Insouciant About Orthodoxy

R. R. Reno is the editor of "First Things" magazine, teaches theology at Creighton University and is the author of In the Ruins of the Church: Sustaining Faith in an Age of Diminished Christianity (Brazos). Rusty converted to the Catholic Church from the Episcopal tradition in the fall of 2004. This reflection was written in the winter of 2005.

Read a portion of his story below

I put myself up for reception into the Catholic Church as one might put oneself up for adoption. A man can no more guide his spiritual life by his own ideas than a child can raise himself on the strength of his native potential. Stories of conversion to the Catholic Church can be rather tediously joyous. One might wish for some variety in such stories, perhaps something along the lines of Winston Churchill's observation that "democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time." But such variety as there is in conversion stories would seem to rest on the different ways in which converts describe a newly found bounty. For me, the gain was fairly simple. 

The Catholic Church did not deliver me from apostasy and false teaching. I teach at a Jesuit University, so I am not naïve about just how insouciant about orthodoxy priests can be. Nor did Catholicism provide me with a neat, efficient, and trouble-free church. I do read newspapers. 

What my reception into the Catholic Church provided was deliverance from the temptation to navigate by the compass of a theory. The Catholic Church has countless failures, but of this I am certain: Catholic Christianity does not need to be underwritten by an idea. A Pentecostal friend came to the Mass of reception at the Jesuit Martyrs' Chapel. He is a close friend and a man whose faith I admire. After the Mass we talked for a while. He asked me, "So, what did it feel like to become a Catholic?" I told him, "It felt like being submerged into the ocean." He reacted with a look of thinly disguised horror. That look reminded me that, while I sometimes suffer from an attraction to Emersonian fantasies of self-reliance and disdain for hierarchy, I have never wanted to be alone with God. It has always seemed to me that such a desire too easily turns into a longing to be alone with one's idea of God, and that is the same as being alone with oneself.

Link (here) to R. R. Reno's conversion story at Why I am a Catholic

Zags Learning About Business, Ethics, And Life From Billionaire Warren Buffett

Warren Buffet with President Obama

Twenty Gonzaga University entrepreneurship students will spend a day this fall in Omaha learning about business, ethics, and life from billionaire Warren Buffett, the “Oracle of Omaha," one of the most innovative and influential business leaders in the world. Buffett is chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, an Omaha-based conglomerate of more than 70 companies with nearly a quarter-million employees that also invests in numerous companies and investment vehicles. Buffett invites a select number of universities to Omaha every year. Todd Finkle, Gonzaga’s Pigott Professor of Entrepreneurship, initiated the visit with the assistance of Paul Buller, the School of Business Administration’s Kinsey-Robinson Professor of Business Management. Finkle wrote an in-depth case study on Buffett and Berkshire before coming to Gonzaga. Buffett read the case and invited Finkle and 27 students from University of Akron, where Finkle taught before coming to Gonzaga. They spent a day in Omaha at Berkshire Hathaway’s world headquarters and two of his subsidiaries.
Link (here) to Jesuitbusinessschools.net
Read about Warren Buffets Support of Planned Parenthood and Catholics for Choice (here)

Jesuit On Mitt Romney's 2012 Campaign

It appears then that Mr. Romney's re-branding of himself is well underway. Yet the former governor Mitt Romney appears to be in a constant state of becoming. As I have previously noted in this space, in the 2008 G.O.P primaries, Mitt Romney changed his message not once, but four times. There was Romney 1.0, the Massachusetts liberal Republican who had previously supported gay rights and abortion rights. Then Rudy Giuliani entered the 2008 race and it seemed that there was only room for one liberal Republican, so Romney's campaign launched Romney 2.0, the social conservative. 

Link (here) to read the full editorial by Matt Malone, S.J.

A Democrat Jesuit On A Catholic Republican Presidential Canidate

I don’t know where Rick Santorum was in 1960, but he was two years old. I was surrounded by Jesuit scholastics in philosophy studies. We knew the speech had been written with the advise of Catholic theologians and that Kennedy knew the proper role of conscience, as well as religion, in making public decisions. Meanwhile the issues which challenge Catholic conscience have grown, particularly in social justice, since the 1960s; and many, if not most, Catholics see the relationship between life issues as both more intimate and complex than those Kennedy faced. A study by Catholic Democrats shows that Santorum has among the worst voting records in the U.S. Congress on social justice and the family, though Santorum describes himself as “pro family.” In November 2011 he questioned the value of lower income children qualifying for Medicaid, food stamps, and housing assistance. “Why do these kids feel they are entitled to so much?...Suffering, if you’re a Christian, is part of life and it’s not a bad thing.” He favors massive tax cuts for the wealthy, wants to abolish public service unions, and denies humans are responsible for climate change. While the bishops have condemned torture in all its forms, in the televised debate Santorum endorsed water-boarding and “enhanced interrogation techniques.” He has long been pro-death penalty, but now says he’s thinking it over.

Link (here) to the full piece by Fr. Raymond A. Schroth, S.J. America Magazine

American Pot Shot

Newt and Calista Gingrich

Does a politician’s personal life prohibit him or her from holding office? I don’t think so, but one quote from Marianne Gingrich, if true, speaks volumes about Newt Gingrich. At the time when Marianne discovered her ex-husband had been carrying on a years-long affair with another woman, he was giving morality laden speeches to the American public. Upset, she confronted him about the talks, and he replied: “It doesn’t matter what I do. People need to hear what I have to say. There’s no one else who can say what I can say. It doesn’t matter what I live.”

It’s one thing to preach morality and then fail to live up to your own lofty ideal; it’s human and we’re all guilty of it now and then. It’s another to build a career destroying others, moralizing day in and day out, and to lead a life that doesn’t come close to the ideal that you impose on others. That’s called being a hypocrite. Leaders, even good leaders, can be lots of things—ambitious, narcissistic, and perhaps even philandering (such as John Kennedy, Bill Clinton, John Edwards, Gary Hart or Ted Kennedy)—but they can’t be hypocrites. Hypocrites cannot lead, and Newt Gingrich is a hypocrite. Let’s hope the American people see this come November 2012.

Link (here) to read the full blog post entitled, Newt Gingrich, Hypocrite by Micheal O'Loughlin at the Jesuit published America's In All Things 
The unoriginal idea for the O'Loughlin piece can found (here)

Ron Paul's 2008 Georgetown Speech 

watch it (here)

Fr. William "Bix" Bischel, S.J. Put In Solitary Confinment At SeaTac Federal Prison

SeaTac

Fr William "Bix" Bischel, S.J. was very happy to see and hear all who came to visit and wanted either to invite everyone in or go out and be with them. He had a strong sense they were angels, which gave him intense joy. He went onto comment that “it was so right they should be there.” His captors on the other hand had a slightly different experience. First reprimanding him for being out of compliance (whatever that meant), he was told he was going to be “written up” and what happened was to be “reported.” The rest is history –

in early morning he was suddenly awakened, grabbed out of bed, shackled, and returned to SeaTac by the marshals. 

Their actions and manner of treatment made it known to him how he would proceed. Upon his arrival at SeaTac he made it clear he intended to be in complete non compliance with their demands; their recourse, which was to be expected, would be to place him in “protective custody or the special housing unit (SHU)”…“the hole”!

Link (here) to Solitary Watch

These Callous And Murderous Times.

I am always amused—just before becoming infuriated—by animal rights activists who argue against fur or leather coats screaming, “How would you like to have your skin ripped from you?” Question?   

How does it feel to have a needle puncture the base of the skull and suck out the brain without anesthesia?  How does it feel to have one’s head crushed?   

 The Gospel calls us to be disciples whose belief leads to action, even when that action is unpopular.  Today we are called to be like the prophet Jonah, who is described in The Jewish Study Bible as “the most successful prophet in the Bible.”  We are called to make our voices heard in these callous and murderous times.

Link (here) to read the full piece by Fr. Jack SJ MD

Neither Amused Nor Shocked

On Monday evening in Hamburg, the controversial play "Golgotha Picnic" was performed in Germany. The SSPX has previously called for protests yesterday evening and had also called for a vigil outside the theater. According to the CBA the protest was attended by about 20 people, according to the "Star" magazine, there were 60 participants. Following the play there was a panel discussion at which the ministers who attended, a Catholic school rector, Jesuit, Father Hermann Breulmann. 

He was "neither amused nor shocked, but thoughtful," said the degreed philosopher of religion. "It was strong stuff, but I have found points where I can say, this piece has something." It raises questions and has an >>intensely deep grammar<<. If you have read Nietzsche, not all of its alienation from God is strange, said Breulmann. Actually it poses a question about all freedom of art, if the aesthetic of the piece has crossed any borders. I would not, however, characterize the play as blasphemous. 

"I would have thought that the Good Lord would have let things be cool," said the elderly Jesuit. Even Jesus said with his last words, "My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" since in the core that would not have been blasphemous, he did not agree with the criticisms leveled by the protesters.

Link to (here) Tancred and The Eponymous Flower

Joe Paterno Graduated From Brooklyn Preparatory High School

Joe Paterno in his Brooklyn Prep Uniform

Joe Paterno was not only a legend at Penn State but also at a place called Brooklyn Preparatory High School, a Jesuit institution of rigid learning that opened its doors in 1908, at 1150 Carroll St. between Rogers and Nostrand Aves. in Crown Heights, and closed in 1972. Paterno graduated in 1945

Link (here) to the NY Daily News

Fr. Lawrence Abello, S.J. "Rest In Peace"

Fr. Lawrence Abello,S.J.

Fr Lawrence Abello SJ, renowned professor, inventor and a devout companion of Mother Teresa passed away on January 22, 2012 at St Xavier's College, Kolkata. Born in Leuven, Saskatchewan, Fr Abello joined the Jesuits in 1956; he volunteered for the Darjeeling Mission, and took his final vows in 1974. He taught philosophy in India, earned a PhD in physics from Wayne State University, Detroit and held two patents for his inventions. Fr Abello was a champion of the unborn, immersed himself in the service of the poor and guided many who chose to work with the poor in Kolkata. He is survived by brothers Fr Louis and Tony Abello and sister Ms Giacinta Auser. He will be sadly missed by many. Fr Abello will be laid to rest in the Jesuit cemetery at Kolkata.
Link to (here) Tancred and The Eponymous Flower

A Multimillion Dollar Jesuit Real Estate Purchase

The Cardinal's Residence

While the adjacent St Joseph’s University has sought for decades to expand across Cardinal Avenue by acquiring the Archdiocesan' "Cardinal's Residence" parcel -- even placing a standing offer for the property in the mid-2000s -- an open bidding process is expected to be held. Despite having spent $92.5 million in 2005 to buy and adapt a 38-acre parcel across the street, the Jesuit-run school is still considered the most likely party to make the winning offer for its neighboring diocesan plot. That result would echo the most prominent house-sale by an American hierarch in recent years: Cardinal Sean O’Malley’s $172 million, three-part deal with Boston College for the famed Brighton Chancery compound, whose 65 acres served as the nerve center of the New England archdiocese for over a century.

Dope Dealer

Bob Dylan

This current semester, I have been teaching a seminar on the “Poetics of Bob Dylan” at a nearby Jesuit university.  Okay, go ahead and laugh, but I did an informal tally of how many universities currently offer courses on Bob Dylan, and it’s over 300.  

He’s an important literary and cultural figure even if you do just think most of his songs are about his dope dealer. My students and I usually do a quick cultural-historical overview of a time period or theme, and then I give them the lyrics to a Dylan song, and we listen and I point out some of what I think are the important themes. 

The students in this course are bright and are by and large good writers, but they’re also college students, so they spend a lot of time staring at me blankly or texting in a manner they think is discreet.

.

Link (here) to read the lengthy piece by James T. Keane, S.J. entitled Varieties of Religious Experience found at The Jesuit Post

A Creature Might Exist Who Is Directly Intended By God For Himself

No human being is simply a product of chance. Each person has origins in the vast creative potential within the Godhead. This fact does not mean that no element of chance is found in our individual lives. But chance itself is the result of the crossing of voluntary or necessary acts. From our viewpoint, what looks like chance looks like purpose within a providential order. 

The most significant entities in creation are not stars, planets, comets, black holes, or other sidereal phenomena. They exist from the ages in order that within the universe a creature might exist who is directly intended by God for Himself. The order of cosmic development is anthropic in character. Once the cosmos itself exists, with the sundry orders of living and sentient beings within it, we only begin the drama of what the universe is about. 

The human being is the one being in the physical cosmos who belongs both to the world and to what transcends the world. All levels of being are found within each human person – mineral, vegetable, animal, spirit. They exist there in a coherent whole. Every human being, however, finds that he does not just live in a physical world. He lives in a world of pleasures and pains, of opinions, thought, willings, and searchings. His own good is not simply himself. He exists “for himself” in order that he may act, know, and choose. To be what he is, it is not enough simply to be. 

Link (here) the full piece by Fr. James Schall, S.J. The Catholic Thing

Optional Activities

Patrick Deneen

Patrick Deneen, Associate Professor of Government at Georgetown University,  had some stinging criticismhttp://www.boomerinthepew.com/images/2008/11/29/deneen.jpg of the Jesuit university, saying that Georgetown “increasingly and inevitably remakes itself in the image of its secular peers, ones that have no internal standard of what a university is for other than the aspiration of prestige for the sake of prestige, its ranking rather than its commitment to Truth.”

Ouch.

Deneen wrote that the school’s  Catholic identity “has increasingly been cordoned off to optional activities of Campus Ministry.” He writes of his experience:

In the seven years since I joined the faculty at Georgetown, I have found myself often at odds with the trajectory and many decisions of the university. In 2006 I founded The Tocqueville Forum as a campus organization that would offer a different perspective, one centered on the moral underpinnings of liberal learning that are a precondition for the continued existence of liberal democracy, and one that would draw upon the deep wisdom contained in the Catholic humanistic tradition. I have been heartened and overjoyed to witness the great enthusiasm among a myriad of students for the programming and activities of the Forum. However, the program was not supported or recognized by the institution, and that seemed unlikely to change. While I did not seek that approval, I had hoped over the years that the program would be attractive to colleagues across disciplines on the faculty, and would be a rallying-point for those interested in reviving and defending classical liberal learning on campus. The Tocqueville Forum fostered a strong community of inquiry among a sizeable number of students, but I did not find that there was any such community formed around its mission, nor the likely prospect of one, among the more permanent members of the university. I have felt isolated and often lonely at the institution where I have devoted so many of my hours and my passion.

Link (here) to read the full story at the Cardinal Newman Society

Tragedy Of The Day

Bikram Choudhury the founder of Bikram Yoga

The one holy catholic and fairly apostolic church of Bikram Yoga. It is a place where people enter into suffering to attain a new kind of purification. 

We do yoga in this ridiculous heat chamber and sweat out toxins and dark thoughts and the tragedies of the day. We enter into poses and postures we once thought unimaginable. 

Poses that, by our sheer wills and some vital Spirit moving through the heat and spandex and foam mats, we manage to pull off grandly.

.

Link (here) to the full post by Joe Hoover, S.J. at The Jesuit Post 

Fr. Mitch Pacwa, S.J. on Yoga (here)

Fr. John Hardon, S.J. on Yoga (here)

A Jesuit And The Hurons

A Jesuit Missionary's Strange Adventures.

The labors and sacrifices of the French Jesuits in North America, during the seventeenth century, have never failed to awaken admiration and interest. Among these heroic men was a certain Father Adrian Grelon. He was appointed to the mission among the Hurons, a great and superior tribe living between Lake Erie and Lake Huron. In time the Hurons were almost exterminated by the Five Iroquois Nations of New York, who had obtained firearms from the Dutch. The surviving missionaries accompanied a band who went down to Quebec. Father Grelon was sent back to France. There he solicited the Chinese mission and set out for the far East. It is probable that he crossed Spain to take passage at some Spanish or Portuguese port, and on the way, to his astonishment, discovered in a Spanish convent an Iroquois, who had been sent to Spain, educated and ordained as a priest. On reaching China Father Grelon was stationed at different missions and labored with zeal. He wrote a book on China which is a curious addition to the Jesuit Relations of Canada, being by an old Canadian missioner. In time he penetrated Chinese Tartary, and there to his astonishment found in one of the camps a Huron woman whom he had known in America. She had been sold as a slave from tribe to tribe till she reached that place. Father Grelon reported the strange circumstance to his superiors and to the learned in Europe, and was the first man to afford any proof that America and Asia at the north, approached very closely, as was afterwards found by navigators to be the fact.

Link (here)

A Few Jesuits On "The Food Stamp President"

As Catholic leaders who recognize that the moral scandals of racism and poverty remain a blemish on the American soul, we challenge our fellow Catholics Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum to stop perpetuating ugly racial stereotypes on the campaign trail. Mr. Gingrich has frequently attacked President Obama as a “food stamp president” and claimed that African Americans are content to collect welfare benefits rather than pursue employment. Campaigning in Iowa, Mr. Santorum remarked: “I don’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else’s money.” Labeling our nation’s first African-American president with a title that evokes the past myth of “welfare queens” and inflaming other racist caricatures is irresponsible, immoral and unworthy of political leaders................

Read the full statement signed by the following Jesuits (here)

Rev. David Hollenbach, S.J.
University Chair in Human Rights and International Justice
Boston College
Rev. John F. Kavanaugh S.J.
Professor of Philosophy
St. Louis University
Rev. Jim Keenan, S.J.
Founders Professor in Theology
Boston College
Rev. Thomas J. Reese, S.J.
Senior Fellow
Woodstock Theological Center
Georgetown University
Rev. James E. Hug, S.J.
President
Center of Concern

“Why Are There No Hittites In New York?”

Walker Percy

In a large class of undergraduate students, I recalled the quip of Walker Percy which I thought was both amusing and pertinent to a discussion of the Old Testament and political philosophy: 

“Why are there no Hittites in New York?” Percy wondered. I expected some laughter, but, as far as I could tell, no one understood the point. Since obviously we find many Jews in New York but no Hittites, what can explain that survival over the millennia of Jews but not of the Hittites? 

In a sense, David Goldman’s book, It’s Not the End of the World; It’s Just the End of You, sets out to answer this question that has much more intellectual substance than we might at first suspect from the book’s somewhat flippant but accurate title. Goldman will indeed say that it is not the Jews of New York, who have very low birth rates, who will survive, but those in Israel, who are the “happiest nation on earth,” with the highest birth rate among industrialized peoples. The relation of birth and economics, happiness and enterprise, dying and living nations is at the heart of this book.

Link (here) to the full article by Fr. James Schall, S.J. entitled, On the Promises of God to Mankind at The Homiletic and Pastoral Review. 
Read David P. Goldman's reflection on Father Schall's piece (here)

George Fox To The Jesuit, "Ye Are The Filthy Dreamers"

George Fox

An excerpt from the autobiography of George Fox the founder of the Protestant sect The Quakers.

About this time many Papists and Jesuits began to fawn upon Friends, and talked up and down where they came, that of all the sects the Quakers were the best and most self-denying people; and they said it was great pity that they did not return to the Holy Mother Church. Thus they made a buzz among the people, and said they would willingly discourse with Friends. 

But Friends were loth to meddle with them, because they were Jesuits, looking upon it to be both dangerous and scandalous. But when I understood it, I said to Friends, "Let us discourse with them, be they what they will." So a time being appointed at Gerrard Roberts's, there came two of them like courtiers. They asked our names, which we told them; but we did not ask their names, for we understood they were called Papists, and they knew we were called Quakers.

I asked them the same question that I had formerly asked a Jesuit, namely, whether the Church of Rome was not degenerated from the Church in the primitive times, from the Spirit, power, and practice that they were in in the Apostles' times? He to whom I put this question, being subtle, said he would not answer it. I asked him why. But he would show no reason. His companion said he would answer me; and said that they were not degenerated from the Church in the primitive times. I asked the other whether he was of the same mind. He said, "Yes."
    Then I replied that, for the better understanding one of another, and that there might be no mistake, I would repeat my question over again after this manner: "Is the Church of Rome now in the same purity, practice, power, and Spirit that the Church in the Apostles' time was in?" When they saw we would be exact with them, they flew off and denied that, saying it was presumption in any to say they had the same power and Spirit which the Apostles had. 

I told them it was presumption in them to meddle with the words of Christ and His Apostles, and make people believe they succeeded the Apostles, yet be forced to confess they were not in the same power and Spirit that the Apostles were in. "This," said I, "is a spirit of presumption, and rebuked by the Apostles' spirit."

I showed them how different their fruits and practices were from the fruits and practices of the Apostles.

Then got up one of them, and said,  

"Ye are a company of dreamers." "Nay," said I, "ye are the filthy dreamers, who dream ye are the Apostles' successors, and yet confess ye have not the same power and Spirit which the Apostles were in. And are not they defilers of the flesh who say it is presumption for any to say they have the same power and Spirit which the Apostles had? Now," 

said I, "if ye have not the same power and Spirit which the Apostles had, then it is manifest that ye are led by another power and spirit than that by which the Apostles and Church in the primitive times were led." Then I began to tell them how that evil spirit by which they were led had led them to pray by beads and to images, and to set up nunneries, friaries, and monasteries, and to put people to death for religion; which practices I showed them were below the law, and far short of the gospel, in which is liberty. They were soon weary of this discourse, and went their way, and gave a charge, as we heard, to the Papists, that they should not dispute with us, nor read any of our books.

Link (here) to that autobiography.

“Sent To The Frontiers, Under The Roman Pontiff”.

Reduction of Our Lady of Saint Ana

The South American country has been at the center of one of the biggest events of the pontificate of Benedict XVI. The Society of Jesus and the World Youth Day (WYD), in fact, have worked together for months at an exhibition on " Jesuit Reducciones" (Missions) in Paraguay. The exhibition speaks of the past and present, of how the Jesuits have been and are “sent to the frontiers, under the Roman Pontiff”.

The "reducciones" of Paraguay (1609-1769) were settlements of Guarani Indians promoted by the fathers of the Society of Jesus in the lands conquered by Portugal and Spain, with the desire to preserve their identity as people and vassals of the Crown.  The Indians, who lived according to their ancient customs, in the mountains, in small very distant groups, , came together through the initiative of the Jesuits to form settlements of about 5,000 people each. “Many will remember the “reducciones” in the film “Mission”, directed by Roland Joffe (1986), starring Robert De Niro and Jeremy Irons”, observes the Catholic news agency Zenit.

The “reducciones” have a complex context which during their exposure is analyzed in greater detail.  It has to do with the '"encomienda", a colonizing system which often disguised slavery, and the strong desire of evangelizing missionaries and collaborators who, in their mission, were not always able to respect the identity of the Guaraní, but managed to defend their freedom and dignity, because on many occasions “reducciones” were the only way to safeguard them.  Up to 30 “reducciones” of Guaraní peoples exited, stretching between the Parana and Uruguay rivers, in a vast territory that included regions that today are part of Paraguay and also Argentina, the south and south-east of Brazil, the south-east of Bolivia and Uruguay. The Jesuit “reducciones” did not stop with the Guaraní, because there were also people like the Moxos (1682) and Chiquitos (1691) of Bolivia, the Maynas (1637) of Ecuador and Peru and the Orinoco (1730) of Venezuela.

I Quickly Switched From Johns Hopkins To Fordham

Dr. Rhonda Chevrin

The guests were Dietrich Von Hildebrand and Alice Jourdain, soon to become Von Hildebrand. They were talking about truth and love. Spontaneously I wrote a letter to them c/o of the station telling them of my unsuccessful search for truth. It turned out they both live on the West Side of NYC: Alice 2 blocks from me and Dietrich 10 blocks from me. Alice invited me for a visit. Her roommate, Madeleine (later to become the wife of Lyman Stebbins founder of Catholics United for the Faith) met me at the door and ushered me into a small room. There was this very European looking woman (she came from Belgium during World War II) who looked at me with such intense interest I was immediately drawn into her heart. She suggested I sit in on classes of Dietrich Von Hildebrand and Balduin Schwarz, his disciple, at Fordham University. Balduin's son, Stephen, a philosophy graduate student, now a philosophy professor and pro-life apologist, could bring me up to the Bronx and show me around. I sat in on a few classes. What impressed me most was not the ideas of these Catholic philosophers which I didn't understand very well, but their personal vitality and joy. The skepticism, relativism, and historicism, that characterized most secular universities at that time left many of the professors sad and dessicated. Drawn to this joy, as well as the loving friendliness with which everyone in this circle of Catholics moved out to greet a newcomer, I quickly switched from Johns Hopkins to Fordham to continue my studies. That the wife of Balduin Schwarz was a Jewish woman converted from an atheistic background certainly also made my entry into this new phase of my life easier. After a few months at Fordham, I could not help but wonder how come the brilliant lay Catholics and the brilliant Jesuits in the philosophy department could believe those ideas such as the existence of God, the divinity of Christ, the reality of objective truth, moral absolutes, and the need for Church-going. Obviously it was not only stupid and weak people who thought this way. What is more they could prove that the mind could know truth and that there were universal ethical truths in a few sentences.

Link (here) to Why I'am a Catholic, the article is entitled, Atheist Convert: Dr. Ronda Chervin

The Great Biblical Scholar Cornelius a Lapide, S.J. On The Wedding Feast At Cana

Cornelius a Lapide records that the marriage festival at which Christ turned water into wine at the request of the Blessed Virgin Mary was that of Saint Simon the Apostle. Here's the quote:

With more probability, Baronius, following Nicephorus (Hist. l. 8. c. 30), thinks that the bridegroom at this marriage was the Apostle Simon, who was surnamed the Cananite from Cana. And Baronius adds from the same Nicephorus that the place where the marriage was celebrated was adorned by a famous church built there by S. Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great. As soon as Simon had seen this miracle of Christ at his wedding, he bade farewell to his bride and the world, and followed Him, and was chosen to be one of His twelve Apostles. This was the reason why Christ came to this wedding; and by coming, indeed, honoured marriage; but by calling him to Himself, He showed that celibacy and the apostolate were better than marriage.

An interesting tradition, to say the least. By the way, Saint Simon the Cananite was the son of Cleophas who was the brother of Saint Joseph.

Link (here) to  the full post at Canterbury Tales

"Cut Your Cloak According To Your Cloth"

......the mind of Ignatius was most express, and became more fixed from day to day. "Cut your cloak according to your cloth," he said to Oliver Manare, when the latter, on going to establish a college at Loretto, asked how he should distribute his men. Ignatius preferred to refuse Princes and Bishops their requests, excusing himself on the score of limited resources, than compromise the reputation of the Society, by an ill-advised assent. And he said, as Juan de Polanco his secretary tells us, that "if anything ought to make him wish to live a longer time, it was that he might be severe in admitting men into the Order." He did not want to have many members in the Society; still less, too many engagements. Having stated thus briefly the material conditions required by Ignatius, and the animating principles or motives which determined him, we are in a position to discern more distinctly the central object of his attention, that for which the material conditions were provided, that by which the ultimate objects were to be attained.

Link (here)

Climb To The Highest Degree Of Christian Perfection

The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius, are something more than a collection of meditations, and christian considerations: if they were that, and no more, there would be nothing in them particular and new. Ignatius is not the first who has taught us the way of raising our minds to God, and of looking into our souls, by the means of prayer and contemplation. Before him, were known the several heads of meditation, as concerning the end for which we were created, the enormity of sin, the pains of hell, the life and death of our Saviour; but this much may be said, that before him, there was not a certain and prefixed method for the reformation of manners : to him enlightened by God, we owe this method, and he it was who, in a systematic way, after a manner altogether new, 

reduced (as it were) into a holy art the conversion of a sinner Knowing, on the one hand, the perverse inclinations of the heart of man; and on the other hand, the power and virtue of the particular truths of Christianity, when rightly applied, to rectify those corruptions, he had set down a process or way, by which man with the succour of grace may recover himself out of his sin and degradation, and climb to the highest degree of Christian perfection. 

In effect, if we look narrowly into the matter, there is as much difference between the ordinary meditations of religious books and these exercises, as between the knowledge only of simples and the entire science of medicine ; which has its principles and aphorisms, (the result of accumulated experience,) for the cure of diseases, according to the constitution of bodies, the nature of distempers, and the quality of remedies. But that the reality of what is above stated may be apparent, we shall here set down the whole order and Scheme Of Ignatius's Spiritual Exercises ; which are adapted for a Four Week's Retreat, for such as desire to Enter Upon A Christian Life. . 

Link (here)