(Wikimedia Commons public domain photograph by Maximillian Puhane)
I was reading something a while ago by the prolific Boston-based Catholic philosopher and apologist Peter Kreeft, and it gave me an idea for an item that perfectly combines my religious-historical interests and my libertarian-leaning political conservatism:
Q. Who was the first Christian in history to be given a government grant?
No, he didn’t build the cathedral at Chartres.
No, she didn’t lead the armies of France.
(Did you know, by the way, that a significant number of the Christians polled in one survey identified St. Joan of Arc as the wife of the patriarch Noah?)
No, he didn’t receive the money from the Emperor Constantine the Great.
No, it wasn’t the artist who did the Byzantine mosaics in the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia at Ravenna.
Could it have been Michelangelo, for his magnificent dome over the Cathedral of Florence? No.
How about Ghiberti, for the “Doors of Paradise” on the Baptistry in front of the Cathedral? Again, no.
Q. Who was the first Christian in history to be given a government grant?
A. It was Judas Iscariot.
***
“Whoever does not visit Paris regularly will never really be elegant.” -Honoré de Balzac
“Paris is always a good idea.” – Audrey Hepburn
“A walk about Paris will provide lessons in history, beauty, and in the point of Life.” – Thomas Jefferson
“To know Paris is to know a great deal.” – Henry Miller
“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.” – Ernest Hemingway
“You know, I sometimes think, how is anyone ever gonna come up with a book, or a painting, or a symphony, or a sculpture that can compete with a great city. You can’t. Because you look around and every street, every boulevard, is its own special art form and when you think that in the cold, violent, meaningless universe that Paris exists, these lights. I mean come on, there’s nothing happening on Jupiter or Neptune, but from way out in space you can see these lights, the cafés, people drinking and singing. For all we know, Paris is the hottest spot in the universe.” – Owen Wilson (sort of)
Posted from Paris, France
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