Skip to main content

Wants

It's kinda cold here. Not bitter, but it's cold enough that I don't want to go outside. [You never want to go outside.--ed.] OK. There's much work ahead. I don't want to do it. But most of the time, like the weather, the clouds are not as dark as they appear.

I've been lax in my prayers recently, but I was literally inspired to pray a whole bunch. It was finding out about people's trials and reading the Catechism. My favorite passage from the past couple of weeks is paragraph 278. It's in the context of whether God is omnipotent. Now, the answer to this is an easy 'yes,' if one is thinking clearly about the definitions of the words, but people's spiritual problems are rarely intellectual.

Doesn't that paragraph just sound like a priest or Jesus admonishing you with rhetorical questions? At least it inspires me to make my "I'm sorry I asked" Face. Isn't it odd that although most people can't think their way out of a wet paper bag, at the same time, we're cultivating this slavish technocratic deference to supposed "experts"? The joke's on us, because they don't know any more than we do, least of all the things that matter. [What's with you and wet paper bags?--ed.] My gift is stupidly humorous, non-sensical metaphors and catch-phrases; if I don't use my gifts, then what am I here for? [Wow. Just wow.--ed.]

Tomorrow will not be a good day, I fear. On the other hand, I generally hate this entire month on account of that day now, and I'm doing OK now. Still, never forget that there are things much worse than the separation of death. I'd give back a hundred friends to heal this gulf caused by sharp words. There isn't a single day I don't think about it.

I guess you could say it's been a good year, even if it has been...uneven. I'm not on a fast track to Hell, though I deserve to be the doorman at best in the Kingdom. I'm not just pulling your chain; I read about this "indifference" we're supposed to have, and I just think, "That's not me." There are lots of worldly goods I prefer to others; I doubt I could say that any of them is just a means to my final end with God.

If I couldn't hear music, I'm not sure I could handle that. That's why I sort of chuckle when people think CP is such a huge burden. It isn't. It's just different. I can't run or ride a bike, but I enjoy watching you do it, by the way. I'm insanely competitive. The reason guys watch sports a lot is because something in us resonates deeply with triumph after a great struggle. Sports is a little picture of that without all the suffering (at least for the rest of us). Maybe in that sense, it isn't so good. How good is a thing if it's not hard to obtain? And who are we to make judgments about some guy in a game, when we can't do 1% of what athletes do?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

My Thoughts On The Harrison Butker Commencement Speech

Update: I read the whole thing. I’m sorry, but what a weirdo. I thought you [Tom Darrow, of Denver, CO] made a trenchant case for why lockdowns are bad, and I definitely appreciated it. But a graduation speech is *not* the place for that. Secondly, this is an august event. It always is. I would never address the President of the United States in this manner. Never. Even the previous president, though he deserves it, if anyone does. Thirdly, the affirmations of Catholic identity should be more general. He has no authority to propound with specificity on all matters of great consequence. It has all the hallmarks of a culture war broadside, and again, a layman shouldn’t speak like this. The respect and reverence due the clergy is *always due,* even if they are weak, and outright wrong. We just don’t brush them aside like corrupt Mafia dons, to make a point. Fourthly, I don’t know where anyone gets the idea that the TLM is how God demands to be worshipped. The Church doesn’t teach that. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Dear Alyse

 Today, you’re 35. Or at least you would be, in this place. You probably know this, but we’re OK. Not great, but OK. We know you wouldn’t want us moping around and weeping all the time. We try not to. Actually, I guess part of the problem is that you didn’t know how much we loved you. And that you didn’t know how to love yourself. I hope you have gotten to Love by now. Not a place, but fills everything in every way. I’m not Him, but he probably said, “Dear daughter/sister, you have been terribly hard on yourself. Rest now, and be at peace.” Anyway, teaching is going well, and I tell the kids all about you. They all say you are pretty. I usually can keep the boys from saying something gross for a few seconds. Mom and I are going to the game tonight. And like 6 more times, before I go back to South Carolina. I have seen Nicky twice, but I myself haven’t seen your younger kids. Bob took pictures of the day we said goodbye, and we did a family picture at the Abbey. I literally almost a...
Post a Comment
Read more

A Friend I Once Had, And The Dogmatic Principle

 I once had a friend, a dear friend, who helped me with personal care needs in college. Reformed Presbyterian to the core. When I was a Reformed Presbyterian, I visited their church many times. We were close. I still consider his siblings my friends. (And siblings in the Lord.) Nevertheless, when I began to consider the claims of the Catholic Church to be the Church Christ founded, he took me out to breakfast. He implied--but never quite stated--that we would not be brothers, if I sought full communion with the Catholic Church. That came true; a couple years later, I called him on his birthday, as I'd done every year for close to ten of them. He didn't recognize my number, and it was the most strained, awkward phone call I have ever had. We haven't spoken since. We were close enough that I attended the rehearsal dinner for his wedding. His wife's uncle is a Catholic priest. I remember reading a blog post of theirs, that early in their relationship, she told him of the p...
Post a Comment
Read more