everyone a little edgy. Please pray for a successful sale that will allow us to resume our usual business.
In addition to the broader concerns of the company, I am living in especially interesting times with regard to work and would appreciate prayers. As far as I can discern all possible news would be good, but I'm waiting on tenterhooks to find out what will happen and there are enormous temptations to pride and other sins.
Finally, a young man who works with me recently announced that his wife gave birth to a child 10 weeks premature. Please pray for Coral that she quickly "comes up to speed." Everything seems okay so far, but you know how delicate the situation of a premature infant can be. Let's pray for continued stability and rapid improvement.
Thank you!
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 28, 2007
Mother Angelica's Little Book of Life Lessons and Everyday Spirituality
This collection compiled by Raymond Arroyo is a delight from start to finish. You may not learn much about Catholicism, but then this is a book compiled by a disciple. It is, in essence an ana revealing a great deal about Mother Angelica in her short, pithy sayings.
Mother Angelica, to her great credit, has nothing new to say to us. Indeed, she should not have. After all, what we know we have known for at least two thousand years, and some of the truths we reflect on today stretch back to the dawn of time. What Mother Angelica adds to them is a way of viewing them--a pithiness and punch that will help some readers internalize them.
For example, take this succinct restatement of Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard's famous dictum:
If you're not a thorn in somebody's side, you're not doing Christianity right.
Mother Angelica takes the abstract, but still clear message of Kierkegaard and applies it to our evangelical life. Kierkegaard: "Those who are comfortable with Christ do not know Him." It's this subtle turn and practical bent that adds the gloss and highlights to what Mother Angelica tells us.
Later she speaks words of comfort:
Suffering in itself does not make us holy. It is only when we unite it, out of love, to the suffering of Christ that it has meaning. Suffering without love is wasted pain.
Once again, we hear the old adage that suffering has meaning. But Mother Angelica, in her straight-to-the-bone manner tells us exactly how it can have meaning.
Once again, a bit later:
The Father judges no one until He calls them home. Did you ever think of that? He doesn't judge you at all in this life, so why should we?
Indeed.
This is a book of a disciple and admirer, an attempt to catch the spirit of the woman while sharing with us some insights that may help, or which may give us a slightly different way of viewing something we have always known. The stories are engaging, the voice even more so.
I don't watch much of EWTN, but in the few times that I whirl by it in my race for the Food Network and I see Mother Angelica, I pause to hear that thick voice and see that lovely face as she reels out another story or shares with us some insight. In this book I can hear the voice and see the face and so the editor, Mr. Arroyo does his subject justice--he captures her spirit on paper for the benefit of all who wish to receive.
Best of all, for busy people, these are short snippets--a book to be dipped into, sampled and savored as needed. A resource for helping us to break out of our own patterns of thought and to look at the same design and see something utterly new.
In short, I cannot recommend the book enough to those who like Mother Angelica or who would like a little lift in the middle of a day--a morsel to chew on and to perhaps to be transformed by.
Highly Recommended to all.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 7:58 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
You Are the Good News
from Mother Angelica's Little Book of Life Lessons and Everyday Spirituality
Raymond Arroyo (ed.)The world is never going to see the Good News by reading the Good Book. Because they won't read it. They are only going to see it when you live it.
Again, nothing startling here, but a reinforcement of what we must understand in order to communicate the faith. No one who is not already part of the faith is going to run to the Bible to find out about Jesus. What they learn about Jesus they learn through those who supposedly act in His name. This is a sobering principle that should serve to guide all of our daily interactions: Are we Good News? Or do we tell the world some other kind of news?
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:15 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Jazz--A Lenten Discipline
The title is sort of a joke--but not really. I've promised myself to try to get over my almost gut-level reaction to most Jazz. I don't like the seeming formlessness of a lot of Jazz. I need melody, something that when I hear it I recognize and can "follow" the line of and understand the development of.
By way of exercising this discipline, I decided to pick up the Dave Brubeck Quartet's mega-best-seller Time Out.
I have nothing coherent to say about the album, and nothing particularly helpful to the readers except (1) you will recognize the sound if not the tunes--it seems to have infiltrated every film of the early to mid sixties and has given rise to countless imitations; and (2) I like it. A lot. Far more than I would have thought possible.
So, knowing that Erik and other more knowledgeable about these matters stop by from time to time, this post is merely a request for references to other similar, accessible pieces. I'm not ready to leap off into the world of Keith Jarrett whose piano work gave me impossible headaches in my college years--nor am I interested at this point in acid jazz or be-bop as such. I need to get a solid grounding in things accessible before I reach beyond. And I'm afraid I do need a hook to engage me. But if you all have any suggestions for good stuff to listen to, please note them and I'll look them up.
Thanks!
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:56 AM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
Brubeck and the Church
So you thought I was joking--lookee what I found. Utterly fascinating.
Excerpt:
from "Jazz Goes Back to Church"
Fr. Michael Sherwin O.P.Brubeck reached a turning point in his religious development when he accepted a commission from Our Sunday Visitor to compose a Mass. Brubeck did not want to undertake the project. Not being a Catholic, he did not feel qualified. Yet, as Brubeck explains, the paper’s editor, Ed Murray, would not take no for an answer. "For two years he bugged me. . . . I’d kick him away like a dog you don’t want nipping at your heels, but he kept coming back." Finally, Brubeck agreed but only conditionally. "I told Ed, ’I’ll write three pieces and I want you to find the best Catholic expert to look at them and say whether they’re alright.’" Murray chose Sr. Theophane Hytrek. It was an inspired choice. "She got together a group of musicians in Milwaukee. The message came back, ’tell Dave to continue and don’t change a note.’" So Brubeck continued. The final result, To Hope ! A Celebration (1979), is stunningly beautiful.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:08 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
The First First Friday in Lent
And I'd like to remind everyone of the effort being joined by our Dallas Blogging friends to bring an end to the scourge of abortion.
Mark has some things to say about first Friday devotions and elsewhere on his and Julie D.'s site is their statement of solidarity in the cause. Please join your prayers to those of our blogging friends in Dallas as they continue on their prayer crusade.
Thank you.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 10:30 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Prayer and the Word
from Essence of Prayer
Sr. Ruth Burrows, OCDBut a rich source of theology and prayer at hand for each of us is the Missal. Here we find theology at its purest, theology that is prayed, that is prayer. If we were to absorb the contents of the Missal we would need little else. Study the four Eucharistic Prayers, the prefaces throughout the yearly seasons and the great doxology "Glory to God in the Highest." . . . a wealth of prayed theology, the Church's understanding at its purest consisting of treasures old and new.
*****
It is our precious Catholic inheritance to realize that the essence of worship and prayer must always lie with God's Self-communication to us and that our part is merely response. We who know Jesus do not depend on our own prayers, our own ways of getting in touch with God, pleasing him, atoning for our sins and so forth. We know that all this has been given for us in Jesus. We have to go and claim it. The fountain is there for us, overflowing, and all that we have to do is drink. We notice in the Mass prayers how we are, so to speak, continually "mingling" with Jesus, immersing ourselves in what He is doing. Our offering of ourselves is to become one with the perfect offering of Jesus. We too are to become the perfect offering that the FAther lovingly accepts, an offering that is first and foremost God's own gift to us. O marvellous exchange.
All of the theology in the world starts with God's revelation to us, perfect and complete. The finest teaching of this revelation is the teaching which is prayer--the Mass, the Mass in which we become in a special way "the body of Christ" (Although we are always and at all times part of the Body of Christ. But this is also true because there is not one moment of the day when the prayers of Mass are not rising to God and incorporating us fully, His sons and daughters into His Son.)
Have you ever looked closely at exactly what it is we pray when we pray the full Mass? Perhaps that might be a start for the scripture shy--see how it is structured and why it is the central prayer of faith. In it we are, for a moment, perfected, brought into Union with Him through His Son. As Sr. Ruth says, "O marvelous exchange."
Posted by Steven Riddle at 11:11 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
DST
It's astounding to me how much real trauma, work and fuss have to go into adjusting the software to compensating for the "new DST."
I honestly wish we had done away with this nonsense decades ago. But finances run the world and it is the financiers who gave us the new DST for whatever purposes they see it as useful. Frankly, whatever they gain is not worth what all of those who need to constantly shift our time frames lose.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 2:15 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
March 1, 2007
Global Warming--The Wrong Argument
My problem with this debate is that it is, as in almost every scientific controversy engaged in by non-scientists, waged in entirely the wrong terms.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that coming out of "the Little Ice Age" of the 1600s, global warming has occurred and is occurring. Anyone who makes even a cursory study of the climate of the past would discover that we live in one of the cooler eras of Geologic history, so warming is hardly a surprise. That addition of carbon dioxide to the air may be adding to the warming is certainly a possibility.
But set all of these things aside. Let's assume that the fluctuations are merely manifestations of Milankovich cycles, they come and they go in predictable ways. The question still boils down to--if we can avoid doing so should we be spewing noxious substances into the air, water, and land? Skip global warming--is it a good thing to burn down tropical rain forests to yield land that might give up one season or two seasons of crops?
We are facing a question of proper stewardship even absent calamity. We can do better, there are technologies for doing so. So why do we choose not to do so? Why do we mortgage our children's and their children's futures? Everything we dump into the air and water now persists for some half-life of recovery--that might be short, that might be, in human terms, nearly endless. Shouldn't we be taking steps to limit the amount of damage we do here and now? The Earth, like most humans, has remarkable recuperative mechanisms--but it is hard to recuperate from complete destruction. A tree is renewable, an entire forest is not.
It would seem that our community obligation is to protect and preserve to the best of our ability all of the goods that have come into our hands. Indeed, according to the parable of the Talents, it is our duty to foster these goods, to make them grow and to give back to God in the body of future generations more than we have been given.
These should be the terms of the debate. If we can control emissions, should we not do so? If we can find alternatives, should we not use them? If we can find means to produce less waste and preserve more of the natural world, should we not do so?
Politicians who raise the warning flag about global warming and then have energy bills in the thousands of dollars which they "offset" by purchasing "greening certificates" are doing a great deal more harm than good. You cannot offset tremendous fossil fuel energy usage by buying "green certificates." It's like sending someone else off to die in that war for you. Each person is responsible here and now for curtailing their own usage and waste--such a thing cannot be purchased from others as though it were a tradable commodity.
The reality is that I would be very surprised if Global warming were not occurring. Earth has been much warmer in the past than it is presently, and life has gotten along just fine. Multiple disaster scenarios are simply the way we seem to think in this day and age.
Christian stewardship demands of us responsible use of our own local resources and careful use of all Earth's resources. It requires that we make reasonable decisions regarding usage and conservation--neither curbing ourselves to ultra-asceticism nor squandering everything we have. We need neither to go out and hug trees nor to go out and cut them down because they are in the way of my view of the lake--but we need to find a middle road that accommodates us, our children, and the great diversity and gift of life on Earth.
And the global warming debate tends to mask the fundamental importance of these issues. It does not raise awareness, but rather focuses it improperly.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 8:10 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Kumiss
From The Roving Medievalist and English Catholic, this marvelous account of the first dried milk and other less-than-delectables. Recounted by the Friar Willem van Ruysbroeck of the Friars Minor.
This cosmos [Willem's spelling of kumiss], which is mare's milk, is made in this wise. They stretch a long rope on the ground fixed to two stakes stuck in the ground, and to this rope they tie toward the third hour the colts of the mares they want to milk. Then the mothers stand near their foal, and allow themselves to be quietly milked; and if one be too wild, then a man takes the colt and brings it to her, allowing it to suck a little; then he takes it away and the milker takes its place. When they have got together a great quantity of milk, which is as sweet as cow's as long as it is fresh, they pour it into a big skin or bottle, and they set to churning it with a stick prepared for that purpose, and which is as big as a man's head at its lower extremity and hollowed out; and when they have beaten it sharply it begins to boil up like new wine and to sour or ferment, and they continue to churn it until they have extracted the butter. Then they taste it, and when it is mildly pungent, they drink it. It is pungent on the tongue like râpé wine [i.e., a wine of inferior quality] when drunk, and when a man has finished drinking, it leaves a taste of milk of almonds on the tongue, and it makes the inner man most joyful and also intoxicates weak heads, and greatly provokes urine. They also make cara cosmos that is "black cosmos," for the use of the great lords. It is for the following reason that mare's milk curdles not. It is a fact that (the milk) of no animal will curdle in the stomach of whose fetus is not found curdled milk. In the stomach of mares' colts it is not found, so the milk of mares curdles not. They churn then the milk until all the thicker parts go straight to the bottom, like the dregs of wine, and the pure part remains on top, and it is like whey or white must. The dregs are very white, and they are given to the slaves, and they provoke much to sleep. This clear (liquor) the lords drink, and it is assuredly a most agreeable drink and most efficacious. Baatu has thirty men around his camp at a day's distance, each of whom sends him every day such milk of a hundred mares, that is to say every day the milk of three thousand mares, exclusive of the other white milk which they carry to others. As in Syria the peasants give a third of their produce, so it is these (Tartars) must bring to the ordu of their lords the milk of every third day. As to cow's milk they first extract the butter, then they boil it down perfectly dry, after which they put it away in sheep paunches which they keep for that purpose; and they put no salt in the butter, for on account of the great boiling down it spoils not. And they keep this for the winter. What remains of the milk after the butter they let sour as much as can be, and they boil it, and it curdles in boiling, and the curd they dry in the sun, and it becomes as hard as iron slag, and they put it away in bags for the winter. In winter time, when milk fails them, they put this sour curd, which they call gruit, in a skin and pour water on it, and churn it vigorously till it dissolves in the water, which is made sour by it, and this water they drink instead of milk. They are most careful not to drink pure water.
Posted by Steven Riddle at 9:47 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack