If you belong to any religion besides Judaism or Christianity, having a religious experience is simple stuff. You obtain it. If you're a Buddhist, simply get better and better at meditation and complete separation from earthly desires, and you'll obtain a supernatural experience of peace. If you're a Muslim, keep on the Straight Way, look "in the heavens and the earth [for the] signs for those who believe" (Qur'an 45:3-5) and you'll find them. If you're a Wiccan, draw the circle, light the … [Read more...]

I hated tobacco. I could have almost lent my support to any institution that had for its object the putting of tobacco smokers to death...I now feel that smoking in moderation is a comfortable and laudable practice, and is productive of good. There is no more harm in a pipe than in a cup of tea. You may poison yourself by drinking too much green tea, and kill yourself by eating too many beefsteaks. For my part, I consider that tobacco, in moderation, is a sweetener and equalizer of the … [Read more...]

"I dare say that when I get out of this bed I shall do some deed of an almost terrible virtue." - GKC There's a simple way to look at a Catholic. It's to take the rosaries, the scapulars, the devotions to obscure Saints, the novenas, the ashes, the fasting and the abstinence; to see all these practices and say, "Legalism. These poor/stupid people are bound to medieval practices. They are not free." It is this view that causes our Fundamentalist brothers and sisters to inform us that we … [Read more...]

(Disclaimers: stream-of-consciousness, potentially loaded with projections of personal problems as absolutes, too wordy, might be limited to those who feel inclined to evil, if that ain't allayuh, too long.) I agree firmly with whoever Sean Connery was pretending to be in whatever that one movie was called, in which he informed a pupil that one must begin writing before they can write, even if it is merely copying some other work before personal work comes forth. Some day I will show you what … [Read more...]

Rule Number One: Use your eyeballs. Sorry I haven't p-p-p-posted in like chika-chika-4 days. I have been white-water rafting in the grand canyon, killing bald eagles, and dressing in their skin. Actually I was at Franciscan University, which really amounts to the same thing, meeting new people, (including some fellow bloggers, like the ever wonderful Michelle who writes at Catholic Unveiled, and deserves your attention, AND support, for she is heading off to Mexico to live the Catholic … [Read more...]