You can’t beat the desert for a good parable. Early in March, about ten years ago, my friend Rick and I went fishing with our friend Jimmy at a place in northern Arizona called Lee’s Ferry. We had woken up that morning to a snow flurry, but by the time we’d rented a jet boat, towed the thing to the launching site, and trolled up the Colorado to what seemed a likely spot, the sun was out and the temperature... Read more
Jeremy Lin is a consciousness-raiser. Jay Caspian Kang claims never to have seen “the Asian American community speak out with such unified force and coherence” as when ESPN headline dubbed Lin as “a Chink in the armor” of the New York Knicks. Why? Well, says Timothy Dalrymple, Asian Americans are sick of life in the cultural shade, in particular, of being thought “timid and unathletic, nerdy or effeminate or socially immature.” Well, take it from someone of Jewish heritage, that’s... Read more
First of all, let me apologize for calling you all a niche market. When I wrote that, I knew all but a few of you in the abstract — many of you, as you said yourselves, had been squirreling yourselves away in Lurkland. Now that we’ve had this chance to meet properly, I’m blown away. For one thing, every one of you knows how to construct a paragraph. For another, you all seem like very nice and down-to-earth people. Not... Read more
Eyes are basically testicles that sit in the middle of your head. Show either too much disrespect in the form of squeezing or prodding, and they will punish you for your impertinence in ways you won’t soon forget. I learned this, or at any rate the apart about eyes, on Tuesday night. The experience constituted one of those miniature Dark Nights of the Soul that, I’m starting to believe, should mark the change of every liturgical season. For a couple... Read more
My lady friend’s family has been combing through my blog for evidence I’m a loser. Thanks to my edgy but disarming confessional style, the task presents about as great a challenge as combing the blogosphere for mentions of Jeremy Lin. If I had any sense, I’d beguile them with false intel — say, by blogging pieces like “How I Became Heir to the Zuckerberg Fortune.” But, being a spiritual memoirist and not a fiction writer, I’ll share a story that... Read more
Yesterday, Rick Santorum defended the honor of women contraceptive-users everywhere…sort of. During a debate in Congress on the Obama administration’s mandated contraceptive coverage, Santorum backer Foster Friess told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell, “You know, back in my days, they used Bayer aspirin for contraception,” he said. “The gals put it between their knees, and it wasn’t that costly.” Santorum later responded, “Foster is a well-known jokester. That was a stupid joke. I’m not responsible for every bad joke someone I happen... Read more
Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan denies that the bishops have become “bullies who are now trying to impose our beliefs on the rest of the country, and trying to utilize the offices of the federal bureaucracy to do that.” What he should have said is: “We bishops are no more bullies than Planned Parenthood, the National Rifle Association or the AFL-CIO.” If policymaking is a sport, the controversy over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act has made the bishops into serious... Read more
In Slate, Julia Feisenthal tries heroically to crack the code of Rick Santorum’s sweater vest. She’s convinced it must mean something — the problem is, she can’t settle on a single meaning. The polysemiotic garment, Feisenthal writes, “lies at the intersection of practicality…and frivolity… The look is both boyish and grandfatherly, sporty and fusty, conservative and eccentric, old-fashioned and hip.” She seems to miss the point that it’s just such a kaleidoscopic mixture of messages that every presidential candidate should... Read more
Is Obama a moron, or evil Lord Sauron? Here Catholic opinion’s divided: His accomodations of abominations Are being quite roundly derided. With bowdlerized cusses, George Weigel now fusses O’er relativists and their schemes. “No way” from Chaput creates great ado; Defiance becomes the new meme. Scalia, so sorely, sings “Roddy McCorley” And stirs up the echoes of Easter. “It’s worse,” Mark Steyn glowers. “It’s Tyburn, the Tower,” “And King Hal’s big boot up your keister.” Obama’s no hero; but still... Read more
When I was an undergrad, I sometimes chanced to meet up in the Student Recreation Complex weight room with a kid named Raul. Raul suffered from what I now realize was Tourette’s syndrome, snorting and jerking his head in mid-sentence before going on to complete his thoughts. Spotting him on the bench or military press felt like defusing a bomb. If he suffered an attack in mid rep, my feeble hands would be the only things keeping the weight-laden bar... Read more
Diary of a Wimpy Catholic
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