Turn and face the strange

Dear readers,

You may have noticed some changes here at our little corner of the internet.  These changes reflect a sort of maturing process of the blog as the authors' relationship to the university community evolves.

The former title of this blog, Catholicae Testudines, served us well when the blog was the internet presence of some guys who hung out together at the CSC.  If you were ever stuck wondering what it meant, it was the nearest we could render "Catholic Terps" into Latin.  As the blog gradually became more and more an alumni operation, however, we felt an increasing inaptness in continuing to present ourselves as typical members of the Catholic student community at Maryland.  In addition, although we always tried to be careful about distinguishing our opinions from the teachings of the Church, we developed an increasing self-consciousness about how people might take our views as articulating what the CSC or the Church is all about, and the resulting caution came to have an increasingly confining effect on our posting.  This was, after all, meant to be a casual journal of what crossed our minds, not an academic journal on the teaching of the Church.

Our new title, The Ark and the Dove, keeps the Maryland and Catholic associations, but is more appropriate to our changing circumstances and allows us more freedom to write on whatever crosses our minds.

You can still expect the authors of The Ark and the Dove to be the same loyal sons of the Church as ever, and expect the same quality of posts.  We hope, however, that the transition will also occasion a new flowering of our writing, with increased variety, experimentation, and creativity.

Happy reading!  We look forward to your comments.  Don't forget to pray for us!

Albert, Peter, and Thomas

The Ark and The Dove