I was first assigned to the beam-cutting station, but I asked to be reassigned. I wanted to weld. It seemed honorable and I wanted to be somebody. But I guess no ones asks to be a welder once they get to the cutting stations. I was given the materials: gloves, sleeves, apron, mask. I needed boots. No tennis shoes. I don’t recall the details or the exact time, but I passed an initial inspection of some kind. I was first... Read more
I spent New Year’s Eve with a buddy from college. We weren’t super close while enrolled, but we knew each other. He was a little older and I had a bad reputation. We somehow ended up in the Twin Cities afterwards and became good friends. I sang and played at his wedding, we recorded music together and played terrible golf at a nine-hole course. He’s a genius or something — understands how things work and can replicate that sense of... Read more
In the early nineties, my Father started a non-profit organization to support our family’s ministry. Missionary Ark for Families. It was our sole source of income for six or seven years in Lorain, Ohio and Reynosa, Mexico. My Mom and Dad would put together a monthly newsletter and send it out, with pictures and some stories and updates. We received monthly donations by mail. While living in Mexico we had a post office box in Hidalgo, Texas, just over the border.... Read more
There is a universal and inextricable relationship between desire and belief. This relationship contains and reveals the natural, religious, and erotic order of things. It is no surprise, then, that New Atheists are today’s fiercest defenders of religious belief in their evangelical zeal, straw-man debates, and group therapy sessions. Echo chambers. No, I’m not going to spell this out to the predictably irritable vigilantes out there. I simply want to point out two well-known facts about desire: we do not... Read more
On today’s Feast of the Holy Family we hear a story about parents losing their only child. Not for a few minutes or even a couple of hours: Mary and Joseph lose Jesus for days. How delightful! The Church draws our attention to a wonderfully confusing scene, where a frustrated Mary asks “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.” To this agitated question, the child Jesus poses another question... Read more
It began when a mostly intelligent, cheeky, and sometimes rabble-rousing group of students I befriended at Wabash College found themselves short on fresh ingredients. Their publication, The Wabash Commentary, was born from the conservative side of the culture wars, the attempted counter-reformation to the 60’s and 70’s. Of course, at Wabash, an all-male liberal arts college founded in 1832, things were running a decade and a half behind — and I consider this proclivity towards the unfashionable to be one of their greatest... Read more
Dear Fellow Catholics, Merry Christmas! Cristus natus est! It’s party time. A time to feast and laugh and sing and make merry. A time to forgive debts and loosen belts. A generous time. A time to give and receive. There is a rigor to this holy season. It’s a twelve day party. Stamina and grace are key. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12. Christmas is not a single day; it is plural. A season that began on the... Read more
Cuando uno espera a Dios, no hay certitud ni miedo. Solo esperanza. Esperar se hace en el presente, pero se directa aun mas lejos. El espero se define por su estado temporal, su tiempo. El pasado no vale para la esperanza. No hay pasado ni historia, solo queda lo que no se ha actualizado. El futuro. Es decir, en su forma temporal, el futuro no es misterioso. Aun mas, el futuro es misterio en si. Por eso, no se puede... Read more
My late Tio “Manino” (short for Marcelino) had an bottle of Mexican brandy beside his recliner. Presidente. He was well into his eighties, past his drinking prime, so I asked what it was for. He replied that, with all the break-ins and robberies and murders that were commonplace in his neighborhood, especially ones targeting the elderly, he had come up with a strategy: if a thug entered his small trailer-house he’d tell him there’s nothing to be stolen, nothing of... Read more
The easy excuse is “I’ve been grading.” But it’s not true. I write most when I’m busy. My productivity thrives on pressure. I’ve run up on a shore of some kind, somewhere. I don’t know what to call it yet. A disposition just shy of melancholy. Paralyzing, in a satisfying way. When sleep finally conquers and washes over you and knocks you out and brings you the rest you need. That sort of paralysis. A surrender of sorts. It’s kept... Read more
Sam Rocha
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