Catholicae Testudines

Looting

How greedy and envious do you have to be to loot a flooding city?  There would be a certain sad poetry to drowning while weighed down by the plasma screen you just stole.

I've been listening to people debate the merits of shooting looters on site.  I'm afraid I haven't made up my my either way.  I don't like the government summarily executing the supposed guilty.  But the problem is that looting is really the beginning of a downward spiral to much worse things, it's not just "normal" thievery.  Initially people were just grabbing food, then jewelry, then I read a report of stores being emptied of their guns.  Now I've heard that the affected areas are patrolled by bands of armed looters, when no is watching and no one is in charge, getting away with stealing, murder, and rape, just to name a few of the vices common in lawless areas, seems like a much more likely possibilty.  It really does appear as though civilization is just a thin veneer between us and say the events depicted in "Hotel Rwanda."

I was just about to click post when the mayor appeared on my radio saying that they'll have to pull 1500 police officers away from rescuing survivors in order to stop looters.  One moral theologian says shoot to wound...

Also, before and after satellite imagery.

More on "Liberal"

Aha, I found someone say it - Davids Medienkritik's explanation of what it means to be "liberal" in Germany. This is a fact I tried to allude to earlier when discussing what it meant to be a political liberal or conservative.

In German, "liberal", when used on its own, is typically a word used to describe someone who favors smaller government, lower taxes, less regulation and less bureaucracy. The German "Liberale" also typically favor free-markets, free-trade and personal, private initiative. In other words, "liberal" in German is almost the exact opposite of "liberal" in (North-American) English when used in a political sense.

This is what I mean when I sometimes call the Democrats "the conservative party" and the Republicans the liberals (not that they have been too insistent on smaller gov't and bureaucracy and lower taxes lately). "Libertarian" has "liber" in it, which should be a clue as to the historical roots, yet libertarians are called conservatives in this country. My conjecture is that relative to America's history this is conservative, though it conserves a tradition that was considered liberal in Europe during the Enlightenment or thereabouts.

Of course there are other senses of "liberal" than matters of policy. One is "liberal government," i.e. more democratic rather than more monarchial. Another is a "liberal education," as in the education proper to a free (liber) man. Yet another is the sense in which it began to be used (I think) starting around the mid-1800s, which describes a person who thinks of himself or a society that thinks of itself as the highest authority, with no responsiblity to abide by the truth God has revealed (interesting - this spirit of non serviam is called by a word that formerly meant "generous"). It is this last one only that the Catholic Church rejects; the others are problematic for the most part only when they are informed by this sentiment.

Those crazy, crazy Masons

Check out the 1930 DeMoulin Bros. "Fraternal Supply Co." catalog featuring such indispensables such as the trick bottom chair, the trick camera and surprise chair, trick pledge altar, and trick drink dispenser to make a candidate think he is drinking goat's blood or other nasty substance.

Yeah, the Knights are way cooler.

Hi

I just finished Early Week for the University of Maryland's marching band, so I guess you could say I'm "back." Despite starting at 8:00 am and finishing at 8:30 pm or later I still managed to get to daily Mass, in case you were wondering (long lunch breaks are nice that way). Having it end was kind of like waking up from a long, weird dream, only if you remembered everything and still had stuff like instruments and music when you woke up.

After the Catholic Student Center, the band is really the best thing on campus in terms of camaraderie and making really good friends. When Dr. Sparks tells freshman that they are about to get 300 instant friends, he is not exaggerating much at all. In high school and college my experience is that there are very few things like a really good marching band for having "good community" (if you want to put it that way). In my experience it's far and away better than any other type of concert band or orchestra in this regard.

One thing I have noticed about groups or societies that have "good community" is that they don't get it by trying explicitly to have good community; it develops naturally among people who are working together, united in heart and mind, for something they love. The more excellent the goal and the more selflessly the people love the goal (and put that love into practice), the more "community" they will have.

To be part of a good marching band involves a lot of self-discipline. It's not "fun" the way playing a video game or watching a movie is fun, but even some of the people who complain the most come back year after year because they can't get enough of it. You must let people you may not like order you around even when you don't feel like it, do things precisely their way even when you think you have a better way, rehearse and perform even when you don't feel like it, acknowledge your dependence on the other people in the group, subordinate some of your individuality to the needs of the group and the goal. If you don't like it, you can always leave, but you can't acheive the goal on your own. Each instrument has its own part and though some are more attention-grabbing and just plain cooler (like trumpets) you can't waste your time slacking or bemoaning that you are not as high-profile as others. Sound familiar?

At the CSC we have tremendous "community" because we are devoted to God's holy Church that He gave us to bring us to Him. This is our safeguard against really being devoted to ourselves under the pretext of being devoted to God. Since love of God and neighbor is the object and total selflessness the ideal, there is really no possible communion or fellowship equal or greater in profundity (or even close) than the Communion of Saints (Saints = God's "holy ones" here on earth and those in heaven). And of course this one little Catholic college chaplaincy is not the only place where this occurs; it is wherever there are people who love God and His Church more than they love their own comfort or opinions. I had a demonstration of this this summer with the young men I worked with this summer helping the Dominicans: seven guys whom I had never met, but we all love the Church so we hit it off immediately and were like brothers (I like to think; which reminds me, with all this stuff going on it's been a while since I've written to them). We might disagree (even strenuously) about politics, what sports or movies we like, taste in liturgical music, or any number of other things; those things are still real, but being of one heart and mind in faith transcends them.

Please do not interpret this as a dig at Protestants or "triumphalism," but I really cannot see how this unity can be achieved under the Protestant system. Show me any ten Catholics, whatever their personal opinions, who are on fire with love for God and his Church, and I will show you ten people united in one faith. But show me any ten Protestants, on fire though they may be with love for God and His holy Scripture, and I will show you as many as ten people disunited because their personal interpretations of Scripture may conflict and they admit no transcendent authority to which they can appeal. They It would be vain for them to try to strip it down to the "fundamentals" that they all agree on because they would still be tailoring their beliefs to themselves rather than themselves to the Faith. But if they built their houses (even if they are different kinds of houses) not on the sand of arbitrary human authority but on the Rock that God has given us, then they would be secure.

[Please also note that I am not dissing God's word; the Church, from whom we have the Scriptures in the first place, is most solicitous to open their riches to us and to safeguard their true meaning.]

I've been banned!

Bill Cork just banned me!  I know, I know... I'm as suprised as you are, and without warning no less!  I've never been banned from a blog or anything before so I'll just post my comments here.  I think that Fr. Tucker is right when he says that John Brown was a "a crazed abolitionist terrorist."  And no, I'm not a neo-Confederate historian or even a southerner (Actually, I'm from Maryland so I just can't make up my mind!  A little border state humor there...). 

    Something that is essential to Christian thought is that the ends do not justify the means.  This is as much a reminder to me as anyone else, because sometimes I wish that the ends did justify.  Even though owning slaves is evil, as is supporting slavery, it is wrong to murder people because they voted for a "pro-slavery" ticket.  It is also wrong to justify it by saying as Mr. Cork did, "We had an evil system of chattel slavery that was the basis for a region's self-identity. We had people who claimed to believe in freedom--but only for themselves. We had some few people who were willing to call this evil by its name. And his actions helped others to see that this evil had to be confronted directly. He thought to assist those enslaved to free themselves and fight against those who oppressed them. He sought to do for African-Americans what the French did for us in our Revolution. That's the makings of an American hero in the minds of many."

What if I did that for any number of injustices that exist in the world today?  Suppose I murdered people that exploited the poor, abortion doctors and drug dealers.  Then went on to seize an armory?  I hope you'd call me a loon!

The funny part is that after he deleted my comments another person jumped in and made the exact same argument.  A reminder to me on the importance of dialogue.  One person may write it, but I bet there are lots of readers who think it.  It's better to address the points of Fr. Tucker's argument then just dismiss him outright.  Either the facts behind Fr. Tucker's argument are wrong, or the logic within it is.

Mr. Cork does a lot of work in the ecumenical dialogue arena.  I trust he treats our fellow Christians better than he has me.

The Night Before Christmas...

A moderator for the theatre group back in my undergrad days (yay, Masque!) used to say that the night before the new semester always felt like Christmas Eve, and that he could never sleep that night.

As I begin my ninth semester, I have come to completely understand what he means.

There's been a festive mood all day long as I finish printing attendance sheets, update my course Webspace, go to the office to get supplies, set up my desk, then go back to the office because I forgot index cards, then go back to my office to drop off hard candy and tissues (there's always a crier every semester).

I'm pumped. I'm excited. I've got a syllabus full of big hairy men with battle-axes, and I'm raring to go.

But the pedagogical equivalent of Santa Claus is on his way, and if I don't get to bed soon, I fear he'll pass over my classroom in the morning and leave me nothing but alcoholics and narcoleptics...

I want to buy this book when it comes out

Mark Shea's book on our Lady is done. Hear some inside info from someone who's read it.

Side note: sorry if I don't seem that interactive lately (not reading everyone's comments or blogging very often) but I've been really, really busy.

Graduate Optimism

I just got back from working a table at the UMD graduate orientation where I was pleasantly surprised by the enthusiasm of some of my new comrades-at-academic-arms.

If you happen to be a Graduate Student at the University of Maryland, then you should take note that we are having a Graduate Happy Hour at 7 PM on the evening of Friday, September 16. (And, of course, Grad students are welcome to steal hamburgers from the mouths of petty undergrads at the Kickoff Cookout next Wednesday, September 7.) And, of course, there is the Graduate Bible Study (which I had to cancel tonight on account of the graduate happy hour).

Last Man Standing

Well, I just got back from a meeting for 200 level TAs in the English department. Apparently, I am the only male TA in the bunch. There are other men teaching other level courses...but I am alone in the introductory English literature classes.

I'm glad to see that UMD's diversity initiatives are doing such a great job at keeping things...diverse.