David Brooks explains it pretty well in his Op-Ed in New York Times from a few days ago,
People are really good at self-deception. We attend to the facts we like and suppress the ones we don’t. We inflate our own virtues and predict we will behave more nobly than we actually do… (more…)
I had someone leave a comment on a post who lamented questioningly,
“After all, do Christians proselytize to others as they wish others would proselytize to them? The very notion is ridiculous.”
Below is a great video clip, courtesy of Kevin O’Brien’s Theater of the Word, Incorporated, that puts that statement to the test. Because we are called to spread the Good News in ways that appeal to all people. (more…)
At least this has been my experience. Perhaps this poem by Emily Henrietta Hickey can help me explain. (more…)
Just a few days ago, I asked if it was arrogant or audacious to seek objective truth during our sojourn here on Planet Earth. A few tried to paint me into a corner (that I was both, and probably idiotic, if not psychotic) for my belief to having claimed to find the elusive truth through Christ and the Catholic Church.
Yes, I’m well aware that it is all the rage to love Jesus, but not the Church. Problem is, to do the one, you have to do the other. I mean, he himself said,
And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Again Jesus mentions this word “church” when a question on conflict resolution is raised,
“If your brother sins [against you], go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that ‘every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If he refuses to listen to them, tell the church. If he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector. Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
so whether we like it, or not, Jesus, the God-Man, the Christ, built the Church, and evidently he wants it to be around.
The apostles got this message, and as a result, the word, “church,” occurs many times throughout the New Testament to describe the assembly of the faithful. In fact, St. Paul calls the Church the Body of Christ, remembering getting knocked down on the road to Damascas and having Jesus ask him, “why do you persecute me?”
For the past few days, I’ve had my nose buried in some very good books. I found a wee treasure written by a fellow named W. J. Williams that includes the names “Newman” and “Pascal” in the title, and as Blaise is one of my favorites, and Newman recently became a Blessed, I had to give it a look.
The book is entitled Newman, Pascal, Loisy and the Catholic Church. It turns out that Loisy was excommunicated in 1909, but he doesn’t figure prominently in the book so I’m mystified as to why his name is included in the title. Maybe it was for “sizzle” back when it was published. Controversy sells, right? (more…)
Originally published on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, in December of last year, it seems fitting, what with Halloween coming up, to run it again.
Yesterday, I did something that I can only explain by pointing to the fact that I am a Catholic. I said a prayer for the soul of Dracula. No, not for Bram Stoker’s fictional vampyre version of him, but for the real Dracula. That’s right, Vlad “the Impaler.” (more…)
 |
| Dr. Nagai and his children praying. |
Thank you YIMCatholic Readers! On the last day of this past August, I shared a post about helping to make the movie All That Remains. When completed, it will be a docu-drama about the life of Dr. Takashi Nagai, survivor of the aftermath of the atomic bombing of the city of Nagasaki. I called it “rattling the tin cup” for a good cause, and I shared the post with you all. I threw a few shekels in myself and prayed that others would respond too.
When Ian Higgins sent me the information about the project, the fundraising page he had built over at IndieGoGo set a lofty goal of $24,000 dollars and had a whopping $45.00 in the kitty from three kind donors. Did I mention that there is some kind of time limit on this campaign? The clock was ticking down with 14 days remaining and that goal seemed all but impossible.
It still seems like a stretch. But who knows? Well, God knows. And maybe Ian and his brother Dominic can get an extension. But the good news is that 1082 folks read that post (according to Blogger’s internal counter) and 22 of them have contributed $4155 dollars towards the completion of this inspiring project. Isn’t that great? I’m thanking everyone who contributed, as well as everyone who forwarded the post, shared it on Facebook, Tweeted it, and linked to it. Thanks for all your help!
Now, the counters over at IndieGoGo say that 4 days is all that remains (pun intended!) on the fundraising campaign and I’m rattling the tin cup once again and praying for a miracle. Of the 1082 folks who read the post the first time around, 22 contributed in various amounts; from as little as $15 to as much as $1000(!). Remember me and my calculator? That works out to 2.03% of readers contributing to the cause. Which is about 17.97% shy of the 20% the Pareto Principle would have predicted would have given.
What’s that? You’ve never heard of the Pareto Principle? The 80/20 rule? Basically it means 80% of your sales come from 20% of your clients. Or,
80% of your profits come from 20% of your customers
80% of your complaints come from 20% of your customers
80% of your profits come from 20% of the time you spend
80% of your sales come from 20% of your products
80% of your sales are made by 20% of your sales staff
80% of your comments come from 20% of your readers
I just made that last one one up. Or put another way, as Our Lord said,
The kingdom of heaven is like to leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, until the whole was leavened.(Matthew 13:33)
I wonder how close the percentage of meal to leaven in the parable is to 80:20?
Here is the link to the fundraising site (Phase 2!) again, as well as the awesome trailer,
All That Remains – Feature film Trailer from Ian & Dominic Higgins on Vimeo.
For those who think that using nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was justified, Joe Six-Pack, USMC would simply remind you that doing so in the future would not be justified in light of Catholic teaching. See Guadium et Spes (§80),
80. The horror and perversity of war is immensely magnified by the addition of scientific weapons. For acts of war involving these weapons can inflict massive and indiscriminate destruction, thus going far beyond the bounds of legitimate defense. Indeed, if the kind of instruments which can now be found in the armories of the great nations were to be employed to their fullest, an almost total and altogether reciprocal slaughter of each side by the other would follow, not to mention the widespread devastation that would take place in the world and the deadly after effects that would be spawned by the use of weapons of this kind.
 |
| Urakami Cathedral, 500 meters from Ground Zero. |
All these considerations compel us to undertake an evaluation of war with an entirely new attitude.(1) The men of our time must realize that they will have to give a somber reckoning of their deeds of war for the course of the future will depend greatly on the decisions they make today.
With these truths in mind, this most holy synod makes its own the condemnations of total war already pronounced by recent popes,(2) and issues the following declaration.
Any act of war aimed indiscriminately at the destruction of entire cities of extensive areas along with their population is a crime against God and man himself. It merits unequivocal and unhesitating condemnation.
Nor was it an open and shut case among many folks involved in the war effort at the time either, not that that matters now. Never Again!
Thanks again to all who have helped out and thanks in advance for those who will! If you can, throw the Brothers Higgins a few shekels, but if you can’t, please share this with others and pray for the successful completion of this important Pro-Life film project.
P.S. Here’s a bonus earworm from Dweezil and Moon Unit…
And to whom have ye likened me, or made me equal, saith the Holy One? Lift up your eyes on high, and see who hath created these things: who bringeth out their host by number, and calleth them all by their names: by the greatness of his might, and strength, and power, not one of them was missing. (Isaiah 40:24-25)
The awesomeness of the above photograph cannot be denied. That’s the latest shot taken by the Cassini probe to Saturn (and her moons). I just saw it on Yahoo! and had to share it with you.
Here’s a snippet from the article,
Taken by NASA’s Cassini robotic orbiter, the shot was captured from the dark side of Saturn as the Sun’s bright rays illuminated every piece of dust and debris circling the planet. Cassini has offered astronomers a never-before-seen look at Saturn and revealed more information about the planet than any craft before it. The craft has taken so many pictures of the ringed wonder that they were recently made into a short flyby film that looks like it was created by George Lucas rather than a robotic space explorer.
Here is that film,
5.6k Saturn Cassini Photographic Animation from stephen v2 on Vimeo.
Wow! How amazing is that?
When my family lived in California, we used to go check out the free Open House that was held annually at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It was just up the road from us in La Cañada Flintridge. One of those times (I think it was when the Mars rover Spirit had just landed), we got to watch a neat movie about the Cassini mission, and the Huygens probe it dropped on the moon Titan. It was sort of like this,
Learn more about the Cassini mission over at the JPL website.
This isn’t the first post I’ve written on paradoxes of the Catholic faith, nor will it be the last. Remember the one on the Church being paradoxically consistent (and vice versa)? Or how about the one on the “Master of Paradoxes,” St. John of the Cross? Like a bull through a china shop, I’ve again let the cat out of the bag with a title that says everything that I’m about to share with you on the modern “virtue” of tolerance. (more…)
Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and meanings differently arranged have different effects. —Blaise Pascal
Yesterday, I shared a post about catechizing the world. That “c” word is one I had never heard of before I was Catholic. It’s a complicated sounding word that I probably could never get right during a spelling bee. But it doesn’t have to be that fancy sounding, because all it means is “sharing the Good News” and “teaching the Faith.”
What is the power of the words we choose when trying to bring others to Christ and his Church? Do they matter? Of course they do. Especially if they are puffed up so much that they wind up blocking the Son.
H/T to Terry Fenwick for posting this on her Facebook wall.
May it find its way through to all the corners of the world. Thanks to Marc Barnes, you can see for yourself.
Why I Am Catholic
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In