Talk and Silence

What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence.

(Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus)

Custom, Time and Reason

"Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages, are not yet sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favour; a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason."

(Thomas Paine, Common Sense)

That's the Church, Baby

Contrary to common perception [...] the Church has had human resource and finance "departments" for her entire 20 centuries of existence.

If you think of Peter as the first "shop floor manager" and Judas Iscariot as the CFO for Jesus and the Apostles, then Judas showed no loyalty to his CEO and betrayed the whole enterprise during the high point of the world's most famous company retreat. The Acts of the Apostles and St. Paul's letters record numerous instances of collections, the buying and selling of houses, and other monetary transactions by the first Christians. Monasteries became and remained places of production and commerce, as witnessed by the enormous success of the Cistercian monastery in Sparta, Wis., that started LaserMonks.

So the Church is not inexperienced when it comes to financial and management issues. Indeed, some people wrongly think it's just the opposite: that the Church's reason for existence is to have money and its attendant power.

[Thomas A. Szyszkiewicz, BusinessWeek]

Die Another Day

"Is there life after newspapers?"

A good American Journalism Review survey.

The A-Word

Le cléricalisme, voilà l’ennemi! (Léon Gambetta)
"Clericalism is the enemy"

Believe it or not, after the Second Vatican Council anticlericalism is a Catholic virtue.

In elaborating a theology of laity, as many call it, and speaking of a hierarchy of service rather than of domination in the Church, Vatican II implicitly endorsed opposition to clericalism, which is a policy of maintaining or increasing the power of a religious hierarchy.

Clearly, this sort of anticlericalism has nothing to do with the other anticlericalism: a term used in Europe since the 12th and 13th centuries, according to Encyclopædia Britannica, and associated in more recent history with the French Revolution and its aftermath.

Holy Seas

In holy seas there is never so much religion.

(Thomas Merton, The Geography of Lograire)

Another 'Mad' in Town

"Being a staff news reporter today, anywhere, often involves doing less real journalism and more churning out an inhuman quantity of stories in a multitude of formats." [Angela Saini, Journalism.co.uk]

When science journalist and filmmaker Angela Saini left the BBC last month to pursue a freelance career, colleagues "thought she was mad."

Monsieur Antipyrine

"We are wise enough to know that our brains are going to become flabby cushions, that our antidogmatism is as exclusive as a civil servant, and that we cry liberty but are not free."

(Tristan Tzara, Monsieur Antipyrine's Manifesto)

In Our Power or Not

Of things some are in our power, and others are not.

In our power are opinion, movement toward a thing, desire, aversion (turning from a thing); and in a word, whatever are our own acts: not in our power are the body, property, reputation, offices (magisterial power), and in a word, whatever are not our own acts.

And the things in our power are by nature free, not subject to restraint nor hindrance: but the things not in our power are weak, slavish, subject to restraint, in the power of others.

(Epictetus, The Handbook - Enchiridion)

Things to Know

Today's London Metro freebie paper has a good front page saying the amount of money to shore up the financial system is equal to 36 times the aid sent by the richest nations to the poorest each year and to 190 times the gross domestic product (GDP) of Ethiopia.

That's for the record.

Stick to Facts

"Now, what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I bring up my own children, and this is the principle on which I bring up these children. Stick to Facts, sir!"

(Charles Dickens, Hard Times)

Sainthood

TIME's Kate Pickert has an interesting brief history of sainthood.

Rosmini's Lesson

A letter by Antonio Rosmini (1797-1855), Italian priest, philosopher, theologian, founder of the Institute of Charity (a religious congregation), author of the book The Five Wounds of the Church, beatified on November 18, 2007.

To Suor Giovanna Antonietti, Superior at Domodossola

Stresa, 4 August 1844

My dear daughter in Christ,

The defects of Suor Bertoletti are not sufficient grounds for dismissing her. If you consider the matter well, you will see that they are the product of a sensitive and timorous conscience. And when a Sister shows she has great fear of God and a delicate conscience, these things must be respected, and her defects must be accepted calmly, while we make every effort, with charity and patience, to help her, comfort her, and strengthen her so that she may amend. Nothing is more greatly to be esteemed and loved than the purity of a soul who fears to offend the Lord; since in the end the greatest treasure the Sisters of Providence can have is the grace of God and holiness.

I have spoken to Suor Maddalena, and she told me that when Suor Bertoletti was at Stresa she did very well; and it seems to her that it might have been well to keep Suor Bertoletti at Stresa not only as the doorkeeper but also as a helper for the Sister who looks after the novitiate. In short, then, keep her, sympathize with her, and try to deal patiently with her when she is at fault in any way.

May Jesus and Mary bless you.

Your father in Christ,

A. ROSMINI p.

(Antonio Rosmini, Ascetical Letters, Vol. 5, Letter 23)

Christians and Catholics

[Pope defends Pius XII over Holocaust (AP)]

Pope Benedict XVI is working softly, slowly, often silently, unobtrusively, behind the scenes, mostly unseen. But he is working hard.

I like the great job of reconciliation that he is doing inside the Roman Catholic Church: reconciliation between traditionalists and liberals, conservative and reform-oriented faithful, liturgical Latinists and Mass polyglots, old-time lovers and progressives, high-flying souls and pedestrian believers, thinkers and doers--Christians and Catholics.

It is a hidden work of diplomacy, interactions, influences, concessions, agreements, acknowledgments.

A "hard job" well done until now.

Please Don't Put Words in Pope's Mouth

Megan Garber has an excellent piece in CJR:

We expend a lot of energy decrying pontification on cable news, in the op-ed pages of the major papers, in the blogosphere, etc. But when the pontification is literal—as it is in the case of an article in the Times of London, headlined "Pope says world financial system 'built on sand'"—delicacy and, above all, accuracy should be the order of the day.

Which makes the headline the Times chose for its article particularly baffling—since "world financial system 'built on sand'" is not, actually, what the Pontiff said. Here's Benedict's general mention of the world financial system, which he made while opening a council of bishops in the Vatican earlier today, per the Times article itself:

"He who builds only on visible and tangible things like success, career and money builds the house of his life on sand."

He added: "We are now seeing, in the collapse of major banks, that money vanishes, it is nothing. All these things that appear to be real are in fact secondary. Only God's words are a solid reality."

The message here? Money is, in light of other realities, worthless. So to build one's life around it is to build upon a shaky foundation. The Pope’s mention of building “the house of his life on sand” is a direct allusion to this passage from the Gospel of Matthew.

So, while the Times's headline—which was picked up, verbatim, by Drudge this afternoon—may be in the neighborhood in terms of Benedict's message, that's about as far as it goes. Per the paper's own roundabout logic, since the Pope said money "is nothing," its headline for this particular article could just as easily have been, "Pope says Wall Street doesn't exist."

Which, you know: Not accurate. And not cool. Because, whatever one's faith, a good rule of thumb when it comes to reporting on the Pope is this: Don't put words in his mouth.

Well said.

[Columbia Journalism Review, The Times, Drudge Report]

Marathon Bible Reading

ROME -- In the beginning Pope Benedict XVI read these words: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth."

And the pope and millions of viewers watching him on Italian television Sunday night saw that it was good.

The pontiff launched a marathon reading of the Bible, from Genesis to Apocalypse, broadcast live on state television. It will last seven days and six nights. The roster of about 1,300 readers features former Italian presidents, current Cabinet ministers, soccer stars, foreign diplomats, cardinals, intellectuals, actors and opera singers as well as ordinary citizens.

The Vatican invited a multi-faith, multiethnic cross section of participants to the event in the Holy Cross in Jerusalem Basilica here. They include Orthodox clergymen; an Algerian female writer and five other Muslims; and the Israeli ambassador to the Vatican, along with a survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp and 14 other Jewish readers.

(Maria de Cristofaro and Sebastian Rotella, Los Angeles Times)

[LAT]

Kokanee Salmon Festival

...in South Lake Tahoe, CA USA.



[Tahoe Daily Tribune]

Morbid

"No horse called Morbid ever won a race."

(Colonel Richard Cantwell in Hemingway's Across the River and Into the Trees)

Etymology of "morbid": Latin morbidus diseased, from morbus disease.

Romano Guardini

Revelation shows that the merely unitarian God found in post-Christian Judaism, in Islam and throughout the modern consciousness does not exist. At the heart of that mistery which the Church expresses in her teaching of the trinity of persons in the unity of life stands the God of Revelation.
(Romano Guardini, The Lord)

Forty years ago today Romano Guardini died in Munich, Germany.

Born in Verona, Italy, in 1885, he was a prominent figure in Catholic intellectual life in the 20th century. A professor of philosophy and theology at the University of Munich, Guardini lectured at universities around the world.

Romano Guardini [pictured below] wrote over twenty books, including The End of the Modern World, Pascal for Our Time, The Conversion of Augustine, The Death of Socrates, The Church and the Catholic, The Spirit of the Liturgy, The Faith and Modern Man and his best-known work, The Lord.