By: Lizzie Furey,
on 10/19/2016
Curse is a much more complicated concept than blessing, because there are numerous ways to wish someone bad luck. Oral tradition (“folklore”) has retained countless examples of imprecations. Someone might want a neighbor’s cow to stop giving milk or another neighbor’s wife to become barren.
The post Blessing and cursing part 2: curse appeared first on OUPblog.
By: RachelM,
on 8/24/2016
Government advisers don’t regularly admit to handling doctored evidence. The extent to which the actions of recent governments may have depended on documents which had been ‘sexed up’ have—quite rightly—become matters for close scrutiny in recent decades. But the modern world has no monopoly over the spurious, the doubtful, and the falsified.
The post Dodgy dossiers in the Middle Ages appeared first on OUPblog.
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| Do your Sunday mornings roll in with waves of whines and crashes of grumbles? |
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By: Hannah Paget,
on 1/23/2016
What was Shakespeare’s religion? It’s possible to answer this seemingly simple question in lots of different ways. Like other English subjects who lived through the ongoing Reformation, Shakespeare was legally obliged to attend Church of England services. Officially, at least, he was a Protestant. But a number of scholars have argued that there is evidence that Shakespeare had connections through his family and school teachers with Roman Catholicism, a religion which, through the banning of its priests, had effectively become illegal in England. Even so, ancestral and even contemporary links with the faith that had been the country’s official religion as recently as 1558, would make Shakespeare typical of his time. And in any case, to search for a defining religious label is to miss some of what is most interesting about religion in early modern England, and more importantly, what is most interesting about Shakespeare.
The post What was Shakespeare’s religion? appeared first on OUPblog.
By: Paula Becker,
on 4/24/2015
Below is a sample (in my cartoon-style) of a spot for the “Heartmatters” column I create illustrations for bi-monthly. All of these stories are uplifting and faith-building. I am blessed to be able to read this and then created illustrations to enhance the story.
By: ChloeF,
on 4/3/2015
Easter, commemorating the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, is historically the most important of all Christian festivals, even though in some Western countries it has largely lost the religious significance it retains amongst the Orthodox; nevertheless it merits discussion in a broader context not only because it is often a public as well as a religious holiday, or indeed because even Christians may be baffled by its apparently capricious incidence, but because the history of its calculation illustrates many complexities of time-reckoning.
The post The origins of Easter appeared first on OUPblog.
By: Hannah Paget,
on 2/7/2015
The unbelievable story of the Roman convent of Sant’Ambrogio in Rome is about crime and murder, feigned holiness, forbidden sexuality, and the abuse of power over others. Does this controversial story, which casts high dignitaries of the 19th century Catholic Church in a less than flattering light, need to be retold for the 21st century?
The answer is: absolutely. It is a mere stroke of luck for Church historical research that the well-hidden files from the Inquisition trial have been unearthed in the Archive of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
What happened to the German Princess Katharina von Hohenlohe at the place of her yearning, a contemplative convent in Rome, is most probably an isolated case: the young novice mistress Maria Luisa feigned to have visions and to work miracles in order to manipulate her surroundings and to satisfy her needs. Supported by various accomplices and protected by mighty men she swept her opponents out of her way – literally under the pope’s eyes.
The files provide evidence of how dangerous exaggerated piety and blind obedience can be, producing a disastrous combination of power, sex, and false holiness within the Roman convent of Sant’Ambrogio.
The nuns were deemed to be “buried alive”; shielded from the outer world that was perceived as threatening by superiors who demanded strict obedience. However, the nuns of the convent weren’t dumb and the supposed saint, Maria Luisa, was always confronted with antagonists. Ultimately, however, she managed to cover up even her worst crimes with outrageous lies about the devil in human form, letters written by the Virgin Mary, and divine punishments. She established a perfidious system that brought unpopular young nuns to the point of praying for their own death. The confessors were no critical authority at all – on the contrary, they themselves were Maria Luisa’s greatest admirers. However the history of Sant’Ambrogio is full of surprises: in the end, Maria Luisa, for instance, appears as the distressed victim of a system that she herself had perfected, and the Roman Inquisition proves to be comparably mild despite its ill fame.
But how did a false saint manage to turn the heads of half of the curia? In order to understand how Maria Luisa achieved this, it must be considered in its context in 19th century Rome. Maria Luisa would have never got away with her lies if she was not part of an environment that wanted to believe her at all costs. The atmosphere in the Vatican was heavy with anxiety, as Pope Pius IX had long lost the support of broad circles of the population and rightly feared he might lose power in the Church state. In 1848, he was forced to flee the Revolution and go into exile. The pope himself increasingly sought refuge in a naïve childish faith. He was convinced that the Mother of God had saved him from drowning when he was a child and that one day she would descend from heaven in order to defend the Church state with the angelic hosts. Simply put, he and those around him wistfully longed for miracles.
The Sant’Ambrogio scandal reveals the dark side of this superficially pious environment, and it put an indelible stain on the history of the Catholic Church that can still be seen today. This is because Pope Pius IX and his predecessors were involved in the scandal of Sant’Ambrogio. Maria Luisa was very close to some figures connected to Neo-scholasticism, the predominant theological orientation at the time, and to the most eminent fathers of the First Vatican Council, which proclaimed the controversial dogmas of the infallibility of the pope and of his primacy of jurisdiction. The story of the convent in scandal tells a lot about the dialectics of enlightened modernity: it is about canting zealots put on the defensive and their longing for a newly enchanted world, in which saints proclaim simple truths, good and evil are easily discernible, the end justifies the means, and in which there always is hope for a miracle. Furthermore, Maria Luisa’s power strategies tell much about the role of women in the Catholic Church of the time, which was clearly dominated by the clergy.
Not even in the 19th century was the Catholic Church as monolithic as it appears from anticlerical clichés. The adherents of mysticism as well as the supporters of rationalism contended for influence in the Vatican. On a church-political level they pursued different strategies; the ultramontane adherents of anti-modernism were confronted with the moderate liberals. The Inquisition trial became a struggle for power between the two most important parties in the Curia; the basic conflict in the background is recognizable if put under a microscope.
The post On the dark side of devoutness appeared first on OUPblog.
By: Sara Pinotti,
on 10/11/2014
The fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council fell two years ago in October 2012. In December next year it will be the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the Council. There is bound to be much discussion in the coming months of the meaning and significance of the Council, its failures, its successes, its misinterpretations, its distortion and exaggerations, its key seminal texts, and its future developments.
Blessed John Henry Newman has often been referred to as ‘the Father of the Second Vatican Council’. Although Newman was certainly inspirational for the theologians who were the architects of the Council’s teachings, many of which he had anticipated in the previous century, there is only one place in the conciliar documents where his direct influence can clearly be discerned, the text in the Constitution on Divine Revelation which speaks of the development of doctrine. Even so, in this most seminal of modern theologians, the theologians of the ‘ressourcement’ found a sympathetic and eloquent precursor. The ‘ressourcement’ was a theological school that sought to retrieve the sources of Christianity in the the Scriptures and the Fathers and was anxious to escape from the dead hand of a desiccated neo-scholasticism which had lost touch with the Fathers.
Newman has often suffered from selective quotation by people on the opposing wings of the Catholic Church who seek to present him as either a liberal and progressive or as a highly conservative and even reactionary thinker. But the truth is that Newman must be seen in the full range of his thought. For Newman was neither simply conservative nor liberal but is best described as a conservative radical, always open to new ideas and developments but also always sensitive to the tradition and teachings of the Church.
As an Anglican, his radicalism disconcerted and dismayed conservative high churchmen. As a Catholic, he disappointed the liberals because of his respect for authority. He also angered the Ultramontanes with his openness to change and reform.
In his Apologia pro Vita sua, Newman was anxious to show, in effect in accordance with his theory of doctrinal development, that his development from a simple Bible Protestantism to Roman Catholicism represented, change but change in continuity – authentic development rather than corruption. The famous seven ‘tests’ or ‘notes’ of true development that he set out in his Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine have frequently been dismissed but they can be shown to be applicable to the history of his own religious development.
And they are valuable in showing how the most controversial of the documents of Vatican II, the Declaration on Religious Freedom, can appear to be an abrupt change in the Church’s teaching and yet be actually an authentic development in continuity rather than discontinuity with previous teaching.
In his private letters before, during, after the First Vatican Council, Newman adumbrated a mini-theology of Councils. He was particularly interested in the connexion between Councils and how one Council modifies by adding to what a previous Council taught, and how Councils evince both change and continuity. He saw how Councils cause great confusion and controversy, not least because their teachings, which require careful interpretation, are liable to be exaggerated by opposing protagonists, and that they can have very serious unintended effects. He was also struck by the significance of what a Council does not say.
Vatican II’s silence on evangelization is a striking example of this. However, the understanding of the Church as fundamentally the organic communion of the baptized, with which its Constitution on the Church begins, has been concretely realized in the new ecclesial communities and movements. These constitute not only a clear response to this silence but also exemplify Newman’s point in the Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine that such an idea becomes clearer in the course of time.
The first two chapters of the Constitution, which is the centrepiece of a Council almost entirely occupied with the Church, emphasise the charismatic dimension of the Church, the importance of which Newman understood very well as both an Anglican and Catholic. He himself was not only the leader of the Oxford Movement but also the founder of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri in England, which he knew had originally begun as in effect an ecclesial community before it became to be virtually a clerical congregation.
The writings of Newman that anticipate the documents of Vatican II provide a valuable and corrective hermeneutic for the understanding of the conciliar documents that have been frequently distorted by exaggerations and partial interpretations. They illustrate how Newman was both the radical reformer and the traditional conservative. The so-called ‘new evangelization’ of secularized post-Christians was also anticipated by Newman in his little read Catholic novel Callista, which in fact dramatizes the approach of an earlier Anglican sermon. What is particularly striking is that his famous argument from conscience for the existence of God is not the primary apologetic approach that he advocates.
The post The Second Vatican Council and John Henry Newman appeared first on OUPblog.
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| Is Your Family's Faith Like a Fairy Tale? |
By: ChloeF,
on 7/25/2014
By Linda Woodhead
There are two kinds of churches. The ‘church type’, as the great sociologist Ernst Troeltsch called it, has fuzzy boundaries and embraces the whole of society. The ‘sect type’ has hard boundaries and tries to keep its distance. Until recently, the Church of England has been the former – a church ‘by law established’ for the whole nation. Since the 1980s, however, the Church has veered towards sectarianism. It’s within this context that we have to understand the significance of the recent vote for women bishops.
Robert Runcie (Archbishop of Canterbury 1980 to 1991) was the last leader to have no doubts about the Church’s role as a pillar of society. That didn’t mean he was a flunky of the social establishment. When he prayed for the dead on both sides of the Falklands War, or commissioned the Faith in the City report which criticised the Thatcher government, he did so from a confident position at the centre of things rather than as critic standing on the margins.
A shift away from this stance began under Runcie’s successor, George Carey (Archbishop from 1991-2002). Carey was part of the modern evangelical wing of the Church, some of whose members were already pushing for the Church to keep its distance from ‘secular’ society, but it was under Archbishop Rowan Williams (2002-2012) that the really decisive shift took place.
The background was a British society whose values were changing rapidly. My recent surveys of British beliefs and values reveal a remarkably swift liberalisation of attitudes. In this context, liberalism is the conviction that all adults should be equally free to make up their minds about choices which affect them directly. Its opposite is not conservatism but paternalism – the view that one should defer to higher authorities.
In the 1960s and ‘70s the Church of England was travelling with society in a broadly liberal direction, with prominent Anglicans supporting the liberalisation of laws relating to abortion, homosexuality, and divorce. But after Runcie, Anglican leaders made a U-turn. The extension of equal rights to women and gay people proved hardest for them to swallow. At stake for evangelicals was God-ordained male headship, and for Anglo-Catholics, an exclusively male priesthood extending back to Christ himself, and good relations with Rome.
Under the leadership of Rowan Williams and John Sentamu, the Church of England campaigned successfully to be exempted from provisions of the new equality legislation, took a hard line against homosexual practice and gay marriage, and made continuing concessions to the opponents of women’s progress in the Church (women had first been ordained priests in 1994, expecting that the office of bishop would be opened to them soon after).
Williams often behaved like an outsider to mainstream English society. He was a fierce critic of liberal ‘individualism’, and thought that religious people should huddle together against the chilly winds of secularism (hence his support for sharia law). He favoured the moral conservatism of African church leaders over the liberalism of American ones, and made disastrous compromises with illiberal factions in the Church. It was the latter which led to the failure of the last vote for women bishops in 2012 – shortly before Williams stepped down.
Williams’ supporters can say that he maintained Anglican unity, both at home and abroad. But the cost has been enormous. Church of England numbers have collapsed, and it has become more marginal to society and most people’s lives than ever before.
So the vote to allow women bishops is a turning-point which may see the Church re-engage the moral sentiments of the majority of its members and the country as a whole. But the sectarian tendency remains strong. Although Archbishop Welby supports women bishops, he remains opposed to same-sex marriage and assisted dying, and takes very seriously the relationship with African churches and their leaders. The sectarian fringes of the Church remain influential, and the bishops remain isolated from the views of ordinary Anglicans. The Church as a whole creaks under the weight of historic buildings, unimaginative mangerialism, and sub-democratic structures.
Over the last few decades the Church of England has missed a great opportunity to reinvent itself as a genuinely liberal form of religion in a world suffering from an excess of sectarian religion of illiberal and paternalistic kinds. It lost its nerve at the crucial moment, forgetting that liberalism has Christian as well as secular roots, and reading Britain’s drive towards greater freedom and toleration as permissive rather than moral.
To task Anglican clergywomen with putting all this right is to ask too much. But the vote for women bishops strikes a blow against sectarian ‘male’ Christianity. And if the Church is serious about drawing closer to the people it is meant to serve, then becoming representative of half the population and an even bigger proportion of Anglicans has to count as a significant step in the right direction.
Linda Woodhead is Professor of Sociology of Religion at Lancaster University, UK. Her research interests lie in the entanglements of religion, politics, and economy, both historically and in the contemporary world. Between 2007 and 2013 she directed the Religion and Society Programme http://www.religionandsociety.org.uk, the UK’s largest ever research investment on religion. She is the author of Christianity: A Very Short Introduction, which comes out in its second edition in August. She tweets from @LindaWoodhead.
The Very Short Introductions (VSI) series combines a small format with authoritative analysis and big ideas for hundreds of topic areas. Written by our expert authors, these books can change the way you think about the things that interest you and are the perfect introduction to subjects you previously knew nothing about. Grow your knowledge with OUPblog and the VSI series every Friday, subscribe to Very Short Introductions articles on the OUPblog via email or RSS, and like Very Short Introductions on Facebook.
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Subscribe to only religion articles on the OUPblog via email or RSS.
Image credit: Common Worship Books, by Gareth Hughes (Own work). CC-BY-SA-3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
The post The vote for women bishops appeared first on OUPblog.
Today, a word from the Reverend Josiah Crane, who has been the preacher of the Goose Creek Country Church in Portsong for as long as anyone can remember. He’s a masterful orator of the Scriptures, but could be described as somewhat distant when it comes to the shepherding side of his calling. In his own way, he cares for the souls of his flock very much.
◊
I see you there.
I know you are squirming in your seat and I know why. What I just said hit close to your wandering heart…that is what the bead of sweat on your forehead tells me. A more compassionate man might offer you his handkerchief to mop your brow. But I say, better a little sweat now than hellfire for eternity!
So while you think I am speaking to the back wall, know that both God and I have you in our sights. Neither of us is oblivious to what goes on in these holy pews. For example:
1. I know the children count the number of times I hit the pulpit every week and even play a little game with it. While I don’t condone wagering, I have stacked the odds for a couple of my favorite little lambs over the years.
2. I know precisely what time it is. If you think repeated checks to your wristwatch will give me a subtle hint, understand that it only makes me slow my pace. You’ll get to your precious lunch, even if the Lutherans beat you there.
3. You cannot hide your dozing off – see point one, that’s why I pound the pulpit. When your head bobs up and down, I assume you are agreeing with me, which stokes the fire of my verbosity.
4. I do not believe in alliterations or acrostics like some word game player. I’ve got the Scriptures on my side and I don’t even care for the little numbers that man added.
5. You are absolutely correct – I do, in fact, like to hear myself speak.
6. I will not tell you how old I am or what year I was born! Before you were, I was. No one is going to win that bet. You may as well put the proceeds into the offering basket. I am not older than dirt, but recall firsthand accounts of its creation.
So next time you think you are pulling one over on the old preacher, remember that I have been doing this a long time. Ecclesiastes chapter 1 and verse 9 tells us, “There is no new thing under the sun.” I’ve seen quite a few suns rise and fall. Further, I’ve seen all the tricks.
◊
I hope the old Preacher will forgive me the edits I made to his submission. He sent me 3491 words that I condensed after dozing off a few times. If you have any memories of being terrified by an old preacher, then you can identify with my friend, Virgil Creech – who is more than a little afraid of the Reverend Crane.
By: ChloeF,
on 2/15/2013
“Pope Benedict is 78 years of age. Father O’Collins, do you think he’ll resign at 80?” “Brian,” I said, “give him a chance. He hasn’t even started yet.” It was the afternoon of 19 April 2005, and I was high above St Peter’s Square standing on the BBC World TV platform with Brian Hanrahan. The senior cardinal deacon had just announced from the balcony of St Peter’s to a hundred thousand people gathered in the square: “Habemus Papam.” Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had been elected pope.
Less than an hour earlier, white smoke pouring from a chimney poking up from the Sistine Chapel let the world know that the cardinal electors had chosen a successor to Pope John Paul II. The bells of Rome were supposed to ring out the news at once. But it took a quarter of an hour for them to chime in. When Hanrahan asked me why the bells hadn’t come in on cue, I pointed the finger at local inefficiency: “We’re in Italy, Brian.”
I was wrong. The keys to t
he telephone that should have let someone contact the bellringers were in the pocket of the dean of the college of cardinals, Joseph Ratzinger. He had gone into a change room to put on his white papal attire, and didn’t hand over the keys until he came out dressed as pope.
One of the oldest cardinals ever to be elected pope, after less than eight years in office Benedict XVI has now bravely decided to retire or, to use the “correct” word, abdicate. His declining health has made him surrender his role as Bishop of Rome, successor of St Peter, and visible head of the Catholic Christendom. He no longer has the stamina to give the Church the leadership it deserves and needs.
Years ago an Irish lady, after watching Benedict’s predecessor in action, said to me: “He popes well.” You didn’t need to be a specialized Vatican watcher to notice how John Paul II and Benedict “poped” very differently.
A charismatic, photogenic, and media-savvy leader, John Paul II proved a global, political figure who did as much as anyone to end European Communism. He more or less died on camera, with thousands of young people holding candles as they prayed and wept for their papal friend dying in his dimly lit apartment above St Peter’s Square.
Now Benedict’s papacy ends very differently. He will not be laid out for several million people to file past his open coffin. His fisherman’s ring will not be ceremoniously broken. There will be no official nine days of mourning or funeral service attended by world leaders and followed on television or radio by several billion people. He will not be lifted high above the crowd like a Viking king, as his coffin is carried for burial into the Basilica of St Peter’s. The first pope to use a pacemaker will quietly walk off the world stage.
In my latest book, an introduction to Catholicism, I naturally included a (smiling) picture of Pope Benedict. But he pales in comparison with the photos of John Paul II anointing and blessing the sick on a 1982 visit to the UK; meeting the Dalai Lama before going to pray for world peace in Assisi; in a prison cell visiting Mehmet Ali Agca, who had tried to assassinate him in May 1981; and hugging Mother Teresa of Calcutta after visiting one of her homes for the destitute and dying.
Yet the bibliography of that introduction contains no book written by John Paul II either before or after he became pope. But it does contain the enduring classic by Joseph Ratzinger, Introduction to Christianity (originally published 1967). Both as pope and earlier, it was through the force of his ideas rather than the force of his personality that Benedict XVI exercised his leadership.
The public relations record of Pope Benedict was far from perfect. He will be remembered for quoting some dismissive remarks about Islam made by a Byzantine emperor. That 2006 speech in Regensburg led to riots and worse in the Muslim world. Many have forgotten his visit later that year to the Blue Mosque in Istanbul when he turned towards Mecca and joined his hosts in silent prayer.
Catholics and other Christians around the world hope now for a forward-looking pope who can offer fresh leadership and deal quickly with some crying needs like the ordination of married men and the return to the local churches of the decision-making that some Vatican offices have arrogated to themselves.
When he speaks at midday from his apartment to the people gathered in St Peter’s Square on 24 February, the last Sunday before his resignation kicks in, Pope Benedict will be making his final public appearance before the people of Rome. A vast crowd will have streamed in from the city and suburbs to thank him with their thunderous applause. They cherished the clear, straightforward language of his sermons and homilies, and admire him for what will prove the defining moment of his papacy—his courageous decision to resign and pass the baton to a much younger person.
Gerald O’Collins received his Ph.D. in 1968 at the University of Cambridge, where he was a research fellow at Pembroke College. From 1973-2006, he taught at the Gregorian University (Rome) where he was also dean of the theology faculty (1985-91). Alone or with others, he has published fifty books, including Catholicism: A Very Short Introduction and The Second Vatican Council on Other Religions. As well as receiving over the years numerous honorary doctorates and other awards, in 2006 he was created a Companion of the General Division of the Order of Australia (AC), the highest civil honour granted through the Australian government. Currently he is a research professor of theology at St Mary’s University College,Twickenham (UK).
The Very Short Introductions (VSI) series combines a small format with authoritative analysis and big ideas for hundreds of topic areas. Written by our expert authors, these books can change the way you think about the things that interest you and are the perfect introduction to subjects you previously knew nothing about. Grow your knowledge with OUPblog and the VSI series every Friday!
Subscribe to the OUPblog via email or RSS.
Subscribe to only VSI articles on the OUPblog via email or RSS.
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Image Credits: Pope Benedict XVI during general audition By Tadeusz Górny, public domain via Wikimedia Commons; Church of the Carmine, Martina Franca, Apulia, Italy. Statues of Mother Teresa and Pope John Paul II By Tango7174, creative commons licence via Wikimedia Commons
The post The abdication of Pope Benedict XVI appeared first on OUPblog.
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By: Chuck Dillon,
on 9/8/2012
I've been working on a big project for the Philadelphia Zoo so I haven't had time to post anything here but here's some photos of pages from my recent sketchbook. I do a lot of drawing in my sketchbook during church so don't mind the little notes.
By: Paula Becker,
on 6/12/2012
Below is a spot illustration I did a few months back that is recently in print. It’s for a Christian magazine so this is a story about kind of letting go and not sweating the chaos that can occur if you give children some part of the church service. It’s a sweet story if you have time to read it. All the ones I do for this magazine are like that. So I feel I get a blessing each time I do the illustration to accompany it.
As for the illustration, this project gives me opportunity to stretch my illustration style. In this case, I did the characters loosely and quickly (though that actually takes a lot of time to do!) and kept the color scheme somewhat monochromatic. Below, I have the spread in the article, and then half the illustration as a closeup.
Thanks for stopping by!
By: Contributing Bloguistas:,
on 12/17/2011
by Rudy Ch. Garcia
Tim Tebow wears his religion on his sleeve, obviously. And now there's a craze, since his come-from-behind victories this season, so far. It got me to thinking.
Before there was American football, religion used to be "the opium of the people," although among our gente here and in Latin America, the Catholic Church still serves that function. If Spanish conquistadores or mexicano ricos or American corporations exploited you and your country, you had the Church to assuage your sufferings. The 99% could pray for deliverance from the 1%, which included the Catholic Church prior to the 1910 Mexican Revolution.
Things were so oppressive that the authors of the 1917 Mexican Constitution that arose out of the Revolution reduced the Catholic Church’s influence in Mexico's affairs. It enforced secular education in schools, outlawed monastic vows and orders, curtailed public worship outside Church buildings, denied religious institutions the right to acquire, hold or administer property, declared national property any real estate held by religious institutions through third parties like hospitals and schools, and took away from Church officials any voting or commenting on public affairs. These provisions still stand as one of the most encompassing rebellions against too much religion where it shouldn't be.
"Wearing your heart on your sleeve," like Tebow does, is a phrase attributed to author William Shakespeare from his play Othello, in a line spoken by Iago: "I will wear my heart upon my sleeve" [1.1.65]. Although, people forget that these words weren't about declaring your religious views, because Iago was attempting to deceive Othello. Shakespeare probably took the phrase from the Middle Ages, where a knight dedicated his performance to a woman in the court by wearing her colors or kerchief tied around his arm to show he represented her. In Tebow's case, maybe he's trying to indicate he represents something higher up, but without any deception, maybe.
Now that American football is the opium at least of the American people, it's assumed the role that another author, Karl Marx, described: "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions." [Introduction to A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right.]
As a Denver resident, I'm a de facto Broncos fan. No, I don't go around saying "our" team or "us" in referring to the 1% NFL team, but I do root for them, now. So, I'm not some "Raider-hater" when I say that when Tebow tebows, it's cute, but it's also historical illusion, and seems to imply an inherent arrogance.
The conquistadores and colonists brought over that arrogance in religious forms, from Puritanism to Catholicism, and the indigenous Americans lost their world and were forced to adopt that European opium. Whether it was De Soto or Cortez or Puritans and Pilgrims, the indigenes would learn that the invaders' tebowing was a sign of
By: admin,
on 4/22/2011
Fabian, Karina & Rob, editors. (2010) Infinite Space, Infinite God II. Kingsport, TN: Paladin Timeless Books, an imprint of Twilight Times Books. Author recommended age: teens. Litland.com recommended age: 14+ but appropriate for slightly younger, advanced readers.
Looking for something new to read? New to science fiction? Consider an anthology such as Infinite Space, Infinite God II edited by Karina and Rob Fabian. Twelve short stories, each can excite the mind yet bring it to closure in one sitting. Read it on the bus or in-between classes. Do you find that you cannot sleep at night when reading a great novel because you want to keep reading until its end? Then read short stories: go to bed with your imagine satisfied and mind at rest.
Anthologies are great for book clubs too. Rather than progressing a few chapters per meeting, the club can complete entire stories together which leads to fuller, more dynamic discussions. This can be especially fun for a family book club, or mother-son/father-daughter reading duos.
Final thoughts: Just because the stories have virtuous underpinnings, don’t presume these are soft kiddie tales. These stories are core sci-fi taking the reader emotionally from apocalyptic doubt to Flash Gordon-like adventure. Some are thought provoking and some are just fun. Enjoy the trip!
Let’s begin the trip with a visit by author and editor Karina Fabian tomorrow. For today, a little bit about the book first…
Publisher’s Description: Infinite Space, Infinite God II The history of the Catholic Church is full of heroes: men and women of courage and conviction. Not only did these Catholic heroes live and die for their faith, but they saved others, fought valiantly, inspired the masses, and influenced nations.
Now, Infinite Space, Infinite God II honors that legacy with twelve science fiction stories featuring Catholic heroes. Meet a time traveler who sacrifices his life to give a man a sip of water, and the nun who faces venomous snakes to save a friend. Share the adventures of priests who battle aliens and machines in order serve the greater good.
Infinite Space, Infinite God II spans the gamut of science fiction, from near-future dystopias to time travel to space opera, puzzles of logic to laugh-out-loud humor and against-the-clock suspense. A great read for any science fiction fan!
(Litland’s Note: Tomorrow we’ll hear from author and editor, Karina Fabian. During the book tour, Amazon has kindle and hard copy editions on sale for both the original ISIG and the new ISIG II…don’t miss out! Buy here: http://ow.ly/4F48e )
By: Paula Becker,
on 4/12/2011
Hey all. Just posting a little something I did for Clubhouse magazine’s April ’11 issue. It’s Easter-related, as you can see and was a really fun piece to pull together. I enjoy doing the busy scenes. It’s always a special challenge to integrate the “silly things” these puzzles house. In this case, the kiddos are to find things that begin with “SU”. See if you can find them too!
(Click on the image to view an enlargement)
By: Kristin,
on 2/20/2011
By: Lauren,
on 1/28/2011
What Galileo believed about providence, miracles, and salvation, is hard to say. It may not matter. Throughout his life he functioned as the good Catholic he claimed to be; and he received many benefits from the church before and after the affair that brought him to his knees before the Holy Inquisition in 1633.
First among these benefits was education. Galileo studied for a few years at the convent of Vallombrosa (a Benedictine order) near Florence. He loved the place and had entered his novitiate when his father removed him from the temptation. Later the Vallombrosans gave him his first important job teaching mathematics. He probably lived briefly at the Benedictine convent of Santa Giustina in Padua just after taking up a professorship at Venice’s university there in 1592. He may have taught at Santa Giustina and from its ranks recruited his most faithful disciple, Dom Benedetto Castelli.
The largest and ablest collection of mathematicians in Italy belonged to the Society of Jesus. When he started serious study of mathematics, Galileo sought and obtained the advice and approval of their leader, Father Christopher Clavius. He had to break off relations in 1606, when the Venetian state expelled the Jesuits from its territories. Galileo restored the connection soon after returning to Florence in 1610 as “Mathematician and Philosopher to the Grand Duke of Tuscany.” Again he had an urgent need for Clavius’ endorsement. The astonishing discoveries he had made in 1609/10 by turning his telescope on the heavens challenged credulity. By the end of 1610 he had the confirmation he wanted. Clavius’ group of mathematicians invited him to their headquarters in Rome to celebrate the “message from the stars,” as Galileo had entitled the book in which he had announced his discoveries, and to toast the messenger.
Galileo’s other benefits from the Church included the large salary he enjoyed as court mathematician and philosopher, which came from ecclesiastical revenues, and a papal pension for his son. The son declined on discovering that its beneficiary had to wear a tonsure, and Galileo, having no such reservation, took it himself. In the hope of relieving his chronic illnesses, he made pilgrimages to Loreto. To relieve himself of his two illegitimate daughters, he put them in a nunnery. When old and blind and confined to his villa, members of religious orders comforted and read to him. And throughout his life he had many friends, disciples, and patrons among ecclesiastics.
His late-in-life comforters were not Jesuits. Obliged to teach the physics of Aristotle, in which the earth stands still at the center of the world, they could not endorse the Copernican system, which Galileo believed his discoveries proved. That did not stop them from becoming experts in telescopic astronomy. Galileo did not like the competition and attacked the Jesuits unfairly. That was a mistake. They did not help him when he ran into an order of priests who did not like mathematics. These were the Dominicans, who ran the machinery of the Inquisition.
Some of their firebrands preached that since Copernican notions conflicted with Joshua’s order to the sun to stand still, they might be heretical. Galileo hurried to Rome in 1615 to clear himself and Copernicanism. Early in 1616 the Inquisition found that Copernicanism was contrary to scripture and philosophically absurd; the Congregation of the Index thereupon banned Copernicus’ masterpiece pending correction and other works altogether; but it did not mention Galileo. Instead, on papal orders, the chief theologian of the Inquisition, the Jesuit Cardinal (now Saint) Robert Bellarmine, summoned Galileo to hear the decree of the Index and to receive, in private, a personal injunction not to teach or hold the Copernican theory in any way whatsoever.
Galileo obeyed this instruction unti
By: Kirsty,
on 1/27/2011
There was fire and rain that year. The last big religious revival in Wales ran from the autumn of 1904 until the summer of 1905. On the 10th November, 1904, the Western Mail, a newspaper that circulated mainly in the south of Wales, reported:
One night so great was the enthusiasm invoked by the young revivalist that after a sermon lasting two hours the vast congregation remained praying and singing until half-past two o’clock next morning. Shopkeepers are closing earlier in order to get a place in the chapel, and tin and steel workers throng the place in their working clothes. The only theme of conversation among all classes and sects is “Evan Roberts.” Even the taprooms of the public-houses are given over to discussion on the origin of the powers possessed by him.
Evan Roberts was the ‘revivalist’ whose preaching triggered off intense religious reaction. In the pubs and factories mysterious powers are attributed to him.
By the end of the year, even the London papers were curious. The Times dispatches a reporter to find out what is going on. Attending one of the meetings he files an eye-witness account:
Presently a young man pushed his way through the crowd and, kneeling in the rostrum, began a fervent prayer of penitence and for pardon. Once again, in the midst of his prayer, the whole congregation break forth into a hymn, repeated with amazing fervour and vigour eight times.
The crowded meeting is silenced by a young’s man prayer. When he has finished, as a kind of collective endorsement, the congregation sings a hymn (which they must know by heart) again and again.
A man in the gallery raises his voice to speak. The people listen, and meanwhile Mr Roberts has resumed his seat and watches all with a steady and unimpassioned gaze. The man confesses his past – he has been a drunkard, he has been a Sabbath-breaker, he had known nothing of a Saviour, but now something has entered his heart and he feels this new power within him compelling him to speak. While he is speaking the people give vent to their feelings in a hymn of thanksgiving, repeated as before again and again. Thus the hours creep on.
The pattern is repeated as the man in the gallery confesses to drinking heavily and breaking the Sabbath. The confession demonstrates the weight of expectation placed on the male population: beer money is money taken from the family budget; Sunday should be occupied with rest and chapel-going.
It is long past midnight. Now here, now there, someone rises to make his confession and lays bare his record before the people or falls upon his knees where he is and in loud and fervent tones prays for forgiveness. (The Times, Jan 3rd, 1905)
This spontaneous form of Christianity results in church services with three characteristics: anyone can take part, anything can happen, and congregational singing expresses collective emotion. The professional clergy find themselves displaced. Even Mr Roberts simply watches for most of the time. The hidden springs of events well up in the troubled hearts of men who feel impelled to public penitence. And, once they have done this, they feel joyful relief. About 100,000 people made their confessions and their commitments to Christ in this way. Historically, the Welsh crime statistics show a fall in these months while, in the mines, industrial unrest was quelled.
When the Welsh revival had run its course the churches were, for a while, fuller. But there were also institutional and organizational consequences. This was most obvious in another religious revival that was linked with Wales and which broke out in the burgeoning city of Los Angeles the following year and ran till about 1
By: admin,
on 12/12/2010
See character review at www.litland.com ages 14+
Doman, Regina. (2007) Black as Night: a fairy tale retold. Front Royal, VA: Chesterton Press. ISBN #978-0-9819-3182-1. Author recommends teens and adults. Litland.com recommends ages 15+.
Publisher’s Description: Blanche Brier entirely on her own this summer in New York City while Bear is wandering through Europe and her family is on vacation. Blanche is fast becoming the focus of a terrifying play of evil forces. Even the refuge she takes among some lively Franciscan friars does not protect her from dangerous attacks. Rather, they continue to escalate as she struggles to persuade a sick and aged man from killing himself. Discovering Blanche’s disappearance, Bear and Fish cut short their European vacation and join up with Rose to begin scouring New York City looking for Blanche. But the same malevolence that is lurking over Blanche seems to be hunting them as well and drawing them all togther into a death trap until it seems that all hope is gone. Yet during this time, the desires of Blanche’s heart are being clarified – and so are Bear’s.
A black night. Tested faith. Honest love.
I’ve read the first book in the series three times over the past dozen years and always enjoyed it. But I was pleased to finally get around to reading book 2. And wow! It immediately takes the reader into an assault and robbery of a girl on a train with subsequent chase through early morning New York until, just in the nick of time of course, she finds sanctuary… in a sanctuary. It reminds me of how Catholic churches were sanctuaries in the middle ages, and those being victimized could run through its doors declaring “sanctuary”, and be kept safe from harm. The learned or well-read mind automatically makes this connection, giving the story even more of a historical or fairy tale feel to it. Thanks to Doman’s almost poetic writing, the scene is far beyond normal. “The church stood a silent soldier against the slow destruction of the night.”
Slowly we are introduced to the characters both new and old. We know from book 1 they were bright, well-read, and funny in an intellectual way. Now the portrait of each is filled in with greater depth. Those familiar with book 1 wonder why Blanche isn’t telling these monks her history with “their church”. Doman’s style takes us in-and-out of past conversations, transitioning between past and present, moving between sets of characters so slowly we begin to understand the current situation that Blanche, Bear and Fish find themselves in.
In the process, we are given glimpses into how Bear and Blanche’s relationship grew into that awkward point where they try to decide if they will continue into the future together. Thus simultaneously we have the suspense of the mystery along with the agony of a relationship in limbo. Very unsettling, which makes for a book you cannot put down…
Just like the best written of mysteries, we have important characters come in and out of a scene, so watch not to miss them. Like the bag lady in black…what is she up to?
This story’s underlying theme of discernment doesn’t just pertain to Bear trying to discern his vocation in life. Blanche can discern she is in danger, being followed, her belongings rifled through. Brother Leon discerns the feeli
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By: michelle lovric,
on 8/12/2010
NOTE TO SELF: SOME PEOPLE CAN BE SO UNCHARITABLE
So a man and his 5-year old pooch, Trapper, walk into an Anglican church in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and the man wants communion. Nothing wrong with that - right? Think so? The priest welcomed the pair and when it was time for the human to receive communion, his dog followed him. The priest, Margaret Rea, didn't see anything wrong with giving both human and pooch communion, an act which is causing an uproar.
Rea said she had nothing to add to the apology she has already offered to her congregation.
"The incident is done, it's over and I have no more comment about it," she told AFP. "I am not going to discuss anything about it."
Thing is, presumably, the offense is giving a non-human communion. One wonders if the Higher Power finds it as equally offensive as some church members. The whole incident has made some people smile but one parishioner took it further and filed a complaint with the Toronto Diocese.
There's a nice photo of Trapper who is luckily oblivious over the stir he caused here:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100728/wl_canada_afp/canadareligionanimaloffbeat_20100728141055
By: Paula Becker,
on 4/5/2010
A sketch from this past Easter Sunday morning. And I thought this might be of interest. A local church (Bay Area Fellowship) got a lot of press this week for their “Mega-Million Give-away”. I don’t know how much money they had tied up in prizes, as I see the numbers reported from 1-4 million. I did [...]
Mark – I just love this! “know that both God and I have you in our sights” brilliant! :-)
Thanks, the Reverend Crane is a little frightening. I think I’ve sat under a sermon of his in my time.
:-)
Hahaha.
“I am not older than dirt, but recall firsthand accounts of its creation.”
–That’s a good one. :-)
And a happy be-lated Easter to you and your family Mark.
Thank you, glad you enjoyed. I will get back to a regular schedule of reading blogs agin soon. Just been a rough few weeks. There will be a routine though.
Oh I totally understand Mark. No worries. :-)