I’m feeling a little under the weather today. Sore throat, runny nose, etc. I posted the YIMC Book Club discussion for this week though.  I may not feel up to posting anything else today, but heck, there is enough for you to read today from Webster and our guest Allison already. So I’ve decided to share a favorite video. Consider it an allegory of the relationship of God and Man.  I’ll leave it to you to figure out who is... Read more

Guest Post by Allison SalernoAbout 8 last night, during the snowstorm, an ancient, snow-laden tree fell on a power line a few houses away. Our little home fell into darkness. My husband, who had been working on the computer, went upstairs to bed. Gone was the TV show Gabriel, 13, was watching. Gone was my phone conversation with a girlfriend across town. I told Lucas, 10, to turn off the stove in the kitchen where he was making cocoa and... Read more

I will never escape Lourdes. My heart will always be a captive of this village on the north skirts of the Pyrenees. I have not seen Lourdes since 1974, my second and last visit, so far. But I’m quite sure there will be a third time. Because of the first time. I was not a Catholic then. I was not even a practicing Christian. I had left the Episcopal Church upon leaving home for boarding school, at 15. In 1971,... Read more

Guest Post by Allison Salerno I grew up in the years immediately following the Second Vatican Council. Nothing in my religious training at Mass or in our parish’s CCD program taught me about the treasure chest of Catholic worship, devotions, or music. My fondest Catholic memory from those years was sitting on the floor in a darkened classroom with my teenaged peers for Tuesday night youth group. A few times, we listened to a recording of whale songs. (This was... Read more

It is easy to dismiss as legend the one and only chestnut we usually read about St. Scholastica, sister of St. Benedict: That she prayed to God to be allowed to talk longer with her brother; that God rewarded her with a lightning storm that forced the siblings to spend the night together in spiritual conversation; and that three days later, when his sister died, Benedict had a vision of a dove rising to heaven. Just another Catholic legend, right?... Read more

After Thanksgiving we debated the Church’s position on war. Make that dual position: The Catechism allows both pacificism and the “just war.” But what do you make of the Church’s historic role helping European governments subdue indigenous peoples, as undoubtedly happened in South America four hundred years ago, literally over the dead bodies of missionary Jesuits? That’s the inescapable question after viewing Robert Bolt’s 1986 film The Mission, starring Jeremy Irons as Father Webster, pacifist, and Robert DeNiro as Brother... Read more

Guest Post by Allison SalernoFor two years now, I’ve been teaching writing Wednesday mornings at a community college in suburbia. Most of the time, I teach classes in what is called developmental writing. These remedial writing classes are for students who are not quite ready for college-level work. Most of the students in my classroom arrive bearing a track record of academic failure. Sometimes, they arrive with their lives broken in other places.While some students are taking the class merely... Read more

Would you believe the Blues Brothers?  Because we are on a mission. Hot on the case. Cool under fire. Or something like that. This is music to fly under the radar with.We just have to watch out for Carrie Fisher and the rocket launcher, LOL. Am I hearing some kind of theme here? LOL, the young Webster Bull? I think not! Another day in front of the keyboard.  Without prayer, it would be like this… Our guest Allison, Webster, and Frank.  In... Read more

Until I became a Catholic I never went to a Super Bowl party. Last night, Catholic friends invited me to two. Bob and Deb invited the Beverly CL crowd to their place, and I would have happily gone there. But Ferde had been making chili since Wednesday, and he sealed the deal by accepting a bet on the game.A footnote about my pre-Catholic Super Bowl experience. I’m not the misanthrope that makes me sound. Until a few years ago, Katie... Read more