From a funny-but-serious short memoir by George Saunders in the New Yorker:
On those Wednesday afternoons when I was Reader for all-school Mass, I would leave class early, confident yet stressed, like a little businessman, and hustle down to the sacristy, where I’d read the Epistle passage aloud so that Father X could check my pronunciation. He’d mark the reading with one of several silk ribbons bound into the pages, and I’d take the book out to the lectern and stand there a minute, thinking, Soon I’ll be up here, and the light will be on me, and the church will be full of my friends.
Normally on Wednesdays I found Father X working at something in the sacristy. This Wednesday, I came up the aisle quietly, so quietly that I discovered Father X and a nun I’ll call Sister Y in the middle of—well, I couldn’t figure out what they were doing. It appeared to be some particularly athletic form of kissing, involving tongues and a lot of snakelike extraneous limb and torso motion, as if this new kind of kissing were filling them with painful electricity.
Later, Saunders went back to the church to do his practice reading, careful to make a good deal of noise as he walked down the aisle.
Out came Sister Y, looking beautiful in the way someone will when she has just, against all sense, done exactly what she most wanted to.
Saunders awakened to the truth that nuns and priests are human beings, like the rest of us, with feet of clay, at an earlier age than I did. I was well into my late teen years before I was disabused of the notion that Roman Catholic priests and nuns were far above us lowly lay folks on the holiness scale. At my Jesuit university, one of my philosophy professors was an elderly priest who was an outspoken racist. He did not mince words in his racist remarks. However, he was very much the exception, in fact, the only exception amongst the Jesuits at that time, 50-plus years ago, for it was at the university that I began to unlearn the racist attitudes I had lived with my whole life. He had been a brilliant philosophy teacher in his prime, or so I heard, but when he taught me, he was way, way, way past his prime.
After graduating from the university, I taught second grade at a Roman Catholic school, one of a small group of lay teachers amongst the nuns who outnumbered us. After my first year there, the nuns treated me more like one of them and began to share news and harmless gossip about life in the convent. I was thunderstruck one day when one of the sisters made a not-so-harmless snide remark about one of the other nuns. The comment implied that the nuns did not always get along with one another! I have suggested before that I stayed an innocent naïf far longer than most young people - you could even say a case of arrested development, but there it is. As time went on, others shared with me the normal tensions involved in living in community. Of course, that's quite usual and natural, and I should have known better than to think all was sweetness and light in the relationships of the nuns one to the other in convent life, but I did not.
Lest you think that goodness went along with my innocence, I'll disabuse you of that notion, because my small circle of friends came close to what would be called "mean girls" today, for we used cutting irony and ridicule when we talked of certain of our peers. The good news is that it was mostly talk for we did not treat them rudely, plus we were not the top group in popularity, so we had little influence beyond our small circle.
UPDATE: From Fran in the comments:
By Thomas Merton
To love another as a person we must begin by granting him his own autonomy and identity as a person. We have to love him for what he is in himself, and not for what he is to us. We have to love him for his own good, not for the good we get out of him. And this is impossible unless we are capable of a love which ‘transforms’ us, so to speak, into the other person, making us able to see things as he sees them, love what he loves, experience the deeper realities of his own life as if they were our own. Without sacrifice, such a transformation is utterly impossible. But unless we are capable of this kind of transformation ‘into the other’ while remaining ourselves, we are not yet capable of a fully human existence.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Pink Snow
The crepe myrtle tree is on the side of our house. I don't know the name of the variety, but we call it pink snow because that's what it looks like with the tree and the ground covered with pink flowers. The flowers in the lower right hand corner are pentas for the hummingbirds and butterflies.
Just thought you'd like to see something pretty for a change.
Please Guys, Give Them Back
From the Times-Picayune:
BATON ROUGE -- Gov. Bobby Jindal urged lawmakers Wednesday to reverse enactment of a raise that would double their pay by taking immediate legislative action before the current session ends in five days.
But with Jindal repeating a pledge not to veto the measure, lawmakers said they considered the issue closed.
"I don't know why he is trying to antagonize the Legislature," House Speaker Jim Tucker, R-Algiers, said of Jindal's request.
OK, someone please explain this to me. Our guv is asking the legislators to reverse the bill that they passed to more than double their salaries. The guv has something called veto power, which he is not willing to exercise. He has antagonized the legislators by his request for reversal of the bill, but he will not veto the bill and please many, many, many other citizens of Louisiana. He won't sign the bill, but if he does not veto by July 8, the bill will become law.
He now seems to be in the position of pleasing no one. Perhaps, he thinks that as long as the lawmakers get their money, they will forget that he antagonized them. Perhaps he thinks the people of Louisiana will forget that he broke his campaign promise to "prohibit the legislature from giving themselves raises that take effect before the subsequent election." Jindal was a Rhodes Scholar, as was our Sen. David Vitter, who admitted to patronizing prostitutes. Having been a Rhodes Scholar does not seem to be a sure-fire predictor that one will serve well in a public office.
I am proud to say that my representative in the legislature, Dee Richard, voted against the pay raise and that he will refuse to take the raise, along with others in the legislature. Good for them. I can't say the same for my senator, Joel Chaisson.
BATON ROUGE -- Gov. Bobby Jindal urged lawmakers Wednesday to reverse enactment of a raise that would double their pay by taking immediate legislative action before the current session ends in five days.
But with Jindal repeating a pledge not to veto the measure, lawmakers said they considered the issue closed.
"I don't know why he is trying to antagonize the Legislature," House Speaker Jim Tucker, R-Algiers, said of Jindal's request.
OK, someone please explain this to me. Our guv is asking the legislators to reverse the bill that they passed to more than double their salaries. The guv has something called veto power, which he is not willing to exercise. He has antagonized the legislators by his request for reversal of the bill, but he will not veto the bill and please many, many, many other citizens of Louisiana. He won't sign the bill, but if he does not veto by July 8, the bill will become law.
He now seems to be in the position of pleasing no one. Perhaps, he thinks that as long as the lawmakers get their money, they will forget that he antagonized them. Perhaps he thinks the people of Louisiana will forget that he broke his campaign promise to "prohibit the legislature from giving themselves raises that take effect before the subsequent election." Jindal was a Rhodes Scholar, as was our Sen. David Vitter, who admitted to patronizing prostitutes. Having been a Rhodes Scholar does not seem to be a sure-fire predictor that one will serve well in a public office.
I am proud to say that my representative in the legislature, Dee Richard, voted against the pay raise and that he will refuse to take the raise, along with others in the legislature. Good for them. I can't say the same for my senator, Joel Chaisson.
Gen. Antonio Taguba - An Honest Man
From McKlatchy:
WASHINGTON — The Army general who led the investigation into prisoner abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison accused the Bush administration Wednesday of committing "war crimes" and called for those responsible to be held to account.
The remarks by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, who's now retired, came in a new report that found that U.S. personnel tortured and abused detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, using beatings, electrical shocks, sexual humiliation and other cruel practices.
"After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes," Taguba wrote. "The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account."
Are you listening, Democrats? I want trials for the members of the Bush maladministration. I want them to have the trials that they've refused to give the detainees. I want them to be held accountable.
The group Physicians for Human Rights, which compiled the new report, described it as the most in-depth medical and psychological examination of former detainees to date.
Doctors and mental health experts examined 11 detainees held for long periods in the prison system that President Bush established after the 9-11 terrorist attacks. All of them eventually were released without charges.
The doctors and experts determined that the men had been subject to cruelties that ranged from isolation, sleep deprivation and hooding to electric shocks, beating and, in one case, being forced to drink urine.
Bush has said repeatedly that the United States doesn't condone torture.
(My emphasis in the quotes)
This is sickening. Evidence that the decision to use "enhanced interrogation" methods was authorized at the highest levels grows ever stronger with new investigations and revelations. Those who were released must have been innocent, right? The maladministration would not let terrorists go free, would they? Is this the kind of country we want to be?
"The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account."
Yes, Gen. Taguba, and thank you.
WASHINGTON — The Army general who led the investigation into prisoner abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison accused the Bush administration Wednesday of committing "war crimes" and called for those responsible to be held to account.
The remarks by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, who's now retired, came in a new report that found that U.S. personnel tortured and abused detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, using beatings, electrical shocks, sexual humiliation and other cruel practices.
"After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes," Taguba wrote. "The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account."
Are you listening, Democrats? I want trials for the members of the Bush maladministration. I want them to have the trials that they've refused to give the detainees. I want them to be held accountable.
The group Physicians for Human Rights, which compiled the new report, described it as the most in-depth medical and psychological examination of former detainees to date.
Doctors and mental health experts examined 11 detainees held for long periods in the prison system that President Bush established after the 9-11 terrorist attacks. All of them eventually were released without charges.
The doctors and experts determined that the men had been subject to cruelties that ranged from isolation, sleep deprivation and hooding to electric shocks, beating and, in one case, being forced to drink urine.
Bush has said repeatedly that the United States doesn't condone torture.
(My emphasis in the quotes)
This is sickening. Evidence that the decision to use "enhanced interrogation" methods was authorized at the highest levels grows ever stronger with new investigations and revelations. Those who were released must have been innocent, right? The maladministration would not let terrorists go free, would they? Is this the kind of country we want to be?
"The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account."
Yes, Gen. Taguba, and thank you.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
The Bishop of London Responds
From The Lead at the Episcopal Cafè.
Below is the text of the letter from Richard Chartres, Bishop of London, to Dudley Martin in response to his blessing of the civil partnership of Peter Cowell and David Lord:
18th June 2008
The Reverend Dr Martin Dudley,
St Bartholomew the Great Parish Office,
6 Kinghorn Street,
London,
EC1A 7HW.
Dear Martin,
You have sought to justify your actions to the BBC and in various newspapers but have failed more than two weeks after the service to communicate with me.
I read in the press that you had been planning this event since November. I find it astonishing that you did not take the opportunity to consult your Bishop.
You describe the result as “familiar words reordered and reconfigured carrying new meanings.” I note that the order of service, which I have now received, includes the phrase “With this ring I thee bind, with my body I thee worship”.
At first sight this seems to break the House of Bishops Guidelines which as I explained in my letter of December 6th 2005 apply the traditional teaching of the Church of England to the new circumstances created by the enactment of Civil Partnerships.
The point at issue is not Civil Partnerships themselves or the relation of biblical teaching to homosexual practice. There is of course a range of opinion on these matters in the Church and, as you know, homophobia is not tolerated in the Diocese of London. The real issue is whether you wilfully defied the discipline of the Church and broke your oath of canonical obedience to your Bishop.
The Archbishops have already issued a statement in which they say that “those clergy who disagree with the Church’s teaching are at liberty to seek to persuade others within the Church of the reasons why they believe, in the light of Scripture, tradition and reason that it should be changed. But they are not at liberty simply to disregard it.”
St Bartholomew’s is not a personal fiefdom. You serve there as an ordained minister of the Church of England, under the authority of the Canons and as someone who enjoys my licence. I have already asked the Archdeacon of London to commence the investigation and I shall be referring the matter to the Chancellor of the Diocese. Before I do this, I am giving you an opportunity to make representations to me direct.
Yours faithfully.
The Rt Revd & Rt Hon Richard Chartres DD FSA
Below is the text of the letter from Richard Chartres, Bishop of London, to Dudley Martin in response to his blessing of the civil partnership of Peter Cowell and David Lord:
18th June 2008
The Reverend Dr Martin Dudley,
St Bartholomew the Great Parish Office,
6 Kinghorn Street,
London,
EC1A 7HW.
Dear Martin,
You have sought to justify your actions to the BBC and in various newspapers but have failed more than two weeks after the service to communicate with me.
I read in the press that you had been planning this event since November. I find it astonishing that you did not take the opportunity to consult your Bishop.
You describe the result as “familiar words reordered and reconfigured carrying new meanings.” I note that the order of service, which I have now received, includes the phrase “With this ring I thee bind, with my body I thee worship”.
At first sight this seems to break the House of Bishops Guidelines which as I explained in my letter of December 6th 2005 apply the traditional teaching of the Church of England to the new circumstances created by the enactment of Civil Partnerships.
The point at issue is not Civil Partnerships themselves or the relation of biblical teaching to homosexual practice. There is of course a range of opinion on these matters in the Church and, as you know, homophobia is not tolerated in the Diocese of London. The real issue is whether you wilfully defied the discipline of the Church and broke your oath of canonical obedience to your Bishop.
The Archbishops have already issued a statement in which they say that “those clergy who disagree with the Church’s teaching are at liberty to seek to persuade others within the Church of the reasons why they believe, in the light of Scripture, tradition and reason that it should be changed. But they are not at liberty simply to disregard it.”
St Bartholomew’s is not a personal fiefdom. You serve there as an ordained minister of the Church of England, under the authority of the Canons and as someone who enjoys my licence. I have already asked the Archdeacon of London to commence the investigation and I shall be referring the matter to the Chancellor of the Diocese. Before I do this, I am giving you an opportunity to make representations to me direct.
Yours faithfully.
The Rt Revd & Rt Hon Richard Chartres DD FSA
Thought For The Day - From Giles Fraser
In the beginning of his talk on BBC Radio 4, Fraser lists the purposes of marriage in the liturgy from the 17th century Book of Common Prayer.
First, It was ordained for the procreation of children
Secondly, It was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication
Thirdly, It was ordained for the mutual society, help, and comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and adversity.
The second and third purposes seem to present no barrier to same-sex marriages. Fraser follows with commentary on the first purpose of marriage - procreation.
The Archbishop of Canterbury himself has rightly recognised that celibacy is a vocation to which many gay people are simply not called. Which is why, it strikes me, the church ought to be offering gay people a basis for monogamous relationships that are permanent, faithful and stable. So that leaves the whole question of procreation. And clearly a gay couple cannot make babies biologically. But then neither can those who marry much later in life. Many couples, for a whole range of reasons, find they cannot conceive children - or, simply, don't choose to. Is marriage to be denied them? Of course not. For these reasons - and also after contraception became fully accepted in the Church of England - the modern marriage service shifted the emphasis away from procreation. The weight in today's wedding liturgy is on the creation of loving and stable relationships. For me, this is something in which gay Christians have a perfect right to participate. I know many people of good will are bound to disagree with me on this. But gay marriage isn't about culture wars or church politics; it's fundamentally about one person loving another. The fact that two gay men have proclaimed this love in the presence of God, before friends and family and in the context of prayerful reflection is something I believe the church should welcome. It's not as if there's so much real love in the world that we can afford to be dismissive of what little we do find. Which is why my view is we ought to celebrate real love however and wherever we find it.
In the event that you wonder about my extensive posting on actions and opinions in the Church of England, it is because I have been stung by Archbishop Rowan Williams critical statements about the Episcopal Church going its own way in consecrating Gene Robinson, a partnered gay man, as Bishop of New Hampshire. He has singled out the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada for particular criticism. Now that he must deal with similar departures from traditional practices in his home church, I hope that he may cast a more kindly gaze upon the actions of his brothers and sisters in the Episcopal Church and the Church of Canada.
Episcopalians in New Hampshire are left without representation at the Lambeth gathering of the bishops of the Anglican Communion this summer by the non-invitation of Bishop Robinson. Diocesan leaders in New Hampshire sent a letter to Archbishop Williams in protest that Bishop Robinson is barred from the conference. I'd like to have signed the letter in solidarity with my brothers and sisters in New Hampshire, because, as a member of the Episcopal Church, I take his non-invitation somewhat personally.
From BBC Radio 4 via The Lead at the Episcopal Café.
First, It was ordained for the procreation of children
Secondly, It was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication
Thirdly, It was ordained for the mutual society, help, and comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and adversity.
The second and third purposes seem to present no barrier to same-sex marriages. Fraser follows with commentary on the first purpose of marriage - procreation.
The Archbishop of Canterbury himself has rightly recognised that celibacy is a vocation to which many gay people are simply not called. Which is why, it strikes me, the church ought to be offering gay people a basis for monogamous relationships that are permanent, faithful and stable. So that leaves the whole question of procreation. And clearly a gay couple cannot make babies biologically. But then neither can those who marry much later in life. Many couples, for a whole range of reasons, find they cannot conceive children - or, simply, don't choose to. Is marriage to be denied them? Of course not. For these reasons - and also after contraception became fully accepted in the Church of England - the modern marriage service shifted the emphasis away from procreation. The weight in today's wedding liturgy is on the creation of loving and stable relationships. For me, this is something in which gay Christians have a perfect right to participate. I know many people of good will are bound to disagree with me on this. But gay marriage isn't about culture wars or church politics; it's fundamentally about one person loving another. The fact that two gay men have proclaimed this love in the presence of God, before friends and family and in the context of prayerful reflection is something I believe the church should welcome. It's not as if there's so much real love in the world that we can afford to be dismissive of what little we do find. Which is why my view is we ought to celebrate real love however and wherever we find it.
In the event that you wonder about my extensive posting on actions and opinions in the Church of England, it is because I have been stung by Archbishop Rowan Williams critical statements about the Episcopal Church going its own way in consecrating Gene Robinson, a partnered gay man, as Bishop of New Hampshire. He has singled out the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada for particular criticism. Now that he must deal with similar departures from traditional practices in his home church, I hope that he may cast a more kindly gaze upon the actions of his brothers and sisters in the Episcopal Church and the Church of Canada.
Episcopalians in New Hampshire are left without representation at the Lambeth gathering of the bishops of the Anglican Communion this summer by the non-invitation of Bishop Robinson. Diocesan leaders in New Hampshire sent a letter to Archbishop Williams in protest that Bishop Robinson is barred from the conference. I'd like to have signed the letter in solidarity with my brothers and sisters in New Hampshire, because, as a member of the Episcopal Church, I take his non-invitation somewhat personally.
From BBC Radio 4 via The Lead at the Episcopal Café.
I Ask Myself...
From LapinBizarre, who insists, "No subliminal meaning in my sending it to you."
I believe him.
Martin Dudley Explains Why
From the New Statesman:
Robustly heterosexual since early adolescence, unable to see that any love surpasses the love of women, and once branded by the odious Daily Mail as 'Dud the Stud', I may seem miscast in the role into which I have now been thrust, that of the turbulent rebellious priest who defies bishop and archbishop to bless two gay men, also priests, in their civil partnership.
Dudley speaks of the influence on him of the turmoil of the 1970s and of his studies in theology at King's College in London:
The study of theology at King’s College, London, was rigorous, critical, comprehensive, and above all engaged with a rapidly changing world. As Dean Sydney Evans posed the existential “Who am I?” he taught us not to accept the “I” as a fixed point but a point in motion, always becoming.
Of the Church of England now, Dudley says that it's as though that time never happened. The questioning, exploring, testing the boundaries of the period, all that seems forgotten.
There has been a return to uncritical fundamentalist use of biblical “proof texts”, ripping verses from their theological and literary contexts. There has been a flight to the safety of rigid law and inflexible dogma and a consequent desire to unchurch those who will not conform.
So on a day late in 2007 when my friend and colleague Peter Cowell asked me to bless the civil partnership that he was to contract with David Lord in May this year I was ready to answer “yes”. I did so not to provoke the so-called traditionalists and to deliberately disregard the guidelines published by the English House of Bishops, not to defy the Bishop of London, whose sagacity I respect, or Archbishop Rowan, who I have known and admired for 25 years, but because to respond in any other way would have been a negation of everything I believe, of everything that makes me who I am, as a man and as a priest.
....
On 31 May, my birthday and the feast of the Visitation, when Mary said “My soul doth magnify the Lord”, 300 people gathered in St Bartholomew the Great to celebrate the Eucharist, to witness Peter and David commit themselves to each other in an exclusive loving relationship.
....
I did not seek the role, the interviews, the publicity, but more than thirty years ago I began a journey, a process of becoming, that focuses on Jesus the Christ, not as lawgiver and judge but as the one who loves us and holds us and will not let us go until we know ourselves as loved by him despite our foolishness and imperfections, and because of that, when Peter Cowell asked me, I did not hesitate, not even for a moment to answer “Yes, I will.”
Robustly heterosexual since early adolescence, unable to see that any love surpasses the love of women, and once branded by the odious Daily Mail as 'Dud the Stud', I may seem miscast in the role into which I have now been thrust, that of the turbulent rebellious priest who defies bishop and archbishop to bless two gay men, also priests, in their civil partnership.
Dudley speaks of the influence on him of the turmoil of the 1970s and of his studies in theology at King's College in London:
The study of theology at King’s College, London, was rigorous, critical, comprehensive, and above all engaged with a rapidly changing world. As Dean Sydney Evans posed the existential “Who am I?” he taught us not to accept the “I” as a fixed point but a point in motion, always becoming.
Of the Church of England now, Dudley says that it's as though that time never happened. The questioning, exploring, testing the boundaries of the period, all that seems forgotten.
There has been a return to uncritical fundamentalist use of biblical “proof texts”, ripping verses from their theological and literary contexts. There has been a flight to the safety of rigid law and inflexible dogma and a consequent desire to unchurch those who will not conform.
So on a day late in 2007 when my friend and colleague Peter Cowell asked me to bless the civil partnership that he was to contract with David Lord in May this year I was ready to answer “yes”. I did so not to provoke the so-called traditionalists and to deliberately disregard the guidelines published by the English House of Bishops, not to defy the Bishop of London, whose sagacity I respect, or Archbishop Rowan, who I have known and admired for 25 years, but because to respond in any other way would have been a negation of everything I believe, of everything that makes me who I am, as a man and as a priest.
....
On 31 May, my birthday and the feast of the Visitation, when Mary said “My soul doth magnify the Lord”, 300 people gathered in St Bartholomew the Great to celebrate the Eucharist, to witness Peter and David commit themselves to each other in an exclusive loving relationship.
....
I did not seek the role, the interviews, the publicity, but more than thirty years ago I began a journey, a process of becoming, that focuses on Jesus the Christ, not as lawgiver and judge but as the one who loves us and holds us and will not let us go until we know ourselves as loved by him despite our foolishness and imperfections, and because of that, when Peter Cowell asked me, I did not hesitate, not even for a moment to answer “Yes, I will.”
Japanese Water-Fueled Car
Thanks to Doug, who says we should all buy stock in Dasani. He adds:
Figures -- the Japanese would do this first!
Runs on something the Saudis don't have a whole lot of. Interesting.
Yes, it is.
From Reuters:
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Button Sold At Texas GOP Convention
From Talking Points Memo.
When TPM contacted spokespersons at the GOP, they said that they did not know about the buttons and, had they known, they would not have permitted them to be sold.
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