Catholicism+Wine

Yet Another Reason to Support Your Local Latin Mass...

..... and this reason isn't from a kooky right-winger, or a frowny trad, or anything of the sort.  It's from Camille Paglia:

Elements of New Age sensibility seem to have entered American Catholicism, which in the 1950s was already moving away from its déclassé ethnic roots and Protestantizing itself through a startling drabness of church architecture and décor. The folk songs, Protestant hymns, affable sermons, and literal hand-holding in today's suburban Catholic churches illustrate mellow New Age principles of inclusion and harmony and reinforce the casualness of the vernacular Mass and the slackness of unpoetic contemporary translations of Scripture. Priests, meanwhile, are now being trained to be social workers; theology and learning per se are no longer as heavily emphasized. The priest, with his public performance of the mysterious Latin Mass, was once an embodiment of learning for ordinary people. Latin, which I still believe to be the basis of most strong writing in English, was intrinsic to a priest's official identity and gave churchgoers a moving sense of historical continuity with classical antiquity, when the Christian story began. The priest, in other words, was an educator, just as university education began in the Middle Ages as training for priests.  

         In the wake of the 1960s cultural revolution, organized religion in America has clearly tempered its authoritarianism and tried to make itself more user-friendly. But in this welcome process, which posits the parish as a happy family, what has been lost is the sense of theology as intellectual history, complex and daunting. Jesuit colleges, following the mandate of early Jesuit missionaries to learn native languages and customs, tended to be hospitable to the post-sixties movement for multiculturalism. But I am not aware of Jesuit voices taking a leading role on either side of the public debate over poststructuralism, which seeped into American universities inthe 1970s and early 1980s and has in my view damaged the humanities in ways that it will take a half century to repair. Surely Jesuit professors, with their scholarly training and tradition of disputation, could have been in the vanguard of engaging poststructuralism in its own terms as a putative philosophy and freeing nascent multiculturalism from its grip. Certainly the response to the theory trend by the professoriat at secular institutions was too slow and feeble, so by the time the general alarm sounded, it was too late.   

She can see our cultural obligation- to the centuries of faithful, priests, martyrs, bishops, scholars, saints- to keep Latin and rigorous theology and philosophy alive.  Now why can't we...

PS- She gave this speech at Santa Clara University, a Jesuit college. I wonder how this portion of it was received.

The Economist's Tribute to Trujillo

Mr. P and I were eating breakfast, perusing the massive stack of magazines that usually covers our dining room table (it's only cleared off when guests come over). Much to our suprise- just because I don't think that the Economist usually concerns itself with such things- we discovered the following obituary in the May 1st edition. I really recommend that you read it; not only was it illuminating, but it was an honorable tribute to a true "Miles Christi."

Here's the intro; go here to read the rest.

Cardinal Alfonso López Trujillo, Vatican enforcer, died on April 19th, aged 72

AFP

IN 1995, as head of the Pontifical Council for the Family, Cardinal Alfonso López Trujillo published a “Lexicon of Ambiguous and Debatable Terms”. They included “safe sex” (no such thing, unless confined to the nuptial bed); “gender” (a construct of strident feminists) and “family planning” (code for abortion). He could also throw back a few phrases of his own: “contraceptive colonialism”, “pan-sexualism”, “new paganism” and, with a special lowering of those beetling black brows, “the culture of death”.

People sometimes forgot, when they met the cardinal, that he had studied Marxism as well as theology at the Angelicum in Rome. He could neatly trade jargon for jargon in the propaganda wars. Or he could write books entitled “Liberation and Revolution” to undercut, from the right, the theologians and priests in his native Latin America who thought they had a monopoly on those words. His red cardinal's skullcap was as much a battle statement as the beret of Che Guevara. “Prepare your bombers”, he wrote to a colleague just before the opening of the Latin American Bishops' Conference in 1979. “Get into training like a boxer going into a world fight.” Every day, on every front, this was López Trujillo contra mundum.

Saturday Cobwebs

It's a sleepy Saturday morning in the valley. Mr. P and I are cruising around on the internet, and Mr. D is dreaming of catching blue jays (probably).  Just a few notes...

 

<sigh> Not only would I not mind being in London, but I would love to assist at this Pontifical High Mass that Cardinal Castrillon Hoyos will be celebrating in June! Read more about it at www.latin-mass-society.org.

On an unrelated note, I'm discovering that the baby goods industry is just as full of marketing and messaging as the wedding industry.  If anything, it is worse: being a new parent, one is worried about "messing up" or not doing things correctly, and there are all kinds of goods out there to "reassure" you that by buying their goods, you're being a better parent. Examples abound.  Magazines are a good place to start if you want to see what kinds of gadgets are out there for anxious parents. I just read an ad about a "Prenatal Education System" that you strap to your belly.  The gadget then broadcasts "lessons" of various sounds to your unborn child. Spending the money on this product and giving your baby these lessons is supposed to yield all kinds of benefits- smarter! more ready to nurse! etc!  I wonder who gets suckered into these things? I recently talked about language development with a professor from BYU. He listed for me all of the abilities that infants have, innately, when it comes to language absorption and retention. An 18-month old, for instance, already knows syntax- well before he even comes close to reading. Babies have abilities that the rest of us will never have again in our lives. And Socrates, and Thomas Aquinas, and Einstein never had prenatal learning systems that their mothers diligently strapped to their bellies.

So some baby stuff is bunk, or at least easy to reject out-of-hand. But then there's the things that are traditional, and can cost a lot of money now: mobiles! wicker bassinets! strollers that look like old-fashioned prams! These are MY Achilles' heel. I almost buy these things, in my happy baby fog.

I realize, though, that darn it, I am a crafty person who was raised by a crafty mom. When we needed costumes, she made them. When our American Girl dolls lacked clothes or fancy steamer trunks, she made them. And she loves doing those kinds of things-and she passed the love of handmade goods onto us. I can knit and crochet, sew a little and embroider. My sister knits even better than I, can make soap, and does wonders with pastels and paper.

I was at the Pottery Barn website. If you want to see expensive items, especially for little people, go there. They have these adorable mobiles- one was even on sale. I was tending towards the sale one, when something shook me out of my consumer stupor: I could make some of these! They had soft, home-sewn stars and moons on them. I think I even made something like these stars for Girl Scouts in 3rd grade. So there's another project to add to the pile. A challenge, really: I want to make this mobile in such a way that no one knows it's been homemade.

I've also been hung up on baby furniture. I NEED a baby dresser, I thought. We're short on closet space. Then I returned to reality, again, and realized that I already have smaller, modular dressers that are even the right color. With new knobs, they will look very nursery-ish. Done, and hundreds of dollars NOT spent.

A dear friend of mine works at a magazine. She sent me copies of tons of wonderful, old baby patterns, mainly knitting patterns. Among them is the pattern, with a whole photo layout, for a sweater that Princess Grace knit for Princess Caroline. Imagine! Even princesses once knitted for their babies, even though, unlike for other moms, the need for knitted items was absent in Princess Grace's case. But other households traditionally relied on home-knit undies and baby items. And here we are now, not even considering that we could make some of the things that we buy. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad I don't HAVE to knit a whole layette set. But as we try to consume and waste less, making certain things from scratch can be really economical. And it cuts the clutter from our lives.

I told you that this was a random post.  I just hope that it didn't add to the clutter of your own day!

Baby Booties and a Papal Mass

Having missed most of the events from the papal visit (I fell asleep during his session with the bishops), I decided that I would just relax and watch the papal Mass yesterday.  First I had to decide whose coverage I would- or could- watch. I quickly grew tired of EWTN and FOX. Why is it that everyone must insist that this visit is the most "_________- est" (insert your own superlative) visit ever made by a pope, ever, in history? Could it be that this is just a normal papal visit, in a long, long line of papal visits to other countries? Go to the blog Hallowed Ground sometime to see photos- yes, real photos!-- of what other popes have done and seen in history. Fr. Neuhaus, God bless him, just needed to stop talking.  I don't envy those who have to comment on papal events, but please: don't get caught up in the moment and start making claims about an event that, as healing and joyful as it was, does not rank among the top Ten Events of Catholic Church History.

I decided to make some progress on the dreaded booties while I watched the Mass. Suprisingly, I found John Allen's commentary on CNN to be the least distracting. He didn't make any broad, sweeping claims about this visit or this Holy Father. He even said (dare he?) that American Catholics should not lose perspective and think that their problems were central to the problems of the whole Church, and that they shouldn't think that the Vatican is intimidated by the American Church. Thank you.

He also said "mushy" stuff, too, things like the Catholic Church in America is like a big family in which all don't agree on all things, and that's ok. This sort of comment makes the Holy Father look like the hard-line (which he's not) patriarch of a large, traditionally Catholic but-not-always-practicing-the-faith family. I can just see all us American Catholics at a family barbecue, live-in boyfriends and girlfriends in tow, rolling our eyes whenever "dad" said something crazy and old-fashioned about values. Not so helpful....

But turning to the Mass itself. I loved the music- it was really reverent and well-done. And while I'm no fan of coercing us all to become bi-lingual- the fix is in, I've decided, regarding Spanish and the liturgy- I still found that the Mass was reverent, with few distractions. It was amazing, really, how reverent it was, considering it was in a baseball stadium.

About the time that "Ode to Joy" began as the Recessional Hymn, I had knit to the rib-stitch cuff part of the baby bootie, with the tricky increase-decrease slip stitch parts behind me. Whew. I had the feeling that it was "good to be here" while watching the Papal Mass, and was done with the bootie in no time. 

For more complete footage (no bootie pun intended) of the papal visit, check out:

http://www.americanpapist.com/blog.html

http://amywelborn.wordpress.com/2008/04/20/open-yankee-stadium-liturgy-thread/

Have a wonderful week!

Easter Joy

 

Christ is Risen, Alleluia, Alleluia!

He is Risen Indeed, Alleluia, Alleluia!

He has fought the good fight

This YouTube clip, via Mrs. Jackie Parkes at Catholic Mom of Ten . I wish more people could see this video.

In our quest to enlighten the Iraqi people, perhaps we forget that some of them already already have what they need. And that individuals like Fr. Ganni have won a freedom that is greater than our agenda there could ever promise.

For all Iraqi Christians: protect them, O Lord, and give them courage.

Status Update!

My philosophy six months ago, life-wise, was that if I cast out as many lines as possible, then I would be likely to get a little nibble somewhere.

I didn't get a nibble, I caught a whale!

So I've found out that I didn't get into Berkeley, I still haven't heard from Stanford, I have a teaching job lined up for this fall regardless of what happens re: grad school,

But most amazing of all:

For nothing is impossible with God.

Beads- and I don't mean the Mardi Gras kind

If you've been to the Yahoo homepage sometime this afternoon, you might have noticed a video link "Birth Control without Pills or Condoms." I clicked on the link, thus being distracted from the work I was supposed to be doing, and watched most of the clip. A lady from Georgetown was being interviewed by a gentleman- who I later found out was also a doctor- and she explained that the university has developed a set of color-coded beads, "cycle beads," which helped women to determine when they were fertile and when they weren't. The interviewer is kind of dorky, and can barely disguise his skepticism for the method, at one point saying, "Isn't this just the rhythm method? Because they taught us about that in medical school...." At another point, he objects again, saying that the cycle beads "give too much power to women." I suppose he means that women could trick men with the beads? Wouldn't that be an easier thing to do with pills- i.e. she could secretly just stop taking them?

What interested me is that the Georgetown doctor never mentioned that this system could be used for religious reasons, but just as "birth control." When I went to the homepage of the program, http://www.cyclebeads.com/ , they do refer to the system as "Natural Family Planning." It seems like basic NFP, but with a visual aid to help the couple see where the woman is in her cycle. Unlike NFP, though, if a woman's cycle is less than 26 days or more than 32 days, then she really can't use the beads. It would be interesting to see if this were ever integrated into other systems of NFP.

Anyway, the video was an interesting watch because 1) the young male doctor is completely skeptical, and seems to have something against a woman knowing where in her cycle she is and 2) religious and moral reasons are never discussed. It's just "how effective is this, really?"

The fact that information about it even made it to Yahoo and ABC is pretty amazing. Maybe it will at least lead some people away from traditional birth control, and all of its dangers and moral problems.  As for the birth control mentality, well, I don't think beads can help that.

December 20th

O Clavis David, et sceptrum domus Israel: qui aperis, et nemo claudit; claudis, et nemo aperit: venit, et educ vinctum de domo carceris, sedentem in tenebris et umbra mortis.

O Key of David, and Sceptre of the house of Israel; that openest, and no man shuttests, and shuttest, and no man openeth: come and bring the prisoner out of the prison house, and him that sittest in darkness, and the shadow of death.

(Yes, the Nativity Scene continues to be placed in Lyman Park, next to the Police Station, in St. Helena. Something I am thankful for!)

Advent In Progress...

Good grief, it's been a long time since I've posted. I can chalk my absence up to 1) finishing grad school applications and 2) wanting to write a real, proper, meaty post, then becoming lazy and deciding to watch Project Runway instead. And then there's those Christmas cards to write...

But anyway, here I am, I made it. And wouldn't you know, after quite a few months, job-wise and life-wise, of "Where's my life going, God?" and "You want me to do this?", things are starting to make sense (that is, they always made sense, I just didn't see it). I've often "stumbled" upon gainful employment. I've sent out resume after resume before, often to find a job in an unexpected place and through some random daisy chain of connections. And now it's happened again- and I think, by now, I can recognize Providence when I see it!

Yet another bit of good news is that, after a period of time long enough to make a writer paranoid, I am getting another article published. I'll post the link here, if I can, when it is ready. It's a light and happy little piece that I wrote about wine and poetry. I always knew it was a keeper, even when other articles weren't, so I plugged it and edited it and sent it out over and over.

The thing that I just realized about that wine article is that it would not have been possible without the troubles and wanderings that happened just before and during it. In one week last year I miscarried multiples, and my father-in-law passed away; we went from excitement, thinking that we'd be having twins or more, to nothing. It was that kind of time when you are constantly expecting more bad stuff to happen, just because so much has happened already.  I had a hard few months after September, and gradually, as if I were groping around in the dark, found myself returning to writing. And writing that little wine and poetry article-- finding something really pretty and pleasant to write about-- helped me through the winter. I keenly felt the necessity of light-hearted times, of friendship and joy, and I found and put those elements in that article. To think that, if everything had been roses and sunshine, the wine article might never have come to be! I might never have felt the need to put to paper what made my heart sing.

And then, with that perspective, my winery job, which seemed like such a digression from Classics, Classics, Classics, 24-7, really has a more dignified place in my life. Here I thought I would just work in a tasting room, give it a try, what the heck; and now, I find that I really do enjoy wine- talking about it, writing about it, tasting it, of course. And I've found a way to marry wine and Classics together, with my writing.

The bottom line is this: don't complain about where God is taking you. The ride will be part of the reward. And the blithe times will be all the more precious, because you've been without them. I think that is why Mary knew, ahead of time, to store up all of the beautiful events of her life with Jesus in her heart.