Tremendous Trifles

Blog Temporarily Out of Service

2006-03-13T19:48:00.000-05:00

Tremendous Trifles is taking a rest. I'll start posting again when I have more time.

Celebrate Christmas like a Catholic!

2005-12-14T11:28:00.000-05:00

It always irked me to see people taking down all the Christmas decorations and storing away all the CDs with carols as soon as Christmas Day was past. Now, I've discovered that the Church is actually on my side in this matter (of course She is!). In his latest column, George Weigel reminds us of a lot we have forgotten about celebrating Christmas. I am taking his advice to heart and celebrating Christmas like a Catholic this year! The following key points from his article provide some very interesting insights about Advent and Christmastime:

Twenty-one years in Washington, D.C., should have rendered me impervious to the bizarre. But I confess to having been taken aback in mid-October when, inside a grocery where I was vainly searching for some decent Peccorino Romano, I saw an enormous Christmas display with ersatz snow and all the trimmings. It was bad enough when stores started putting out the Christmas decorations (or, as they now say, "holiday decorations") a nanosecond after sweeping their shelves of leftover candy corn and other Halloween goodies beloved of dentists with medical school bills to pay. But Santa and the elves two weeks before Halloween?
It works the same way at the other end, so to speak. The estimable Father John Jay Hughes reports that the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran a feature article last December 26 on how to disassemble and store Christmas decorations. As Father Hughes commented, "In my childhood, thanks to my Anglican priest-father, we were never permitted to put up the tree or any Christmas decorations until Christmas Eve. And once up, they stayed there until at least the Octave of Epiphany."

Fifteen years of intense involvement with Poles and Poland has given me an even more capacious view of the Christmas season. In Poland, the decorations stay up, the Christmas carols are sung, and the celebration of the Incarnation continues until February 2, the Feast of the Presentation, or Candlemas [note: Now that's what I'm taking 'bout!]. That's the way it was in the papal apartment in Rome between 1978 and 2004. And that's the way it will be in Poland's intact Catholic culture this year.

(...)

We need more Advent and Christmas, not less – but we need them at the proper time, which is the Church's time, not Macy's time or Wal-Mart's time. Taking Advent seriously would be a good beginning. The widespread use of Advent wreathes in churches is a welcome development. Even more welcome would be pastors actively encouraging every Catholic family to have an Advent wreath in their home, to learn the rituals of lighting it, and to pray together at the nightly lighting of the wreath during one of the most spiritually rich seasons of the Church's year of grace.

Reconstituting the liturgical calendar would also help. The Solemnity of the Epiphany belongs on January 6, period. Restoring Epiphany to its proper place would do justice to a generally neglected feast; in a nifty countercultural move, it would also stretch the Christmas season back to its proper length. And while we're on the Epiphany, why not stretch it out, too? Bringing back, say, three "Sundays After Epiphany" would give the Church a greater opportunity to pray over the mission-to-the-nations, one of the great themes embedded in the Lord’s "epiphany." What's the rush to get to "Ordinary Time"? Wouldn't it be spiritually beneficial to spend more time in that extraordinary time marked by Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany?

Let's be different. Let's let liturgical time define this unique time of the year.

GLORIA IN PROFUNDIS

2005-11-27T00:28:00.000-05:00

by Gilbert Keith Chesterton

There has fallen on earth for a token
A god too great for the sky.
He has burst out of all things and broken
The bounds of eternity:
Into time and the terminal land
He has strayed like a thief or a lover,
For the wine of the world brims over,
Its splendour is split on the sand.

Who is proud when the heavens are humble,
Who mounts if the mountains fall,
If the fixed stars topple and tumble
And a deluge of love drowns all-
Who rears up his head for a crown,
Who holds up his will for a warrant,
Who strives with the starry torrent,
When all that is good goes down?

For in dread of such falling and failing
The fallen angels fell
Inverted in insolence, scaling
The hanging mountain of hell:
But unmeasured of plummet and rod
Too deep for their sight to scan,
Outrushing the fall of man
Is the height of the fall of God.

Glory to God in the Lowest
The spout of the stars in spate-
Where thunderbolt thinks to be slowest
And the lightning fears to be late:
As men dive for sunken gem
Pursuing, we hunt and hound it,
The fallen star has found it
In the cavern of Bethlehem.

Blog Temporarily Out of Service!

2005-11-17T10:55:00.000-05:00

As you may have noticed, I have not been posting much during the last couple of months. The reason is that my internet at home has been down and that I am currently engaged in a pretty interesting project that you may check out by clicking here. I have not forgotten about the existence of Tremendous Trifles, but I will not be able to begin posting regularly for at least another month.

Evil Strikes the Notre Dame Campus!!!

2005-09-24T00:05:00.000-05:00

You need to see this. So good. Click here now!

It can take a while to load, but its worth the wait.

Just Plain Trifles

2005-09-01T00:32:00.000-05:00

This is yet another post in that never-ending series of posts about how I'm so upset that my blog sucks so much. But it does, so what else can I do but complain about it? Surely not write something good to post; that would too smart. In any case, I was looking through all my history of posts and I have discovered that the blog's suckiness has progressed in an unceasing manner throughout the past year. Evidence of this is that my own sister, who was once my number one fan, does not read it anymore. If you look back, old posts are full of her comments, but I guess recently there hasn't been anything good to comment about. Besides that, a mysterious "Anonymous" fan who used to comment a lot, and who apparently loved my posts for some inexplicable reason, has almost completely disappeared. I've always been intrigued to know who this person might be, but since the blog's boringness drove them away, perhaps now I'll never now. Finally, now and then I catch a whiff of arrogance in some of my posts that, although it indeed reflects arrogance that exists within me, I detest. Thus, the blog more and more feels simply like a collection of plain old trifles, rather than tremendous ones.

I justify my unwillingness to post by pointing to the many urgent and important things I must attend to, but to be quite frank, the problem is really laziness. When I'm musing about some subject on my own time, sometimes I stumble into ideas that truly excite or inspire me, but when I think that to communicate them to others I might have to struggle through a few paragraphs, I prefer to leave the matter for a later time. Of course, that time never comes, and the idea drifts away from my mind as quick as it came, perhaps never to be heard of again.

To be perfectly honest, though, I must also admit that many times I'm afraid to post my thoughts online for everyone to see. I fight against it, but it nevertheless frightens me to think that someone might rip my exposed thoughts apart in a fury of criticism, or alternatively, that someone I personally know might disapprove of me because of what they read. All my life I have been an avowed opponent of thinking, saying, or doing anything based on what others might think, but I must admit that to do so consistently sometimes takes more than one would think.

I utterly despise labels. They are a simplistic, mindless substitute for thought that, when applied to people, squashes their experience, essence, and the meaning of what they stand for into a dull, predetermined category on an ideological file cabinet. Of course, publicly expressing thoughts or opinions makes one vulnerable to being labeled, and I could almost say that the thought terrifies me. In a way, this fear might be a little irrational, but in another it is quite justified. It is the fear of losing my personhood in the eyes of another.

That is why the idea of Heaven excites me, as it does every human being (consciously or unconsciously), for to be in Heaven must surely be to be a true person. If each human being (indeed each thing in Creation) is so unique, it must be for a reason. Each new work of art says something new of the artist, and God does not make reproductions. Thus, I must have been made to express the beauty, the wonder, the Glory of one special part of Him who Created me. That is my mission. If I fulfill it, then I know will truly be a person like never before. I will finally and truly be accepted for who I am, since I will be accepted (into God's love in eternity) precisely because of who I am. What greater desire could there be? What greater adventure than to be myself? There is one lock in Heaven for which only my soul is the key.

And on that note, I guess I've rambled enough for one night. Sleep tight.

Tired of Hearing About Iraq?

2005-08-29T21:37:00.000-05:00

I know I am. Especially because all you ever get from the media is the usual drivel about how we need to get out out fast, or how we should simply "stay the course," or how Bush is a liar and just wanted revenge against Saddam, or how we should go ahead and invade Iran, North Korea, and Venezuela. In any case, ever since it was announced that "Bush is an idiot" (a comment that apparently never gets old), all sorts of people that are almost completely ignorant of foreign affairs suddenly feel entitled to consider themselves experts on the matter and share their nonsense with anyone within earshot. If you are as tired of this as I am, I suggest you stop paying attention to these insta-experts when forming your own opinions. Try gathering some insights from those who at least have somewhat of a clue about what is going on. The pages of Foreign Affairs magazine are a good place to start, as well as Foreign Policy magazine and the Foreign Policy Research Institute website (this one is highly recommended). Below is an excerpt from an article in Foreign Affairs that touches on some aspects that I constantly hear a lot of nonesense about:

Both insurgent camps know they cannot defeat the U.S.-led coalition militarily. Their best chance of success is to wait for a premature U.S. withdrawal and then spark a coup, in which a small, well-disciplined group with foreign backing seizes power from a weak, demoralized regime. Toward this end, the insurgents are fighting to perpetuate disorder and to prevent the establishment of a legitimate, democratic Iraqi government. By creating an atmosphere of intimidation, insecurity, and despair, they hope to undermine support for the government. Brazen attacks on its leaders and police send a chilling message to the Iraqi people: If the government cannot even protect its own, how can it protect you? Sabotage of Iraq's national infrastructure underscores the government's failure to provide basic services such as water and electricity and to sustain the oil production on which Iraq's welfare depends. By inflicting casualties on U.S. forces at the same time, the insurgents seek to raise the cost of continued U.S. involvement and weaken support for the war back home -- thereby hastening a U.S. withdrawal.

The insurgents have proved themselves to be resilient and resourceful, but they have also shown serious weaknesses. Compared with the United States' opponents in Vietnam, they are a relatively small and isolated group; the Iraqi rebels number no more than a few tens of thousands, whereas the ranks of the Vietnamese Communists were composed of roughly ten times that number. Iraqi insurgents rarely fight in groups as large as 100; in Vietnam, U.S. forces often encountered well-coordinated enemy formations of far greater size. The Vietnamese Communists, veterans of over two decades of nearly continuous war against the Japanese, the French, and the South Vietnamese, were also far better trained and led than the Iraqi insurgents and enjoyed external backing from China and the Soviet Union. The support provided to the insurgents by Iran, Syria, and radical Islamists elsewhere pales in comparison.

The Iraqi insurgents are also relatively isolated from the Iraqi people. Sunni Arab Muslims comprise the overwhelming majority of insurgent forces but account for only 20 percent of Iraq's population, and the jihadists are mostly foreigners. Neither insurgent movement has any chance of stimulating a broad-based uprising that involves Arab Shiites and Kurds. Indeed, despite the hardships endured by the Iraqi people, there has been nothing even approaching a mass revolt against the U.S.-led forces or the interim Iraqi government. This is not surprising, for the insurgents have no positive message with which to inspire popular support. A Baathist restoration would mean a return to the misery of Saddam's rule, and the jihadists would do to Iraq what radical Islamists have done in Afghanistan and Iran: introduce a reign of terror and repression.

The insurgency's success, accordingly, depends on continued disorder to forestall the creation of a stable, democratic Iraq and erode the coalition's willingness to persist and prevail. The insurgents believe the coalition lacks staying power, citing as evidence the U.S. withdrawals from Lebanon following the 1983 bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut and from Somalia a decade later after 18 U.S. servicemen were killed. The Baathist insurgents hope that if they succeed in outlasting the Americans, support from Syria and other Arab states will enable them to topple the new regime. This would likely trigger a civil war, with Shiite Arab Iraqis supported by Iran. Radical Islamists would have perhaps their best chance of seizing power under such chaotic conditions.

2005-08-18T01:13:00.000-05:00

BRAVO, a teen magazine in Germany, normally includes a poster featuring the newest pop band with its issues. This month, however, they have been distributing posters with the Holy Father's image in preparation for World Youth Day. Apparently the posters have been a tremendous success. Demand is so large that some people have even put up their own copy for sale on e-bay. It seems that there might still be hope for Germany, after all.

Factcheck.org: NARAL Falsely Accuses Supreme Court Nominee Roberts

2005-08-11T23:26:00.000-05:00

Not finding anything real with which to accuse Supreme court Nominee John Roberts, NARAL has decided to fall back on their only option: lies. Here is what Penn's Factcheck.org has to say about a new NARAL ad attacking Roberts:

NARAL Falsely Accuses Supreme Court Nominee Roberts

An abortion-rights group is running an attack ad accusing Supreme Court nominee John Roberts of filing legal papers "supporting . . . a convicted clinic bomber" and of having an ideology that "leads him to excuse violence against other Americans." It shows images of a bombed clinic in Birmingham, Alabama .

The ad is false.

In addition, Factcheck.org also states that:

The images used in the ad are especially misleading. The pictures are of a clinic bombing that happened nearly seven years after Roberts signed the legal brief in question.

Finally, they point out that:

In fact, Roberts called clinic bombers "criminals" who should be prosecuted fully.

It's funny. The add concludes with the words "America can't afford a Justice whose ideology leads him to excuse violence against other Americans." I would suggest that what America can't afford are extremists like NARAL "whose ideology leads them to excuse the violence of blatant lies against other Americans."

2005-08-03T17:39:00.000-05:00

Beautiful Villa de Leiva, Boyaca.

2005-08-03T17:35:00.000-05:00

A hostel in Raquira, a town known for its pottery and other crafts.

2005-08-03T17:33:00.000-05:00

The monument by Rodrigo Arenas depicting fourteen heroic spearmen on horses at the Pantano de Vargas (Vargas's Swamp), the site of a decisive battle in the Colombian independence movement.

2005-08-03T17:29:00.000-05:00

The gorgeous Basilica of Mongui. This is an amazing church located in a very tiny village lost in the middle of the mountains. It is amazing how the Church was able to bring such beautiful works of art and architecture to such remote places. The village as a whole is beautiful as well, though probably no bigger than it was a century ago.

2005-08-03T17:21:00.000-05:00

The central square at Mongui.

2005-08-03T17:14:00.000-05:00

Altar at the Basilica of Mongui.

2005-08-03T17:09:00.000-05:00

Sutamarchan, home of the best Longaniza in the country!

2005-08-03T17:07:00.000-05:00

A ceiling decorated with old wine bottles at the Pozo Azul Hotel in front of the Lago de Tota.

2005-08-03T17:05:00.000-05:00

Playa Blanca, a white-sand beach high up in the Andes!

2005-08-03T17:03:00.000-05:00

Freezing at Playa Blanca in the Lago de Tota, Boyaca.

2005-08-03T15:59:00.000-05:00

The hostel we stayed at in Punta Larga, Boyaca.

2005-08-03T15:56:00.000-05:00

Outside the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary of Chiquinquira, Patroness of Colombia.

2005-08-03T15:52:00.000-05:00

Inside the church at Aquitania, Boyaca.

2005-08-03T15:46:00.000-05:00

This is the church at the tiny, onion-growing village of Aquitania. Beautiful and elegant, except for the fact that someone had the bright idea of adding to it a gigantic, pastel-colored statue of Jesus on a minuscule boat (that looks like a surf-board) on top of it.

Hello Again

2005-07-30T00:29:00.000-05:00

Wow, it's been a while! I would like to thank the person who posted an anonymous comment pointing out how it is sheer disrespect to keep the site open but without ever updating it. I don't know if this will be a valid excuse, but one main issue is that I have been in Colombia for the past two weeks. I'll post some pictures later, but for now, it will suffice to say that it was an awesome trip - even better than the last one. I was able to relax a little more and enjoy my time there a little better. Of course, when I had to leave today it still felt like I could stay for much, much longer, but I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity nonetheless.

Now that I'm back in the States, my task is basically to figure out what to do with my life so that I can finally decide what type of job to go for. I am trying to discern where it is that the Lord is calling me, but I can't really tell yet. Should I work directly with the Church? Should I seek valuable experience in a secular non-profit? How about spending some time within a corporation? All of these experiences could possibly be enriching, but it's difficult to say which one is the right for me at this point in time.

In any case, I'll try to get back into the hang of posting more frequently. I'm glad to know that someone still checks out the site from time to time.

On Chasing Neighbors With Swords

2005-06-13T11:55:00.000-05:00

I've hear it said that on certain occasions, a quiet Oxford philologist called J.R.R. Tolkien used to dress up in a full suit of armor and chase his neighbors around the block while wielding a sword. Some might explain this rather odd behavior as evidence that Mr. Tolkien was beginning to take his fantastic literary creations a little too seriously and was surely on the path to madness. Instead, I would suggest this is clear evidence that the man was sane.

Outbursts of silliness - of imaginative, playful silliness - can be incomparable medicine for the soul; they free us of the seriousness of the world, of the grave and heavy tones of the mundane. The political world is imperialistic. Left and right are ever joined in an effort to colonize every possible world, to make the least of our dreams or the greatest of our loves a slave to their rhetoric. It is likewise with the world business. A professor who has never heard a joke argues that supply and demand are more important for human happiness than laughter, and soon enough only the utopias of Adam Smith or Karl Marx are the ones laughing. But not only towering philosophies cast shadows. I think most of the time it is our own towers that are the tallest. We take ourselves so seriously that we make the little things in our daily lives matters of grave concern. The question of choosing what to wear each morning soon becomes "What will others think of me today?" and even "What will I think of myself?" We all think so much of ourselves (even those with "low self-esteem," I would suggest) that the thought of others not being impressed by us soon becomes unbearable. This is not only true regarding our friends and family, sometimes the possibility that a complete stranger might think us ridiculous can be downright terrifying.

But of course, what is ridiculous is not us but an idea like that. A wise man has said that angels fly because they take themselves lightly. There may be more than mere fancy in such a thought. The "ridiculous" J.R.R. Tolkien had a mind that could soar over an entire new world, full of peoples, stories, dangers, dreams... and jokes. So our duty to be silly and even feel silly on occasion should be taken seriously. Are you a trendy dresser? How about wearing the first clothes you find in your dad's closet (or mom's, as the case may be) before going to the movies? Are you known for your sober or classy looks? How about painting your hair purple for a couple of weeks? Are you concerned with taking care of your "coolness" factor? How about singing loudly as you walk somewhere (while sober)? Do you see yourself as an intellectual? Why not admit you were touched by the latest chick flick you watched in secret? Adam Sandler's "Fifty First Dates," for example?

Pride, ego, a reputation, call it what you will, these things do not come without chains. Silliness breaks those chains and turns them into a source of laughter and good memories. Practice looking like a fool. I seriously advise it.

Not a Trifle

2005-06-10T09:21:00.000-05:00

Michael Alberico was a U.S. citizen who spent decades of his life living, working, and taking care of his wife and three kids in Colombia. Although his family moved to Washington, D.C. a few years ago, Michael so loved this land that he made arrangements so that he could work there several months out of the year and then spend the rest with his family in the U.S. Yesterday I found out that Michael was shot and killed in Cali, my home town, last Saturday after getting some cash out of the ATM. It was around one in the afternoon when this happened. He was merely running an errand. His wife, Luz Marina, had to stay in D.C. with their younger children, while their eldest, Thomas (of about 20), had to go back to Colombia on his own to bury his father. As my mom accurately pointed out, in Colombia you risk your life just running errands.

How sickening. How disgusting. How shameful. I am ashamed of my country right now. I am even scared of it. How much corruption there is. How much sin, greed, death. President Uribe cannot save our country - only God can do that now. Let us hope we have not completely forgotten Him.

Please pray for the soul of Michael Alberico and for his wife, Luz Marina, and their children, Thomas, Stephanie and Martin.

Identity Crisis

2005-06-06T13:26:00.000-05:00

In case you haven't noticed, I haven't been updating as much as I used to. The reasons are many but they probably boil down to the fact that Tremendous Trifles has been suffering a crisis of identity. I have been rather unhappy with the site for a while and I have decided that it is time for a new beginning. And because of a very stupid mistake that cost me all the template changes I had made on the old site (including grueling hours of searching the web for stupid quotes), this will very truly feel like to me like a beginning. I am not going to do anything so drastic as deleting my old posts, but I am going to make an effort to change the atmosphere of the site a bit.

First, I am going to try to get out of the bad habit of making this a site in which I merely forward people to articles by other authors that I happen to find interesting. I started Tremendous Trifles as an outlet of creativity and as fun way to improve my writing skills, but recently I have frankly been too lazy to do anything of the sort. That has got to stop. If you are interested in checking out the sites that I consider to have consistent intelligent insight into the dilemmas of our world then you can click on the permanent links on the sidebar to such websites as that of First Things Magazine and the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Also, my good friend Frank tends to have links on his page to the type of articles to which I used to link here. If you haven't visited his site, you can find it at www.excessivecatholicism.blogspot.com.

So do I have a new vision now? Well, not exactly. The website's name, after all, is Tremendous Trifles, and it should continue to deal with all sorts of random topics that may interest me. That said, I am going to make an effort to make the website more creative. If I live up to my promises, this means that I will do as much of my own writing as possible (instead of merely posting things written by other people); that I will try to write about a larger variety of topics; that I will include, hopefully, some short fiction; and that I will occasionally post some of my own artwork. In addition, since I am about to get started with the reading programs suggested by The Well-Educated Mind and The Catholic Lifetime Reading Plan (both of which I highly recommend), then I am going use this blog as the place to write down my reflections on these readings. Although I won't formally start with the program for maybe one or two months, I will probably post my thoughts on the books I have on my own reading list right now, such as Story of a Soul, The Cube and the Cathedral, Crime and Punishment, and Pride and Prejudice (I got a lot of gift certificates for graduation!).

I not sure how this new experiment will turn out, but I thank anyone who decides to come along for the ride.

An Effort to Make "Brave New World" Non-fiction

2005-05-24T09:51:00.000-05:00

After decades in the fiction section, it may well be that Aldous Huxley's Brave New World may soon be up for a promotion to the non-fiction area in bookstores. Eric Cohen at the Ethics and Public Policy Center explains:

In 2001, during the first few months of the Bush presidency, America engaged in a debate about the ethics of embryo research. The policy question was narrow: Should the federal government use public funds to support stem cell research that involves embryo destruction? But everyone knew that the issue was actually much larger--about whether we should be the kind of country that uses some (nascent) lives to benefit others, the kind of country that plunges ahead in revolutionary new areas of biotechnology without establishing clear moral limits.

Research advocates made their case by saying that thousands of embryos in fertilization clinics were "going to die anyway," and that of course no one was suggesting we create human embryos solely for research. The ethical argument was unconvincing--being destined to die hardly turns human beings into things, otherwise no one would feel safe in a nursing home. But at least the research advocates endorsed the notion that there was a line they did not want us to cross.

Today, most advocates of embryonic stem cell research offer no limits and seem to accept no compromises. Last week, a team of South Korean and American researchers announced a successful experiment: They had created scores of cloned human embryos that they then destroyed to produce 11 stem cell lines. So we have truly entered the age of human cloning. Any competent team of researchers in a laboratory anywhere in the world can now create cloned human embryos to the blastocyst stage--and then try to implant them in efforts to initiate a pregnancy. If they fail, they can--and some will--try and try again. To be sure, there will be many grotesque failures along the way to cloned babies--just as there were when Dolly the cloned sheep was created. And the children who make it to birth will inevitably suffer deformities and health problems. But the first cloned child is coming soon, and with it a new, terrible moment in the history of modern science.

For the rest of the article, which I recommend reading, please go to the EPPC website by clicking here.

Don't Panic

2005-05-21T21:36:00.000-05:00

Ok, ok... Don't panic. I haven't completely forsaken Tremendous Trifles. It's just this pre/post-graduation period. There's just been way to much to do. I should start posting again sometime during the next few weeks.

Later,

ertandberni

The Econ Exam Prophecy

2005-05-06T16:33:00.000-05:00

As of today, I have finished each an every one of my responsibilities as a student at the University of Pennsylvania. Thus, although I am not yet an alum, I am also no longer a student. Strange.

One small fact is worthy of note due to its sheer sense of ominous irony. I completed my last exam today, my last duty as a Penn student, with the words: "which eventually led to a large-scale debt crisis." Hmmm. I'm unemployed. Not good.

The Sword of Surprise

2005-04-30T12:46:00.000-05:00

by G.K. Chesterton

Sunder me from my bones, O sword of God
Till they stand stark and strange as do the trees;
That I whose heart goes up with the soaring woods
May marvel as much at these.

Sunder me from my blood that in the dark
I hear that red ancestral river run
Like branching buried floods that find the sea
But never see the sun.

Give me miraculous eyes to see my eyes
Those rolling mirrors made alive in me
Terrible crystals more incredible
Than all the things they see

Sunder me from my soul, that I may see
The sins like streaming wounds, the life's brave beat
Till I shall save myself as I would save
A stranger in the street.

2005-04-28T01:45:00.000-05:00

Yep. That's pretty much it. Opinion Art at the Daily Pennsylvanian by Yifei Zhang.

Left to Do:

2005-04-24T23:52:00.000-05:00

1) Final Exam: Econ 245 (Math for Economists), Thursday, April 28
2) Final Exam: Astro 001 (A Survey of the Universe), Thursday, April 28
3) Finish my Thesis, April 29 by 4:00 p.m.
4) Final Exam: Econ 022 (Development Economics), May 6

After I'm done with these, I'll be pretty much as good as graduated (though Commencement isn't until May 16). I don't know whether to laugh, cry, or explode from all the stress about what I have to do this week (add a long job application to the final exams and the thesis). Prayers are welcome, of course.

The End

2005-04-22T11:57:00.000-05:00

Today is my very last day of class as an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania. Impossible. This cannot be happening. Being an undergraduate at Penn has become such a large part of my identity that I seriously feel like I'm beginning to leave a part of myself behind. And I really am. I can only hope it's just a layer of skin - though what wonderful skin it has been! I won't say I'm not excited about graduation, but sometimes growing up just breaks your heart.

That's all for now. Off to class I go...

VIVA BENEDICTVM XVI

2005-04-19T22:12:00.000-05:00

From recent posts, it seems like Tremendous Trifles is turning into the Pope Blog, but what can I do? There is just way too much excitement going on these days. In any case, I'd just like to say that we should all be glad to have a man like Joseph Ratzinger as our new Holy Father, and I pray that all Catholics may really act like a family during this time and leave aside petty bickering. I also think that this is an important moment for orthodox Catholics to be humble, and reach out to those people that have strayed from Church's truth rather than gloat because our new pope is such a strong defender of the faith. Remember that love without truth is blind, but truth without love is nothing but "a clanging cymbal." Let us take these words seriously.

And now for the gloating... It turns out that now that Cardinal Ratzinger is Pope Benedict XVI, I have met TWO popes, and have the pictures to prove it! The best thing is that I met them both within one hour of each other! What an awesome grace! Now you can all look at the pictures below and wish you were as cool as me.

2005-04-19T22:05:00.000-05:00

The Prince of Liechtenstein 2004 Fellows with His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI. I'm the second one from the left on the very back row! Yep, I am THAT cool. And you're not. Deal with it.

2005-04-19T22:01:00.000-05:00

Now you can see the Holy Father from the back and my big head covering the left part of the picture!

2005-04-19T21:59:00.000-05:00

Now you can see Pope Benedict and the top of my head (the one with the black hair)!

2005-04-19T21:57:00.000-05:00

I'm the guy on the right edge of the picture. You can only see my hand, my gray blazer, and a bit of my face.

Are They Fans or Disciples?

2005-04-15T14:26:00.000-05:00

A quote from Fr. Richard John Neuhaus's Rome Diary:

I have seen several accounts, and heard worldly wise reporters, describing the "rock star" attraction of John Paul. In fact, the crowds, stretching more than three miles beyond St. Peter's, were wondrously solemn and prayerful. The Legionaries of Christ and other religious orders posted priests all along the way and there was a brisk business in confessions around the clock. One Legionary priest tells of his non-stop hearing of confessions--from five o'clock in the afternoon until six o'clock the next morning. The mayor of Rome said that not one serious crime was reported in the city during the days when millions were waiting up to 26 hours to view the body. That is hard to believe, but that is what he said.

John Paul went to the world and the world came to him, and they knew why they had come.

Subversive Virginity

2005-04-14T01:03:00.000-05:00

A provocative little article at First Things. Check it out.

On Amazon's Payroll? Perhaps...

2005-04-13T00:29:00.000-05:00

I am on page 43 of Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton. There is still a lot to go, but it is already apparent that this book is nothing less than absolutely brilliant. Indeed, it is so brilliant that it is funny (and the chain of causation applies in that order, not vice versa). If you have not read it, you need to go and get this book NOW. Here is a link to Amazon.com. Do it. Trust me on this one.

2005-04-10T12:54:00.000-05:00

John Paul the Great and the 2004 Compass Fellows (you can see half of my face in the upper-right corner!)

2005-04-08T22:05:00.000-05:00

Opinion Art in the Daily Pennsylvanian by Pamela Jackson-Malik

An Echo in the Fields

2005-04-03T01:31:00.000-05:00

by Ertandberni

The stage is set.
Shadows dance on a field of black and green under a restless sky.
Anxious leaves flutter in the wind; spinning, rising, diving
Onto fearful blades of grass.

Light, precious light, ever waning
As deadly darkness creeps, stalks, encircles and mocks
A lowly, broken band - an old and frightened clan -
That hastens through the valley.

Some hold candles, others shields, others symbols,
But all fear;
While the gloom swells with merciless pride,
And an icy silence speaks of their demise.

Someone screams and falls; others lose their wits.
Some only weep, looking down,
Staring at the ground: they see only their graves.
Others don't even see at all.

So the shadows move in as they laugh.
No mirth, only death, marks that hateful cackle.
They see a people weakened with forgetfulness
And a race now ready for its fall.

But then atop a hill blades of grass are enkindled.
Bright green they shine, as small flowers burst into a song of color.
Crippled men look towards the mountains and a figure rushes forth
Frantically waving joyful light.

His raiment is all white, he comes in haste
As shadows move away but don't relinquish their attack.
And yet the men no longer crawl, but stand.
For the pilgrim's voice now echoes in the fields,
And he has said
"Be not afraid!"

Ioannes Paulus II, the sound of your voice in this field of sorrows will be missed but not forgotten. The echoes of your call linger on - and grow. Now we know we can stand. Now we know we can fight the good fight until we reach the Home on the other side of the mountains, where surely the King now greets you, His faithful servant, with the warm embrace of Imperishable Love. God bless you, Holy Father. Thank you, thank you so much.

John Paul II

2005-04-02T04:06:00.000-05:00

We love you.

2005-04-02T04:04:00.000-05:00

God bless you, Holy Father!

2005-04-02T04:03:00.000-05:00

JPII going incognito...

2005-04-02T04:01:00.000-05:00

Baby Pope

2005-04-02T04:00:00.000-05:00

Awwww...

Goodbye Terri

2005-04-01T01:13:00.000-05:00

I don't really have much to say right now. One of our sisters has been taken from us with violence, and it hurts us all. Let us pray for her, that she may rise to see the source of all joy. Let us pray for her loving family that never gave up, and loved her to the very end. Let us pray for all those anonymous men and women who have fallen victim to similar crimes in silence. Let us pray for all those who brought or wished death upon Terri, that they may break free from the lies of evil, and repent. Let us pray for the future of our society, that all those fighting for life may never give up. That we may always remember that death has already been defeated.

Give her eternal rest, oh Lord, and may Perpetual Light shine on her forever.

Goodbye Terri.

May the road rise up to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
And the rain fall soft upon your fields,
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

On a Few Contradictions

2005-03-28T17:40:00.001-05:00

The people who insist on "letting Terri die" confuse me with their own confusion. It seems weird that they would care about this case at all if what they say is sincere. They say that they want her to die because living on a bed and being fed through a tube must be a terrible way to live. Then they say that starving her is not a problem because she can't feel anything, is not aware of anything, and is in fact not even a person anymore. They say that in actuality she is already dead.

Does anybody else see all the contradictions here? If she is not really a she, but just an it that can't even feel pain anymore, then why should they feel so strongly about letting this particular "it's" bodily functions keep existing? If she can't feel the suffering of starving or dying of thirst, as they claim, then she can't feel any discomfort from her difficult condition either. So why would this matter to anybody so much as to protest about it and set up a whole lobby around it? If Terri is not a person, as they claim, and is just an empty shell, why would anybody particularly care that her family wants to keep this thing around to treat it as if it was a person?

I mean, given those beliefs, one might find such a desire odd, or even bizarre, but why would it be so tremendously controversial that someone would want to keep a specific "thing" around the house? And in case someone objects, while I agree that a person might have a concern for what is done with their body after they pass away, Terri's "body" (if we assume that is all that is left of her), is being treated with respect and great love. But of course, that is not the issue anyway--such matters are not the stuff that divides nations. No, if she really is not a person, as those who want to starve Terri claim, then I find no logical reason why such people should feel a strong need to voice their opinion. Well, perhaps there would be one, that of an altruistic desire for not letting her family waste their entire lives giving love to a "thing." But of course, no one that believes these things has said that.

If you think Terri is just a thing, a body devoid of a person, then there is no good reason why you should find it so terrible that some people who do think she is a person want to take care of her. Why not give them the benefit of the doubt, and let them do it, if after all according to what you think she is not feeling any sort of pain? On the other hand, if she is a person, and an innocent one at that, then how dare you ask that anyone withold from her the food and water we all need to live? How dare you impose death on her? That is not something one does to a person in a civilized world. Right?

The Da Vinci Hoax

2005-03-27T19:59:00.000-05:00

The Da Vinci Code movie is on its way and if it is anything like the book, it is bringing with it a barrage of misinformation. I call it misinformation because although its supposed to be fiction, no one actually seems to realize this and many take the things said about the Catholic Church in it as true. I have even heard people use this book - one that can be found in the fiction section - as a basis for argument about history or religion. For this reason, I would like to point my readers to books such as The Da Vinci Hoax, which adequately distinguish factual claims from fictional ones, and which can be bought online directly from Ignatius Press or from Amazon.com. I encourage you to get the book, but in case you don't have time, are too lazy, or simply too cheap, you can still learn about some of the fictional elements that masquarade as fact in The Da Vinci Code by reading the following excerpts from a summary of Hoax that can be found in full on the Ignatius press website:

Facts vs. Fiction in The Da Vinci Code
By Carl E. Olson and Sandra Miesel

A frequent question asked by readers of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code is “How much of the novel’s depiction of historical events, people, artwork, and institutions is correct.” The short answer is “Not much.” In fact, the only thing more amazing than Brown’s consistent misrepresentation of facts is a widespread acceptance of his claims, with both reviewers and readers praising the “research” and “knowledge” supposedly evident in his novel. The Da Vinci Hoax: Exposing the Errors in The Da Vinci Code examines, in much detail, the lengthy list of claims made in the Code. Here is a brief look at just a few of the claims made in Brown’s novel and on his web site.

The Divinity of Jesus

Much attention has been given to The Da Vinci Code’s claim that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. But an even more audacious claim of the novel is that the divinity of Jesus was first raised and established at the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325, and that prior to that time, no one—not even Jesus’ followers—believed Jesus was anything more than a “mortal prophet” and great man. The fact that this has caused hardly a ripple among fans of the novel indicates a revealing (and hardly surprising) lack of knowledge about early Church history and belief.

There is plenty of evidence that the early Christians, dating back to Jesus’ time on earth, believed that Jesus of Nazareth was divine. In his seminal study, Early Christian Doctrines, noted scholar J.N.D. Kelly writes that “the all but universal Christian conviction in the [centuries prior to the Council of Nicaea] had been that Jesus Christ was divine as well as human. The most primitive confession had been ‘Jesus is Lord’ [Rom 10:9; Phil 2:11], and its import had been elaborated and deepened in the apostolic age.”

The Council of Nicaea did not define that Jesus, the Son of God, was divine (since that was accepted by all Christians) but addressed the issue of the exact relationship between the Son and the Father: Are they equal? One in substance? Two Persons? The Council specifically addressed and condemned the popular heresy of that time, called Arianism, which insisted that the Son was a lesser god, created by the Father at some point in time and not eternally existent.

The Real Jesus vs. the Gnostic Jesus

One of the more laughable claims of Brown’s novel is that the early Christians “literally” stole Jesus and shrouded his “human message . . . in an impenetrable cloak of divinity, and using it to expand their own power”. The novel claims that the gnostic Jesus is far more human than the divinized Jesus of the four canonical Gospels contained in the Christian Bible.

That sounds fine—unless you actually read the so-called “gnostic gospels” and compare them to the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The Jesus of the gnostic writings is rarely recognizable as a Jewish carpenter, teacher, and prophet dwelling in first century Palestine; instead, he is often described as a phantom-like creature who lectures at length about the “deficiency of aeons”, “the mother”, “the Arrogant One”, and “the archons”—all terms that only the gnostic elite would comprehend, hence their secretive, gnostic character.

In reality, the “gnostic gospels” aren’t gospels at all in the sense of the four canonical gospels, which are filled with narrative, concrete details, historical figures, political activity, and details about social and religious life. On this point, as on others, Brown has it completely wrong and backwards.

Leonardo da Vinci

On a webpage titled “Bizarre True Facts from The Da Vinci Code . . .”, Brown writes that Leonardo was a “prankster and genius” who is “widely believed to have hidden secret messages within much of his artwork.” Widely believed by whom? It’s difficult to find any reputable art scholar or historian who would agree with that remark. But according to Brown, “most scholars agree that even Da Vinci's most famous pieces—works like The Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, and Madonna of the Rocks—contain startling anomalies that all seem to be whispering the same cryptic message.”

First, no scholar would ever refer to the great Italian artist as “Da Vinci” since his given name was “Leonardo”; “da Vinci” indicates the province he was from. Secondly, few, if any, scholars would concur with Brown’s dramatic assertion. Thirdly, there are no “startling anomalies” in any of the paintings Brown mentions. Any such anomalies can only be found in his novel and conspiracy-heavy books such as The Templar Revelation, which happens to be the source of almost all of Brown’s “research” into Leonardo. As for the cryptic message, which one is Brown referring to? He claims the Mona Lisa is an androgynous self-portrait, insists The Last Supper depicts Mary Magdalene at the right of Jesus, and claims Madonna of the Rocks (better known as The Virgin of the Rocks) depicts John the Baptist scandalously blessing the Christ-Child.

Brown’s site states that this cryptic message “hints at a shocking historical secret which allegedly has been guarded since 1099 by a European secret society known as the Priory of Sion.” Nevermind that the Priory of Sion was founded in the 1950s in France by a political radical, that its mysterious history is an admitted fabrication, and that it has been proven more than once to be a complete hoax. And yet the Priory of Sion is a central element in the plot and logic (so to speak) of The Da Vinci Code.

Opus Dei

One of Brown’s “bizarre true facts” is that Opus Dei exists and “has recently completed construction of a $47 million, 133,000-square-foot American Headquarters at 243 Lexington Avenue in New York City.” Why this is considered bizarre is, well, bizarre. Far more bizarre than the existence of a personal prelature of the Catholic Church - erroneously described as “a church” in the Code - is the character of a murderous albino Opus Dei monk. Never mind that Opus Dei is not a religious order and that it consists of mostly lay people, with less than 2% of its members being priests. As others have noted, Brown’s mythical Opus Dei has simply taken the place of the Jesuits, an order commonly depicted as murderous, vile, and corrupt by anti-Catholics writing in the 1800s and well into the 1900s.

More Clear Facts About Muddy Fiction

The Da Vinci Code states that over a three hundred period in the medieval era, the Catholic Church was responsible for burning a total of five million women at the stake. That’s quite a bit off of the best current estimate of 30,000 to 50,000 of men and women killed during the four hundred years from 1400 to 1800—certainly a significant number, but not comparable to the Holocaust or Stalin’s purges. Many of those deaths didn’t involve burning. Witches were hanged, strangled, and beheaded as well. In addition, witch-hunting was not woman-hunting: at least twenty percent of all suspected witches were male. Despite what the novel clams, midwives were not especially targeted; nor were witches liquidated as obstacles to professionalized medicine and mechanistic science.

Another glaring error is found in character Robert Langdon’s explanation of the origin of the tetragrammaton—YHWH (pronounced as Yahweh)— the sacred name of God, which observant Jews believe should not be uttered. Langdon claims that YHWH comes from the name Jehovah, which he insists is an androgynous union between “the masculine Jah and the pre-Hebraic name for Eve, Havah”. A quick trip to the encyclopedia (or theological dictionary, if you prefer) shows that Langdon is wildly off the mark. The name “Jehovah” didn’t even exist until the thirteenth century at the earliest (and wasn’t common until the sixteenth century), and is an English word. It was created by artificially combining the consonants of YHWH (or JHVH) and the vowels of Adonai (which means “Lord”), the name substituted for YHWH in the Old Testament by Jews. The Hebrew—not “pre-Hebraic”—word for Eve is hawwâ, (pronounced “havah”), which means “mother of all living”. There is absolutely nothing androgynous about any of this, but that dubious assertion is in keeping with the neognostic flavor of the novel.

Possibly Brown’s silliest mistake about the Templars is charging that Pope Clement V not only burnt hundreds of Templars but had their ashes “tossed unceremoniously into the Tiber River”. That the statement is put in the mouth of his “Royal Historian” character, Teabing, only adds to its irony. The largest burnings of Templars actually took place in Paris, with smaller holocausts in three other French cities and possibly Cyprus. There’s no record of Knights burnt at Rome. In any event, the pope couldn’t have dumped any remains in the Tiber since he resided at Avignon in southern France and not in Rome. Also, the Templars had nothing to do with gothic architecture, despite Brown’s claims that they had everything to do with it.

The Code claims that the Merovingians founded Paris. Nope. This is a mistake no educated Parisian would make, inasmuch as Paris was originally a Gallic village called Lutetia Parisiorum that was expanded into a city by the Romans.

On and on it goes, with faulty and often blatantly incorrect statements about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, the Vatican, paganism, early Christianity, medieval Christianity, modern day Catholicism, the life and work of Leonardo, secret societies, the origins of the English language, Constantine, and much more. All of it is exposed in The Da Vinci Hoax, described by Francis Cardinal George as the “definitive debunking” of Dan Brown’s best-selling novel.

On Suffering

2005-03-25T12:10:00.000-05:00

Sorry I've been so bad at updating recently, but things have been kind of hectic around here recently. In any case, given events such as what is going on with Terri Shiavo, the illness of the Pope, and of course, our remembrance of the Lord's Passion on this Good Friday, I think many of us have been giving a lot of thought to the question of suffering. I found an article by Peter Kreeft that deals precisely with that question, and I strongly encourage you to read it. Just click here.

A Visit With Terri Schiavo

2005-03-17T00:59:00.000-05:00

The short hours are running out, and unless some legislative action is taken very soon, the process of starving Terri Schiavo to death will begin tomorrow (Friday, March 18). I strongly encourage you to read the article below, taken from the HLI website, which tells of a visit to Terri in her hospital room. It will give you a glimpse of the innocent person some are trying to kill.

It may still be possible to save her, however. Please immediately contact Congress at (202) 225-3671 to support the Incapacitated Persons Legal Protection Act. The HLI website tells us that:

US Rep. Dave Weldon (R-Melbourne) is working to introduce the Incapacitated Persons Legal Protection Act (first seen on nickqueen.com, and then on terrisfight.org). This would explicitly authorize and require the Federal court system to act upon Writs of Habeas Corpus for violations of civil rights cases.

Here's your chance to voice your support of this most crucial and timely Bill, revised for the case of Terri Schiavo.

The clock is running out.

A Visit With Terri Schiavo
Attorney Barbara Weller

This past Christmas Eve day, 2004, I went to visit Terri Schiavo with her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, her sister, her niece, and Attorney David Gibbs III. The visit took place at the Woodside Hospice for about 45 minutes just before noon.

When I knew I was going to visit Terri with her parents, I had no idea what to expect. I was prepared for the possibility that the Schindlers love their daughter and sister so much that they might imagine behaviors by Terri that aren't actually evident to others. The media and Mr. Schiavo clearly give the impression that Terri is in a coma or comatose state and engages only in non-purposeful and reflexive movements and responses. I am a mother and a grandmother, as well as one of the Schindlers attorneys, and I could understand how parents might imagine behavior and purposeful activity that is not really there. I was prepared to be as objective as I could be during this visit and not to be disappointed at anything I saw or experienced.

I was truly surprised at what I saw from the moment we entered the little room where Terri is confined. The room is a little wider than the width of two single beds and about as long as the average bedroom, with plenty of room for us to stand at the foot of her bed. Terri is on the first floor and there is a lovely view to the outside grounds of the facility. The room is entered by a short hallway, however, and there is no way for Terri to see out into the hallway or for anyone in the hallway to observe Terri.

From the moment we entered the room, my impression was that Terri was very purposeful and interactive and she seemed very curious about the presence of obvious strangers in her room. Terri was not in bed, but was in her chair, which has a lounge chair appearance and elevates her head at about a 30-degree angle. She was dressed and washed, her hair combed, and she was covered with a holiday blanket. There were no tubes of any kind attached to her body. She was completely free of any restraints that would have indicated any type of artificial life support. Not even her feeding tube was attached and functioning when we entered, as she is not fed 24 hours a day.

The thing that surprised me the most about Terri as I took my turn to greet her by the side of her chair was how beautiful she is. I would have expected to see someone with a sallow and gray complexion and a sick looking countenance. Instead, I saw a very pretty woman with a peaches and cream complexion and a lovely smile, which she even politely extended to me as I introduced myself to her. I was amazed that someone who had not been outside for so many years and who received such minimal health care could look so beautiful. She appeared to have an inner light radiating from her face. I was truly taken aback by her beauty, particularly under the adverse circumstances in which she has found herself for so many years.

Terris parents, sister, and niece went immediately to greet Terri when we entered the room and stood in turn directly beside her head, stroking her face, kissing her and talking quietly with her. When she heard their voices, and particularly her mother's voice, Terri instantly turned her head towards them and smiled. Terri established eye contact with her family, particularly with her mother, who spent the most time with her during our visit. It was obvious that she recognized the voices in the room with the exception of one. Although her mother was talking to her at the time, she obviously had heard a new voice and exhibited a curious demeanor. Attorney Gibbs was having a conversation near the door with Terris sister. His voice is very deep and resonant and Terri obviously picked it up. Her eyes widened as if to say, Whats that new sound I hear? She scanned the room with her eyes, even turning her head in his direction, until she found Attorney Gibbs and the location of the new voice and her eyes rested momentarily in his direction. She then returned to interacting with her mother.

When her mother was close to her, Terris whole face lit up. She smiled. She looked directly at her mother and she made all sorts of happy sounds. When her mother talked to her, Terri was quiet and obviously listening. When she stopped, Terri started vocalizing. The vocalizations seemed to be a pattern, not merely random or reflexive at all. There is definitely a pattern of Terri having a conversation with her mother as best she can manage. Initially, she used the vocalization of uhuh but without seeming to mean it as a way of saying no, just as a repeated speech pattern. She then began to make purposeful grunts in response to her mothers conversation. She made the same sorts of sound with her father and sister, but not to the same extent or as delightedly as with her mother. She made no verbal response to her niece or to Attorney Gibbs and myself, but she did appear to pay attention to our words to her.

The whole experience was rather moving. Terri definitely has a personality. Her whole demeanor definitely changes when her mother speaks with her. She lights up and appears to be delighted at the interaction. She has an entirely different reaction to her father who jokes with her and has several standing jokes that he uses when he enters and exits her presence. She appears to merely tolerate her father, as a child does when she says stop but really means, this is fun. When her father greets her, he always does the same thing. He says, here comes the hug and hugs her. He then says, you know whats coming next---the kiss. Her father has a scratchy mustache and both times when he went through this little joke routine with her, she laughed in a way she did not do with anyone else. When her father is ready to plant the kiss on her cheek, she immediately makes a face her family calls the lemon face. She puckers her lips, screws up her whole face, and turns away from him, as if making ready for the scratchy assault on her cheek that she knows is coming. She did the exact same thing both times that her father initiated this little routine joke between the two of them.

The interactions with her family and our appearance in her room appeared to require some effort and exertion from Terri. From time to time, she would close her eyes as if to rest. This happened primarily when no one was paying particular attention to her, but we were talking among ourselves. After a few minutes or when one of the visitors approached her and started to talk directly to her again, Terri would open her eyes and begin her grunting sounds again in response to their conversations. Although I approached her, leaned close and stroked her arms and spoke to her, she did not verbally respond to me.

Terris hands are curled up around little soft cylinders that help her not to injure herself. I understand that these contractures are likely very painful, although there was a time when Terri was receiving simple motion therapy when her hands and arms relaxed and were no longer as constricted. When the therapy was discontinued by order of her guardian and the court, the contractures returned. These contractures would apparently be avoidable if Terri were given the simple range of motion therapy she previously received. It is very sad to observe firsthand these conditions that make her life more difficult, but that would be correctable with little effort.

When we were preparing to leave, the interactions with Terri changed. First, she went through the joke routine with her father and the lemon face. When her niece said goodbye to her, Terri did not react. Nor did she react to me or to Attorney Gibbs when we said our goodbyes to her. When her sister went to her to say goodbye, Terris verbalizations changed dramatically. Instead of the happy grunting and uh uh sounds she had been making throughout the visit, her verbalizations at these goodbyes changed to a very low and different sound that appeared to come from deep in her throat and was almost like a growl. She first made the sound when her sister said goodbye and then, amazingly to me, she made exactly the same sound when her mother said goodbye to her. It seemed Terri was visibly upset that they were leaving. She almost appeared to be trying to cling to them, although this impression came only from her changed facial expression and sounds, since her hands cannot move. It appeared like she did not want to be alone and knew they were leaving. It was definitely apparent in the short time I was there that her emotions changedit was apparent when she was happy and enjoying herself, when she was amused, when she was resting from her exertion to communicate, and when she was sad at her guests leaving. It was readily apparent and surprising that her mood changed so often in a short 45-minute visit.

I was pleasantly surprised to observe Terris purposeful and varied behaviors with the various members of her family and with Attorney Gibbs and myself. I never imagined Terri would be so active, curious, and purposeful. She watched people intently, obviously was attempting to communicate with each one in various ways and with various facial expressions and sounds. She was definitely not in a coma, not even close. This visit certainly shed more light for me on why the Schindlers are fighting so hard to protect her, to get her medical care and rehabilitative assistance, and to spend all they have to protect her life.

I realize that Terri has good days and bad days. There are obviously days when she does not interact with her family, as they had previously told us. There are also apparently days when Terri is even more interactive and responsive to them than she was on the day I visited. Since this visit I am more convinced than ever that the Schindlers are not just parents who refuse to let go of their daughter. There really is a lot going on with their daughter and potentially, it seemed obvious to me, Terri could improve even more with appropriate care and 24 hour a day love that can only come from a dedicated family. As I watched her, my foremost thought was that on the next day, Christmas, Terri should not have been confined to her small room in a hospice center, nice as that room was, but that she should have been gathered around the Christmas dinner table enjoying the holiday with her family.

Spring Break Reflections

2005-03-14T21:00:00.000-05:00

The two weeks of hibernation are over and Tremendous Trifles is back on the air! [crowd goes wild, fireworks shoot off into the sky, etc.]

Did you miss me? Good. I'd like to say I missed you too, but I was too busy having ridiculous amounts of fun in Bogotá, Colombia. Seriously speaking, it was a really great trip and I'm really thankful to God for it. I was able to spend some quality time with my maternal grandparents as well as my cousins, whom I hadn't seen in several years. Ahead are some random reflections from the trip:

- My family is freakin' awesome. Each one of them has something really special and interesting about them, starting with my grandfather. It was inspiring and really humbling to sit down and listen to his stories - it would seem like there is nothing this man has not done. I was especially amazed when he told me about a student strike that he led as a high school senior (when he was only eighteen), which eventually spread throughout the country, achieved its goal of abolishing a set of hated state exams, and even cost the minister of education his job. It also allowed him to meet political figures like Mariano Ospina Pérez and Alberto Lleras Camargo, whom all Colombian children learn about in their history textbooks. It kind of makes me feel silly that at twenty-one, getting good grades in class still rates among my most impressive accomplishments.

- People can surprise you. My aunt, who has a mental disorder and who I never really paid much attention to, is actually a pretty smart and rather interesting person. It turns out that despite her condition, she is a busy student of theology and amateur writer. She has already written a short book on Padre Pio, and is currently working on an anthology about the Blessed Virgin Mary as well as a novel. We had a few conversations, though it was difficult to communicate as one normally would because of the way her mind works. Still, I was very impressed and surprised.

- Colombia is a nice place, and Bogotá is a really interesting city. It really is a metropolis with a little bit of everything, from historic, colonial neighborhoods to modern business sectors. Clubs and the party scene in general are really enjoyable there. Within the same night, one can dance to very different styles of music including salsa, merengue, vallenato, pop, trance/techno, rock, and even (rather regrettably) reggeaton. Though there is certainly drinking involved, that is not the central part of the night, making the experience more dynamic and even joyful.

- On the negative side, the faith in Colombia seems to be in trouble among the youth. From what I could gather, the Church's beliefs are perceived as antiquated and even arbitrary among young members of the socioeconomic and intellectual elites. There may well be groups of young and educated Catholics standing up for their faith, but I don't know where they are. There is a great need for serious education about the faith, evangelization and apologetics among the youth. The Church can answer the challenges of the modern world, and we must help young people in Colombia (as well as everywhere else) become aware of this fact.

- Closely connected to this deterioration of the faith, I sensed a significant amount of moral, social and cultural corruption that I hadn't in the past (probably because I was not old enough to become aware of it). I was especially shocked to learn about what Colombians refer to as "Pre-paid" women, who are mid to upper social class university students, so concerned with leading a luxurious lifestyle, that they will prostitute themselves to affluent costumers. It seems that in today's world, some find designer clothing to be considerably more important than human dignity. Big surprise, huh?

- Abortion activists are working hard in Colombia and Latin America as a whole. My cousins were well acquainted with imported pro-choice rhetoric, although I was relieved to find out that they rejected such nonsense (even the ones that are not religious). Still Planned Parenthood has been pushing forth its agenda under an organization with the disturbingly ironic name of Pro-Familia, and many young people now consider legalized abortion to be the "progressive" option. Let's hope that Colombian pro-lifers will do their work and ensure that sanity remains the law of the land in regards to this issue.

- Back to more positive things, Colombian food is great, the people are warm and friendly, and the countryside is beautiful. I love mountains. I love Spanish colonial architecture. I love looking at faces that have something indescribable but uniquely Colombian about them. I love my family.

- I'm thinking that my love for the Church and Colombia might be connected in God's plan for my life, though I don't really know in what way. I have no clue in what part of the world I'll end up living, but I'm thinking that wherever that is, aiding people and the Church in Colombia ought to be among my top priorities.

- For the first time in a while, I experienced how it feels to have no pressing responsibilities. I have grown so unaccustomed to this feeling that I actually could not identify what it was until today when classes started again. It was almost like being in another world.

- There is nothing like seeing and old friend after a long time, and feeling like you had never gone away at all.

- What an awesome and needed break. Thank you God!

Going into Hibernation

2005-02-28T20:21:00.000-05:00

Yes folks, that's right, Tremendous Trifles is going into hibernation during this week and the following one due to ridiculous amounts of work followed by spring break. I understand that for some of you this may come as a tough blow or even a life-shattering disappointment, but I'd like to remind you that there are other good things in life besides this blog. I urge you not to vent your anger and disappointment through violent rioting or other extreme methods, as much as you might feel like doing so, since that would violate the spirit of this blog.

Also, in case you just can't seem to make it without your daily dose of TT, then perhaps this is a good time to search through the archives and take a look at all the other crap, I mean, masterpieces, that I've written.

Later!

A Lesson From a Late Night Chat

2005-02-26T05:42:00.000-05:00

Tonight taught me an important lesson, or at least the beginnings of one. It is a lesson that I already knew, but didn't really understand, or that I understood, but just did not truly grasp. Indeed, I guess I still don't, not completely anyway. Whatever the case, for the first time I am really beginning to feel the reality that only works of love can truly change the world. Works of love are what glorify God and fulfill our mission in this world.

Before, I accepted this intellectually, but for the first time I am really grasping this as a fundamental reality. Paul really did get it right when he told the Corinthians that "If I speak in human and angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing."

So think, learn, seek the truth, study the Faith, defend it; but whatever you do, love as if your life depended on it, because ultimately, it does. That's the whole point of Christ on the cross. Self-giving, self-sacrifice, Love. Love saved us from death, and love takes us to the land of the living. To merely know a certain truth is no reason to boast; that is, in a way, the least that is expected. Instead, we must let truth transcend knowledge and lead into love, become love and guide love.

Love is the call that we must answer.

Please pray for me, because I really am fearful of lacking the courage to follow.

A Question For My Readers

2005-02-24T02:07:00.000-05:00

As some of you might know, I'm graduating from Penn this semester and have officially started the desperate search for a job with which the real world initiates university students at the end of their undergraduate careers. This being the case, I am facing a somewhat difficult dilemma and would like to request advice from that infinitely profound pool of wisdom that must certainly be my readership.

Basically, my problem is that while in the long-term I am interested in having a career serving others in accordance with my Catholic faith, perhaps in the field of human rights (especially the right to life), peace, or poverty reduction, I don't know whether I should try to work with an avowedly Catholic or pro-life organization as a recent college graduate. In other words, I fear that I will be branded in a particular way if I become involved with such organizations and that this will make it difficult for me to have a greater effect later in my career. For example, I have hopes that in a few years I might be able to attend a top graduate program, perhaps in International Relations, but I am worried that doing that sort of work may make it more difficult for me to get into certain schools. I am not unwilling to stand up for my beliefs, but it sometimes seems to me that it might be a good idea to wait a while before being vocal about them in my professional life. One reason, for example, is that people in general might be more willing to listen to someone with, say, a graduate degree from Yale, than someone who has been working in a pro-life organization all his life. Also, with an impressive and relatively "neutral" resume, I may have greater chances of finding high-level jobs at various sorts of organizations in order to help change them from within. I don't want to spend my whole life preaching to the choir.

So what do you think? What type of job should I get? Do you consider that making it obvious that I am Catholic and pro-life could ruin certain important prospects for the future? Let me know.

Good News from the UN!

2005-02-20T13:41:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone! I thought some of you might be interested (and happy) to hear about a major new development in the UN regarding human cloning. Congratulations to everyone who worked in favor of passing Costa Rica's proposal for a total ban. I must add, however, that as a "Declaration" the document that was passed is not binding international law. The following a report from C-Fam:

Friday Fax

February 18, 2005
Volume 8, Special Report

UN Adopts Pro-Life Declaration Against Human Cloning

In a monumental victory for the pro-life movement, the UN today adopted a declaration condemning human cloning. The UN called on Member States to adopt urgent legislation outlawing all cloning practices "as they are incompatible with human dignity and the protection of human life."

Costa Rica, which led the effort for a cloning ban, called the declaration a success for those who seek to promote ethical scientific research.

"This is a powerful message to the world that this morally questionable procedure is outside the bounds of acceptable experimentation," said Austin Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, one of the main NGOs involved in the negotiation. "By adopting this declaration, the international community is united in condemning all human cloning as exploitative and unethical. This should encourage similar bans in legislatures around the world including in the US Senate," said Ruse.

The declaration, introduced today by Honduras, came on the last day of a week-long special session devoted entirely to resolving this issue. The declaration proved at the last minute to be an acceptable compromise to countries that have appeared staunchly divided all week. The declaration also marks the end of three years of UN deadlock over human cloning.

Countries were divided mainly over whether to protect human life or the human being. Costa Rica, Uganda, the United States and others who sought to ban all forms of human cloning, supported "human life." Countries including Belgium, Singapore and the United Kingdom, who wanted to ban only cloning that would result in born human beings, insisted on protecting the "human being," which according to some international legal documents would protect only those already born.

The declaration also calls on countries to "prevent the exploitation of women." Cloning requires harvesting eggs from women, and delegates from developing countries feared their women being turned into inexpensive "egg farms." The declaration calls on wealthier nations to direct attention and funding to pressing medical issues such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. It also condemns all applications of any genetic engineering techniques that threaten human dignity.

The declaration sets an international ethical standard that sends a clear signal to countries that encourage human cloning. For instance, in the United Kingdom, two "licenses" for research cloning have been issued. The first is currently subject to a legal challenge on the basis that the cloning "license" is unlawful and unnecessary. It is due to be heard in the High Court shortly. Cloning opponents in the United Kingdom welcomed the UN's resolution and look forward to Member States fulfilling their international obligations.

Copyright 2005 - C-FAM (Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute).

Thesis Time!

2005-02-17T21:14:00.000-05:00

Hey people, so I decided to finally do what I had promised. Below, you will find the first two parts of what will be my senior IR Thesis at Penn. I encourage you to read what I have up to now and give me comments if you have any, although please keep in mind that this is a work in progress so things may still change... even the case studies I have picked. The thesis takes both a theoretical and empirical approach to understand the role of the Church in the field of conflict mediation, especially within the contexts of Guatemala and Colombia. I argue that in cases such as this, the Church is in a unique position that gives it possible advantages as a mediator. But don't take my word for it, go ahead and take a look at what I've done up to now.

Oh, and please don't steal my ideas. That's just a mean thing to do, as well as illegal.

Let the Hobbit Happen!

2005-02-17T14:47:00.000-05:00

I am unsure whether it is a good idea to start pushing for a Hobbit film so soon, but as the Tolkien groupie that I am, I have no choice but to suggest that you head over to thehobbitfilm.com and help them with their noble endeavor. Bilbo lives!

Pictures!

2005-02-16T03:54:00.000-05:00

Here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure. Since a lot of the people who visit Tremendous Trifles are family or friends, I thought it might be a good idea to post them. The pictures were taken with my friend Kent's camera. The first two are from our advance Valentine's Day dinner on Saturday, while the other one was randomly taken at the dining hall. If you are a creepy wacko seeking to steal my identity, be forewarned that your task is futile - I don't have a personality.

2005-02-16T03:52:00.000-05:00

Advance Valentine's Day dinner organized by Kent and me for these two lovely ladies. Kent cooked the main course and the dessert was provided by Chili's... I mean... me.

2005-02-16T03:46:00.000-05:00

Kent and Cait

2005-02-16T03:42:00.000-05:00

I was NOT posing!

Beautiful. Read it.

2005-02-15T23:28:00.000-05:00

Cry out full-throated and unsparingly, lift up your voice like a trumpet blast; Tell my people their wickedness, and the house of Jacob their sins.

They seek me day after day, and desire to know my ways, Like a nation that has done what is just and not abandoned the law of their God; They ask me to declare what is due them, pleased to gain access to God.

"Why do we fast, and you do not see it? afflict ourselves, and you take no note of it?" Lo, on your fast day you carry out your own pursuits, and drive all your laborers.

Yes, your fast ends in quarreling and fighting, striking with wicked claw. Would that today you might fast so as to make your voice heard on high!

Is this the manner of fasting I wish, of keeping a day of penance: That a man bow his head like a reed, and lie in sackcloth and ashes? Do you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the LORD?

This, rather, is the fasting that I wish: releasing those bound unjustly, untying the thongs of the yoke; Setting free the oppressed, breaking every yoke;

Sharing your bread with the hungry, sheltering the oppressed and the homeless; Clothing the naked when you see them, and not turning your back on your own.

Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your wound shall quickly be healed; Your vindication shall go before you, and the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.

Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer, you shall cry for help, and he will say: Here I am!

-Isaiah 58: 1-9

Lazarus

2005-02-12T13:53:00.000-05:00

By: José Asunción Silva
Translated by: Ertandberni

Come, Lazarus! comanded
The Savior, and within the black sepulcher
The body meekly rose under its shroud,
Attempted walking, with a few fearful steps,
Then Smelled, then touched, then looked, then gave a cry
And wept for joy.

Four moons thereafter, amidst the wretched shadows
Of the darkening twilight in the silence
Of the place and the hour, amidst the frigid tombs
Of ancient a cemetery
Was Lazarus, there in solitude weeping
And in envy of the dead.

Lázaro
Por: José Asunción Silva

Ven, Lázaro! gritóle
El Salvador, y del sepulcro negro
El cadáver alzóse entre el sudario,
Ensayó caminar, a pasos tremulos,
Olió, palpó, miró, sintió, dio un grito
Y lloró de contento.

Cuatro lunas más tarde, entre las sombras
Del crepúsculo oscuro en el silencio
Del lugar y la hora, entre las tumbas
De antiguo cementerio
Lázaro estaba, sollozando a solas
Y envidiando a los muertos.

I'm unsure whether a couple of the lines on my translation work well. Please let me know if you have any suggestions or any opinions whatsoever!

Guess what...

2005-02-12T02:33:00.000-05:00

I saw George Weigel speak today about the future of the Church. It was pretty awesome. There are certainly a lot of challenges but also a lot of hope for the future. He considers that the three "hot" issues in future years around which there will be much debate within the Church will be how to engage an apostate Europe, radical militant Islam, and the biotech revolution. There is much work to be done.

Also, I asked him for some pointers for my senior international relations thesis and he gave me his contact info. Now you can all be jealous.

Besides that, I'd like to point out what a huge nerd he is. There is simply no question about it. But of course, it's nerds that rule the world.

Love and Superstition

2005-02-11T00:11:00.000-05:00

Is God a superstition? Perhaps. But if so, then love is a superstition. The following are a couple of very good observations by Jonah Goldberg in an old NRO column:

[A]ll morality is based upon transcendence — or it is merely based on utilitarianism of one kind or another, and therefore it is not morality so much as, at best, an enlightened expediency or will-to-power. It is no more rational to vote based on a desire to do "good" than it is to vote based on a desire to do God's will. Indeed, for millions of people this is a distinction without a difference — as it was for so many of the abolitionists progressives and civil-rights leaders today's liberals love to invoke but never actually learn about.

Love, in fact, is just as silly and superstitious a concept as God (and for those who believe God is Love, this too is a distinction without a difference). Chesterton's observation that the purely rational man will not marry is just as correct today, because science has done far more damage to the ideal of love than it has done to the notion of an awesome God beyond our ken. Genes, hormones, instincts, evolution: These are the cause for the effect of love in the purely rational man's textbook. But Maher would get few applause lines from his audience of sophisticated yokels if he mocked love as a silly superstition. This is, in part, because the crowd he plays to likes the idea of love while it dislikes the idea of God; and in part because these people feel love, so they think it exists. But such is the extent of their solipsism and narcissism that they not only reject the existence of God but go so far as to mock those who do not, simply because they don't feel Him themselves. And, alas, in elite America, feelings are the only recognized foundation of metaphysics.

Some Facts to Ponder

2005-02-09T17:58:00.000-05:00

The following is a report regarding a new study revealing how women are disproportionally hurt by the destructive sexual behavior that is prevalent in our culture. Please go ahead and consider its findings:

Culture & Cosmos
February 8, 2005 Volume 2, Number 27
Study Shows America's Sexual Behavior To Be Highly Lethal

The high toll of the sexual revolution on the lives of Americans was made apparent in a recently published study showing 1.3 percent of all American deaths to be caused by sexual behavior. The study, from the current edition of the medical journal Sexually Transmitted Infections, examined data from 1998 to determine the overall health burden caused by sexual activity in the US and found that women "bear a disproportionately high proportion" of the cost that comes with sexual liberation.

The study, authored by three researchers from the Centers for Disease Control, examined "adverse health outcomes" that result from sexual activity including both sexually transmitted diseases, viruses and infections, infertility and abortions. More men then women died in 1998 as a result of sexual behavior - 19,634 men compared to 10,148 women. But almost all of the deaths in men were caused by HIV. "If HIV related mortality were excluded, more than 80% of sexual behaviour related mortality would be among . . . women." The study found that 5,914 women died of non-HIV related sexual behavior; for men the number was number 1,413.

While HIV killed 4,234 women, it was cervical cancer that was leading cause of death for women claiming 4,921 lives. Cervical cancer is caused primarily by the human papillomavirus (HPV), the most common sexually transmitted disease. That it causes more deaths than HIV is notable due to the politically charged nature of HPV. Because condoms do not protect against HPV, a fact acknowledged by the American Cancer Society, pro-family organizations have pointed to it as proof that sexual health can be insured only by abstinence until a monogamous marriage. Planned Parenthood Federation of America has in the past accused such organizations of engaging in "an alarmist and misleading public policy and media campaign."

Beyond death the report also examines the overall health effects of sexual behavior. It found that in the course of one year, 7.5 percent of Americans suffered from almost 20 million incidences of negative health effects brought on by sexual behavior. Of such cases women suffered a disproportionate 62 percent including 2.5 million cases of gonorrhea and 2.6 million cases of trichomoniasis.

The study also calculated the Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALY) cost for illnesses brought on by sexual behavior. DALY is a number that combines into a single measurement the loss of healthy years of life that result from an illness with the years of life cut short by premature death due to an illness. Sexual behavior cost women 1,224,953 disability adjusted life years while men came in under one million.

The report did not buffet the bad news with hopeful predictions and called this a problem not likely to go away soon. "[G]iven the size and chronicity of HIV, HPV, and other hepatitis virus epidemics, the overall health burden related to sexual behaviour is unlikely to decline rapidly in coming years."

Culture of Life Foundation
1413 K Street, NW, Suite 1000
Washington DC 20005
Phone: (202) 289-2500 Fax: (202) 289-2502
E-mail: clf@culture-of-life.org
Website: http://www.culture-of-life.org

Straight from the Competition!

2005-02-08T14:08:00.000-05:00

Looking through the posts of Being! Or Nothingness, one of my fellow nominees for Best New Blog (vote for me!), I found some really insightful thoughts regarding the culture of life, euthanasia, and the controversy over Million Dollar Baby. Here it goes:

Sure [the movie is] an apologia for euthanasia . . . but it doesn't have to be. Christians today (not to mention conservatives) seem to be in the business of elimating everything in the culture that they think doesn't support their ideology. This is exactly the problem. Christians today treat Christianity as an ideology, something that others must be "convinced" of, even if that means eliminating everything that would not support it. They treat Christianity as a moralism and not as a man, a man who has come to us and said "Follow me" and offer us life, a life that not even death can destroy.

A life that death can't destroy . . . nor the culture of death for that matter. When will christians realize that the culture of death is not something to be feared, but something to be combatted with Life? This film, in my opinion, should be used by Christians to fight Euthanasia. Ebert tells us:

"I believe the character Maggie is such a fighter that she could learn to deal with her disability and enjoy her life. But here is the important point: She doesn't believe that. Yes, it is true, as critics have charged, that she receives inadequate counseling. That the care in her hospital is not good, and the security is laughable. But the screenplay by Paul Haggis and Eastwood's direction make that clear -- they know it, too. It is not movie criticism to say Maggie needed better counseling. We might as well say Hamlet needed a psychiatrist."

If this is true, then we should take up where this line of argument leaves off. People are not choosing Euthanasia because they really want to die, they are using it because they think their lives aren't valuable, worthwhile, important. They are choosing Euthanasia because the counseling they receive is inadequate, often motivated by financial concerns. They are choosing Euthanasia because of poor care and neglect. They are choosing Euthanasia because of our failure to love.

In the end, this movie seems to help make our case. Euthanasia is the response of a people that have given up hope. A people that see no positivity to life. A people who are as dead on the inside as they seek to make those they "care" for.

But Christianity is a living hope. Christianity is the announcement of a Presence that offers us a postivity toward life. Christianity is a people who are alive, with life-life, and seek to fill those around them with the same hope, postitivity, and life.

We have nothing to fear from this movie. We have only to fear the timidity of our hearts.

2005-02-07T22:24:00.000-05:00

EQUAL JUSTICE UNDER LAW - Irony provided at taxpayers' expense

2005-02-07T22:19:00.000-05:00

Penn for Life at the March! Riff, Shannon, & Frank

I'm Famous!

2005-02-06T15:08:00.000-05:00

Ok, maybe not. But I was still lucky enough to somehow get nominated for the Catholic Blog Awards under the category of Best New Blog. This is so exciting. If you like the blog, please go and vote! You can find the Best New Blog category at the bottom of the page.

Fellow Nominees:

Happy Catholic
Diary of a Suburban Priest
Moniales
Being! Or Nothingness

What is Compassion?

2005-02-06T01:19:00.000-05:00

Wow. My friend Frank just made what I regard as a really piercing observation in a post on his site. Here it goes:

Real compassion means suffering with somebody, because you care about them so much that you're willing to give your energy, your time, and your whole self to them. It doesn't mean giving a homeless man some cash; it means getting down and dirty into the nitty-gritty details of his suffering, working with him to make his concerns your concerns.

Too many people want to end suffering because it causes them to become uncomfortable. Not because they do have compassion but because they don't: the possibility of suffering simply disgusts elitist people. 'How could anyone live like that?' they wonder. The disabled, the unwanted, the unloved -- these do not fit into their Grand Utopian Visions, where everybody is Equal (that is, the Same). So if We cannot help you (i.e., make you the Same as the Rest of Us) with a Government Program, you can be erased. Hence abortion and euthanasia. And they call themselves `Progressives'.

Welcome to the Brave New World.

Intense.

What to Drink?

2005-02-05T16:27:00.000-05:00

Feast on wine or fast on water
And your honour shall stand sure,
God Almighty's son and daughter
He the valiant, she the pure;
If an angel out of heaven
Brings you other things to drink,
Thank him for his kind attentions,
Go and pour them down the sink.

From G.K. Chesterton's "The Song of Right and Wrong."

Murder

2005-02-02T18:23:00.000-05:00

Make no mistake about it, to starve Terri Shiavo is to murder her. It horrifies me and enrages me to see the way this sad case has been twisted around to suggest that killing her would be an act of compassion. People say that they should just "let her die." Its something that one hears all the time. This is the product of a false, stupid, and simply evil myth. TERRI IS NOT DYING. Please get this through your head. She is not on life support. She simply cannot feed herself (neither can a baby, by the way) because she is disabled, so she is being fed. She is NOT in a coma, and she is not in a vegetative state. If they stop feeding her, she will die a horrendous death: by starvation (you know, like the people from Africa you see on pictures?).

When I was growing up, my friend's sister was severely mentally handicapped. Her name was Monica and she was loved and cared for by her family. Her situation was very dire, and cognitively speaking, I seriously doubt she was better off than Terri. However, to anyone who ever met Monica, it would have been painfully obvious that if her family had suddenly decided to stop feeding her, it would have been nothing less than murder.

Of course, Terri's family cares for her and would never do such a thing. It is her "husband," who now has another woman, who longs to make things easy for himself by getting rid of her. This is a warped reason for killing somebody, if I ever heard one.

But why don't you check Terri out yourself? You can go see some videos of her on the Terri's Fight website to see just how "vegetative" she is. Do it.

Myths about Terri's case:

MYTH: Terri has been in a persistent vegetative state, a coma, or is terminally ill, for 13 years.
FACT: NO. Terri is disabled and has brain damage, but is not in PVS, coma, or terminally ill.

MYTH: Removal of food and hydration is "death with dignity" and painless.
FACT: NO. Removal of food and hydration is "death with gross indignity" and monstrously painful and ugly even with morphine or other drugs.

MYTH: Food and hydration are "extraordinary means", and thus a patient has the right to refuse.
FACT: NO. Even, and especially, in secular terms, while the use of ventilators, drastic surgery, experimental "therapies", etc., are extraordinary means and may be refused, food and hydration have always been defined in medicine as ordinary means, or "palliative care" (as is the use of antibiotics, needed X-rays, minor surgery, etc.). For Catholics, it is morally permissible to refuse extraordinary means, but not morally permissible to refuse ordinary means, or palliative care (including food and hydration).

Please, please stand against this horrible injustice! Call your representatives at the Florida State Legislative branch. Or, at the very least, pray for her.

Any person with the least bit of concern for the dignity of human life should stand firmly against this. Do you realize what you are saying about the value of the life of physically or mentally handicapped people? Can't you understand that you are saying to a whole class of people that their life is worthless? And they don't like it. Just go to the Not Dead Yet website and see for yourself. How dare you tell somebody that it would be better for them to be dead?!

Some Food for Thought

2005-01-31T01:50:00.000-05:00

In case you find yourself with nothing do or happen to be in the mood for pondering the meaning of existence, I suggest you head over to Peter Kreeft's site and check out his "Twenty Arguments For the Existence of God." There he has compiled and summarized several arguments in an intelligent and approachable manner that serve as a good starting point for anyone interested in these questions.

Penn for Life in the News!

2005-01-30T02:31:00.000-05:00

Penn for Life has been getting some major media coverage during the past couple of weeks. The group has recently appeared in the Daily Pennsylvanian, the Christian Science Monitor, the National Right to Life website, and even the Wall Street Journal online. It's a good moment to be part of the club, though there is still a lot of work to do. Congratulations to our fearless leaders Nina and Frank. Go ahead and check out the following links:

National Right to Life article

Christian Science Monitor article

Wall Street Journal online (type "Penn" in the "Edit/Find" tool of your browser since the article is pretty far down the page by now)

The Daily Pennsylvanian

Penn For Life homepage

P.S.: I'll post about the awesome experience of going to the March for Life later on when I have some pictures!

Breaking Myths in the Minds of Secular Fundamentalists

2005-01-26T15:13:00.000-05:00

George Weigel's latest column about a rising female liberal Catholic politician in the UK is a must read. I am posting the full column below; I hope (and beg) that nobody will sue me. You can find Weigel's column, The Catholic Difference, at the Ethics at Public Policy Center website.

Ruth Kelly, Myth-Breaker
By George Weigel
Posted: Tuesday, January 25, 2005

ARTICLE
The Catholic Difference

Late last year, when Italian philosopher and cabinet minister Rocco Buttiglione was denied the post of European Minister of Justice because his convictions on sexual ethics and marriage were unacceptable to a gaggle of libertine Euro-parliamentarians, there was a certain plausibility to the whole exercise – at least from the point of view of secularists, leftists, and the establishment European media. Buttiglione, after all, was a minister in a center-right Italian government; Buttiglione is a devout, intellectually astute Catholic whose thinking is shaped by natural law reasoning and Catholic moral theology; and it’s an article of faith in the left-leaning worlds of European secularism (which include most of the mainstream Euro-media) that Catholic + conservative = in vitro fascist.

Why, then, has Britain’s Ruth Kelly been getting the Buttiglione Treatment in recent weeks?

Who, you ask, is Ruth Kelly? Let me introduce you.

Born in Northern Ireland in 1968, Ruth Kelly is a graduate of Oxford and the London School of Economics, where she earned a masters degree in the dismal science. After working as an economics correspondent for the (very left-oriented) Guardian, and later at the Bank of England, Kelly was elected to Parliament at age 29 in 1997 as a Labor Party candidate. Having held a series of sub-cabinet posts, Ruth Kelly was appointed to the cabinet last month by Prime Minister Tony Blair as Education Secretary. (At which point, observers remembered that Britain’s first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, was another Oxford graduate who’d begun her ministerial career in the department 36-year old Ruth Kelly now headed.)

Then came the Buttiglione Treatment.

The fact that Ruth Kelly doesn’t conform to certain feminist conventions – she’s a Catholic, a daily communicant, married once, the mother of four small children, and vigorously pro-life – evidently didn’t agree with one fellow-MP (another woman, no less), who labeled Kelly "that cow." Kelly’s previous decisions to decline the Health and Overseas Development cabinet portfolios because those jobs would have entangled her with contraception and abortion didn’t sit well with the keepers of the feminist flame, either.

The British science establishment quickly went into its default mode in such matters: the Galileo case was back! A senior geneticist, Dr. Robin Lovell-Badge, told newspapers that it was "very worrying" that someone with Kelly’s religious convictions might, in overseeing government funding of scientific research, impede embryo-destructive stem-cell research, thus producing a "schizophrenic" and "confused" situation like that in the United States. (By which adjectives, Dr. Lovell-Badge apparently evidently means a situation in which the law requires that scientific experimentation take place within boundaries that protect innocent human life.) The Times of London summed up this change in the Ruth Kelly indictment by writing that "some MPs [Members of Parliament] fear her religion may cloud her judgment."

"Cloud" was the give-away, of course. In an objective news story, that sentence would have concluded, "...inform her judgment." But in the intellectually insular world of European secularism – which has many parallels on this side of the Atlantic – religious faith in general and Catholicism in particular are, by definition, obscurantist and irrational. How could Catholic moral theology "inform" anyone’s judgment? Catholicism, according to the settled mythology of the Euro-secularist left, clouds judgment. Or distorts judgment. Or replaces "judgment" with robotic obedience.

Inflamed by The Da Vinci Code, British conspiracy theorists are in a lather because Ruth Kelly has participated in activities organized by Opus Dei. What really earned Ruth Kelly the Buttiglione Treatment, though, is the fact that she’s a myth-breaker: day by day, her public life refutes the canard that serious public Catholicism in the 21st century means incipient fascism. For who could plausibly accuse this bright and accomplished trade union member of being – gasp! – one of those dreaded conservatives? Conservatives and former Guardian writers don’t get elected Labor MP for Bolton West.

Ruth Kelly isn’t just a sign of contradiction for Britain’s secular left, though. What will accommodationist Catholic legislators in America – Nancy Pelosi and Barbara Mikulski, for example – make of a popular, competent, liberal, Oxford-certified Catholic woman and politician who’s convinced that Humanae Vitae and Evangelium Vitae got it right?

Song of the Snow

2005-01-21T01:31:00.000-05:00

How to Avoid God

2005-01-18T01:12:00.000-05:00

A former atheist gives the following advice:

Avoid silence, avoid solitude, avoid any train of thought that leads off the beaten track. Concentrate on money, sex, status, health and (above all) on your own grievances. Keep the radio on. Live in a crowd. Use plenty of sedation. If you must read books, select them very carefully. But you'd be safer to stick to the papers. You'll find the advertisements helpful; especially those with a sexy or a snobbish appeal.

- C. S. Lewis, "The Seeing Eye"

Listen Up Cynics!

2005-01-06T02:15:00.000-05:00

To see through all things is the same as not to see.
-C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man

A Brief Agenda

2005-01-05T23:41:00.000-05:00

As a general rule I try to encourage consistency whenever possible. Thus, I have decided to point out something that secularist reformers committed to the separation of Church and State ought to add to their agendas in order to be more effective in their efforts - names of cities. I am deeply disturbed that apparently no one has paid attention to such an offensive reality in the past. Has no one realized how offensive the names of some of our cities are? These names need to be changed for more appropriate ones that do not violate our beloved secular identity. There is no telling what may happen if my suggestions are not heeded and these blatantly offensive and fanatically religious forms of influence are allowed to persist in society. Here is the list:

1. Los Angeles, California: I realize that most Americans might not have gotten perfect grades during Spanish class in high school, but come on, this one is just to obvious to ignore! To call one of our most populous and important cities after these strange beings that clearly derive from the Judeo-Christian patriarchal religion and which are closely connected with an outdated black-and-white morality could hardly be more insulting to our open, multi-cultural society. Fortunately, some progress has been made by transforming the city's name to LA, but this is not enough. Who knows what may happen if one day a child decides to ask what those two letters stand for? Let us not dwell long on such dark thoughts, but I will say that I fear such talk may inevitably lead to the G word. For this reason, I suggest re-Christenin... I mean, renaming the city Lots of Actorston; that way, when kids ask, they'll get an answer that sounds logical enough and inquire no further. A tragedy will be averted.

2. Santa Fe, New Mexico: Who was the right-wing fanatic that named this one? Santa Fe means nothing less than Holy Faith - as in, the Holy Faith. What could be more more exclusive or offensive? Next thing you know, the Pope will be running for mayor! This cannot be tolerated within a progressive society like our own. I propose we change the name to Santa's Fair! The switch wouldn't be too dramatic, and it would be great for business. We could turn the entire town into a magical Holiday Land Themepark all year round! And as we know, Santa's really for everyone, so no one need be offended.

3. San Antonio, Texas: One ought to expect something like this from the most backward state in the Union. San Antonio? Give me a break! When will this end? Who thought of the idea of naming cities after "saints," or more accurately, ignorant religious weirdos? The worst part is that there are many saints that go by this name, and by the time some inquisitive person is done finding out about all of them they might well be converted! To think that one of these "Saint Anthonies" was the very founder of Christian monasticism! There is really no telling what could happen. Our malls might suddenly go empty with people going off into the mountains to worship in some strange building. Thousands of boutiques would close and, and... well, its just too horrible to think about. Again, immediate action is needed. Indeed, what we need is an action hero! I propose that, from now on, the city be called Antonio Banderasburg. It would pay tribute to a great actor who has enriched our culture with touching works of art. And it wouldn't be offensive - everyone loves Antonio.

Well, you guys get the idea. All this needs to be done soon. The very deliverance of our State from the grasping claws of the religious-right depends on it.

And now the final question of the night: What would a secularist do if the separation of Church and state were one of the Ten Commandments?

Tangerine

2005-01-05T19:06:00.000-05:00

It annoys me when I have to cut open a tangerine as if it were an orange - the whole point of a tangerine is that it can be peeled with ease.

A Load of Good Ol' Fashioned Crap

2005-01-05T01:03:00.000-05:00

I've been wanting to post during the last few days but for some reason every time I sit in front of the computer it feels like writing would be too much of an effort. Given that unfortunate state of affairs, I have decided to just write something, anything, no matter how crappy, just to see if I can get my drive for writing "un-stuck." I think part of the problem is a short story that I've been writing since the summer. At any given moment I think that I'm just days away from finishing it, but it somehow has continued to drag on for months. The worst part is that, actually, I have not even written that much. It can't be more than two pages (single spaced). And I don't even know if it's going to work or not. At first it seemed really straightforward, but once I started writing it, it really began to get me into all sorts of trouble. Now I think I've finally found a way to make the story work, but I'm not sure whether I'll get my self in a pickle again once I summon the strength and patience to sit down and work on it. I was supposed to finish it during this Christmas break, but it doesn't seem like that's going to happen.

In other news, I've started looking for a job since it actually seems like in less than six months I'll be Penn alum. It's very difficult to believe that undergrad is almost over since I really still feel like a freshman (though smarter and better looking, of course). At the same time, by now I've started getting excited about graduation and having a "real" job. It's somewhat of a surreal experience to think that I probably will be getting a salary, one of those strange things that you hear about from older generations. From what I've heard, it works a little bit like a drug: it becomes a real necessity and you always need it in larger quantities. My plan, however, is to kick the habit in one or two years, in order to go to grad school. The problem is that I have simply no clue what I would want to study. I know that I want to learn much, much more, but grad school is much more focused than undergrad so I don't know what to pick. I sort of wish I could take an extra two years of random classes for pleasure; that would be amazing! Especially if I didn't have to worry about my GPA. But in any case, I'm still excited about graduation, it looks like a pretty intense experience.

Also, next semester I'm going to be writing my senior International Relations thesis. I'm quite enthused about it. I still don't know what specific issue I'm going to be dealing with, but it's probably going to have something to do with the Church and European international relations during the latter half of the 20th Century. If you know of any development during this period that you think would be good to explore, please let me know, I'm still shopping around for stuff to analyze. I'm thinking of posting my progress up on the blog as I go along, that way you guys can help me out with your comments.

And now let's go back to the jobs thing. I just can't seem to be able to decide what kind of job I would want. The problem is that I want a job in which I can help people, think and use my analytical skills, write, and get paid a decent amount. I also want a job that will look good on a grad school application, and hopefully one which allows me to stay within a two-hour radius of Philly. These restrictions end up making my job search pretty difficult. Every job that I might like for one reason, ends up failing on another level. Thus, jobs that I might enjoy would either not be likely to help me get into grad school, or pay salaries that are less than ideal. Of course, I really have no right to whine, since my prospects of getting a job are still looking fairly good, which is more than a lot of people can say. And yet I can't help but wonder: could there not be an eccentric billionaire out there willing to pay me for blogging, pseudo-philosophizing and just having fun? Such people ought to exist.

Wow, what a long and boring post. Sounds like something out of LiveJournal. Dear readers, I sincerely apologize. Please don't hate me.

El Año Viejo

2005-01-01T02:30:00.000-05:00

Porro de Crescencio Salcedo

Yo no olvido el año viejo,
Porque me ha dejado cosas muy buenas,
Ay yo no olvido el año viejo,
Porque me ha dejado cosas muy buenas!

Me dejo una chiva, una burra negra,
Una yegua blanca y una buena suegra.
Ay me dejo una chiva, una burra negra,
Una yegua blanca y una buena suegra!

Yo no olvido el año viejo,
Porque me ha dejado cosas muy buenas.
Yo no olvido, yo no olvido el año viejo
Porque me ha dejado cosas muy buenas.
Me dejó una chivita, una burra muy negrita,
Una yegua muy blanquita y una buena suegra.
Me dejó, me dejó, me dejó, me dejó
Cosa buena, cosa muy bonita!

Tremendous Trifles wishes you a Happy New Year 2005!!!

Silliness and Cultural Relativism

2004-12-29T19:13:00.000-05:00

I have a problem with Cultural Relativism. Although this theory has indeed served the purpose of contradicting justifications within the academia for the dominion of some supposedly more advanced cultures over other “primitive” ones, it is simply not sensible to accept it as a correct and adequate basis for understanding societies. Here is why:

An idea cannot be self-contradictory and remain true. Cultural Relativism brings forth the idea that no culture can be better than another - something that at first sounds nice, warm, and politically correct. This is a perspective that is supposed to give us and egalitarian view of the world. Nevertheless, if no culture or society can ever be better than another, this in fact means that efforts towards social change actually gain nothing, even if effective, as the new order attained is supposed to be just as good (or bad) as any other. Such a view in fact destroys the idea of progress; the notion that positive change can be promoted and achieved. However, since it can be supposed that Cultural Relativism arises as a new way of looking at society, it is in fact aiming at change, and if this theory thinks of itself as meaningful at all, then it can be said that it aims at positive change - it seeks to be a tool for humanity to better its understanding of the world. In other words, it seeks progress. Unfortunately, as this theory destroys the idea of progress in the way that has already been explained, it renders itself useless and unable to attain what it originally should have. Indeed, this theory self-destructs, as in denying the idea of progress it implies that its own existence is indifferent, as nothing “better” can be attained through it. Furthermore, as it both upholds the idea of progress (through its mere existence) and at same time destroys this idea through its content, it is undeniably self-contradictory. Cultural Relativism can thus hardly be a coherent way of looking at the world and the differences between human societies.

Some people think that Cultural Relativism is useful given that it is difficult to reach a consensus about which societal views are superior to others, but such a position cannot be anything less than sheer dishonesty. If an idea is not true, it should very simply not be accepted. Rather, let Cultural Relativism die a pitiless death, and allow civil debate about the various merits of our different civilizations to enrich us all. That would be true progress.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

2004-12-27T23:23:00.000-05:00

I just finished watching A Series of Unfortunate Events, and I must say that the title of this movie could hardly be more appropriate. I should have taken the hint before buying the ticket, or even later when the narrator entreated the audience to leave the theater. Why, oh why, didn't I listen to him? I only have myself to blame, I guess. This movie delivers exactly what it promises: a series of very, very unfortunate events - for the viewers.

Dear readers, please, please stay away from this unimaginative, badly acted, horribly put together marketing scam masquerading as a film. You've been warned.

A Thought on Christmas

2004-12-24T16:33:00.000-05:00

(from The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton)

This sketch of the human story began in a cave; the cave which popular science associates with the cave-man and in which practical discovery has really found archaic drawings of animals. The second half of human history, which was like a new creation of the world, also begins in a cave. There is even a shadow of such a fancy in the fact that animals were again present; for it was a cave used as a stable by the mountaineers of the uplands about Bethlehem; who still drive their cattle into such holes and caverns at night. It was here that a homeless couple had crept underground with the cattle when the doors of the crowded caravanserai had been shut in their faces; and it was here beneath the very feet of the passers-by, in a cellar under the very floor of the world, that Jesus Christ was born. But in that second creation there was indeed something symbolical in the roots of the primeval rock or the horns of the prehistoric herd. God also was a Cave-Man, and had also traced strange shapes of creatures, curiously coloured, upon the wall of the world; but the pictures that he made had come to life.

About the Two Posts Below

2004-12-23T03:09:00.000-05:00

The two essays that I have just posted are just a small fraction of the many end-of-semester tasks that have kept me away from my blog for the past few weeks. Although I realize that very few people would actually want to read them, I posted them up for a couple of reasons. First, they are to stand as proof that I have been writing quite a bit, despite what my recently negligent attitude towards my blog may suggest. Secondly, I'd like to help out fellow students who may need ideas for writing about these topics in the future. Thirdly, at three in the morning this seemed like a good idea. Finally, I just know that there are nerds big enough out there to actually want to read this type of stuff.

Make Up Your Mind

2004-12-21T20:27:00.000-05:00

We love babies. They're cute and cuddly and they make us talk like idiots. Fetuses? Well, fetuses we don't seem to mind aborting. And yet, are we really that sure of the difference between the two? The media reaction to the murder of Bobbie Jo Stinnett and the subsequent theft of her baby?/fetus? is revealing the pathetic confusion within the pro-"choice" world about what constitutes a human being and what is supposedly nothing but a "clump of cells." An article by Rich Lowry on National Review deals with this linguistic confusion in a pretty poignant way. I encourage you to read the whole thing (but in case you're too lazy, I have attached some excerpts below). One just has to wonder, for how long are pro-choicers going to continue in this appalling state of denial? Lowry says:

During the coverage of the crime, the status of the Bobbie Jo Stinnett's unborn girl steadily changed. All at once on AOL News during the weekend, there were headlines tracking events in the case: "Woman Slain, Fetus Stolen"; "Woman Arrested, Baby Returned in Bizarre Murder"; "Infant in Good Health." Note how a "fetus" something for which American law and culture has very little respect was somehow instantly transformed into a "baby" and "infant" for which we have the highest respect. By what strange alchemy does that happen?

An AP story effected this magic transition all in one sentence: "Authorities said Montgomery, 36, confessed to strangling Bobbie Jo Stinnett of Skidmore, Mo., on Thursday, cutting out the fetus and taking the baby back to Kansas." At one point, when Montgomery was still at large, an Amber Alert went out about the Stinnett girl, putting news organizations in the strange position of reporting such an alert for what many of them were still calling a "fetus."

Given that fetuses are routinely destroyed in America (and legally can be destroyed up to the point of delivery), it was odd to see such an uproar about the welfare of one. Indeed, it is tempting to say that from a pure legal point of view, Lisa Montgomery simply killed the wrong victim, taking the life of the mom instead of the fetus.

But that's not entirely true. Earlier this year Congress passed the Unborn Victims of Violence Act partly in reaction to the Peterson case, making it a crime to harm an unborn baby while assaulting the mother. Kate Michelman, president of NARAL, complained that President Bush is doing "everything in his power to restrict a woman's right to choose." Right to choose what? To have her baby harmed by an assailant?

(...)When we mourn not just for the women, but for the babies destroyed in such terrible acts, we commit a kind of transgression against the strictest pro-choice orthodoxy. Pro-choicers have a hard time explaining why, if Bill Clinton was right that abortion should be "legal, safe and rare," the practice should be rare. One reason is that there is a continuity between the "fetus" and "baby."

Otherwise, why do we rejoice over ultrasound images of the unborn? Why do we give them names? Why do we pray for their health and happiness? Why are we so quick to go from calling them fetuses to babies?

Chilly Philly

2004-12-20T13:39:00.000-05:00

Weather.com says that it feels like -4 degrees Fahrenheit with the windchill, that is -20 Celsius. These my friends, are temperatures people from the tropics like me don't even understand. You might as well tell me that its negative Gazillion degrees out there and it would sound the same to me (it certainly feels that cold!). In other words: I LOVE THE WINTER!!!

2004-12-10T02:33:00.000-05:00

Some Christmas humor from yours truly...

I'm Back

2004-12-07T01:08:00.000-05:00

Some way or another, it seems that I survived last week. Some highlights include virtually spending the weekend at the library and writing a nine page "historiographical analysis" of the European revolutions of 1848 (between Sunday at 11:30 p.m. and Monday at 10:40 a.m., mind you). But in any case, the important thing is that I made it. I'm still considering, however, whether I should turn last night's events into an epic poem. All the necessary elements are there, though given the quality of my paper, the prospects don't look promising for the hero. In any case, until the onslaught of finals (or "semifinals," I guess, since this is my penultimate semester as an undergrad... Get it? Get it?) I hope to be posting more frequently than I have during the past couple of weeks, so check back in soon for new stuff. Later!

A Christmas Carol

2004-11-30T03:23:00.000-05:00

(Advent is finally here! The following is a nice little poem to get us started on the right foot)

By G.K. Chesterton

The Christ-child lay on Mary's lap,
His hair was like a light.
(O weary, weary were the world,
But here is all aright.)

The Christ-child lay on Mary's breast,
His hair was like a star.
(O stern and cunning are the kings,
But here the true hearts are.)

The Christ-child lay on Mary's heart,
His hair was like a fire.
(O weary, weary is the world,
But here the world's desire.)

The Christ-child stood at Mary's knee,
His hair was like a crown.
And all the flowers looked up at Him,
And all the stars looked down.

Keep Reading!

2004-11-26T13:00:00.000-05:00

Hello imaginary readers! How are you doing? This is just a short post to let you know that I am currently swamped with ridiculous amounts of work for school and so I will not be blogging very much until next Friday; however, once that is over, I have a bunch of pretty good ideas stored up, so please come by and check them out. Of course, by "good" I mean repetitive and whinny, but you don't mind, do you? I mean, do you really ever do anything better with your time? I didn't think so... See you in a week then!

Get Yourself Some Air

2004-11-18T19:27:00.000-05:00

Air: we all like it, we all need it, and now we can take it in through our ears. Listen to chill, quality music by Air and other bands at Astralwerks. I highly recommend Alpha Beta Gaga, which you can listen to by clicking here. Enjoy!

My Addictions

2004-11-13T01:42:00.000-05:00

I crave knowledge. I really do. You know how in high-school, when you were applying to college they sent you all these silly brochures telling you what a "stimulating, challenging environment" you would find? You know how they would always talk about how at whatever the particular school was, there you could find a place that would be apt for the pursuit of knowledge? You remember how in light of this you said "yeah right?" I do. I mean, not that I didn't care about learning, but I didn't crave knowledge. Now I do. I wish I could take it all in faster, and I wish I was not so lazy about actually seeking it. These is SO MUCH TO LEARN OUT THERE. You have no idea. Really. It turns out that it really is true that the more you learn, the more you realize you don't know anything. Seriously. I feel like a complete ignoramus. There will never be enough time in this life to take it all in. And that is just awesome, I think.

Who would have ever thought that I would really feel like this one day? I crave truth. I'm in love with it, in fact. But it always seems to stay one step ahead of me; that much I've figured out. When will I finally be able to grab on to wisdom? I see it, it's just ahead of me, but I can never quite reach it. And you know what? That's awesome too. I think its great that so many works, so many beauties of this world are still out there, waiting to be discovered. There is just so much to learn that there is no way we can even begin to begin to comprehend it. I love that.

You know what else I crave? I crave love. I crave beauty. I can never seem to get enough of these. Not because I'm not surrounded by love and beauty a-plenty, but I think rather because I am. There are so many wonderful people and so many beautiful things that I know. But love and beauty are addictive. You really can't get some without wanting more. And you know want? Once again, that is simply great. Because love and beauty point us upwards, they remind us that we have souls. They work on our hearts like a hard (but lovely) slap across the face reminding us that we can never be reduced to set of particles, atoms and chemical reactions. Either that, or existence is a superstition. But then it is a glorious, grand, and mighty superstition. Terrible at times? Yes, no doubt. But what an amazing dream reality is. We haven't even begun to understand the mystery of a blade of grass.

Many people think that Heaven means of a bunch of people with wings playing harps on a cloud. I've heard that it means an eternal learning, an unending love affair, an interminable contemplation of the source of all love and truth and beauty and knowledge and wisdom. Nay, it means standing before love and truth and beauty and knowledge and wisdom themselves. Always. Forever.

I can barely wait. Good thing He came down here so that all this can start - now.