reunion date set

Speaking of which, anybody interested in catching Nativity Old Style this year? Or at least the vigil? Not necessarily ROCOR [it's quite a hike], possibly Serbian if it's closer? It's a good excuse to visit the Slavs and see how it all really should be done.

score one for the papists

After reading some positively vomit-inducing remarks by an Orthodox convert from Catholicism about how spiffy Orthodoxy is, I took to thinking about the book I just finished, Brideshead Revisited. Quite unfortunately, such a book would be impossible in modernity if the characters were Orthodox and not Catholic, and this is a major strike against Orthodoxy. None of the characters could licitly divorce, and rightly so. None of the characters could licitly remarry, and rightly so. Julia and Charles, in the end, have to give up their affair and live as celibates, and rightly so. Such is the Law of God. Quite thankfully, they are in the end given the grace needed to live their lives as such. The modern Orthodox methodology, however, would probably let at least one of the couples "off the hook", if not more. Quite fortunately, we have not gotten so far as to possibly ever allow Julia and Charles "off the hook" and let them marry each other, but even taking the first steps down that path is horrible. So, kudos to you, Roman Catholics, for getting one right and, in the process, producing great literature. I believe that's what's known as a "twofer".

EDIT: how ridiculously pathological it is that, in the free moments I have waiting to leave for the great city of $HOMETOWN I am writing web-log entries about how lame some fanatics are and how awesome Catholics are. I'd link to the post I refer to, but I haven't found a way to direct you to a version that won't make your eyes bleed. And, don't worry, if I did so, I would tell the person who wrote the post, I'm not one for anonymous hit-and-run type stuff.

EDIT: I just added a link to a post I made about this same fellow earlier. I believe he was also elliptically-referred to here, but it was quite likely somebody else.

Quomodo sedet sola civitas...

...plena populo [etc etc]! Just finished Brideshead Revisited. Ierusalem, Ierusalem, convertere ad Dominum Deum tuum! I'm going to start giving out copies to my modernist friends [either this or Liberalism is a Sin]. Looks like I made a good choice when deciding between this and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead, because this was certainly the balm I needed. Next on the list: find a way to score Gilead, 'cause Iowans got to represent.

I've gotta get out of here.

And find my way again, I've lost my way again. The crystal lake, it only laughs, it knows you're just a modern man. It's shining like the chandelier, shining somewhere far away from here.

So I've fled Chicago for the week for the great state of Iowa. I've lost my way again and I am just a modern man.

What else has lost its way: it seems my latest paycheck lost its way to the bank? #@$@#.

I doubt you or I are one of the two who could understand...

...but the post linked is worth reading.

What we can really be certain about in life is very, very little, and it seems with the passing of time it becomes less and less. Certainty as a sentiment is not the test of faith, deeds are. It is not that we have to lie about our difficulties, our opinions, and our failures in order to believe. The key is to accept them and to keep going. To keep going to Orthros at four in the morning, to keep going to Mass on Sunday even if everything is not perfect, and to keep striving to love even if you know you will fail is how we will make it through this vale of tears. There is no certainty in this: there is only duty and resolve, and that duty and resolve must come from the heart.

I commented previously...

...on Protestants taking an interest in history ceasing to be Protestant and enjoying reading the works of Protestants who do indeed take an interest in history. I have found a delightful web-log run by Protestants who take a look at history and seemingly aren't ceasing to be Protestant. In the process, they write some delightful articles, like the above. A precis: he criticizes Mark Driscoll, apparently big name, for his publicized approach to sermon writing for its making the sermon the focal point of Christian worship rather than, say, the sacraments or God's Word [I'd throw in: "or God"], which was the focus in historic Christian worship. Incisive, ecumenical, historically-accurate, and, most of all, defends my point of view. Gets the panheresy seal of approval.

More of the same: an article which points to and summarizes a better article which demolishes the Warfield's assertion that, "The Reformation, inwardly considered, was just the ultimate triumph of Augustine’s doctrine of grace over Augustine’s doctrine of the church." Augustine! Defeating sloganeers! Medieval history and theology! Pointers to a longer work on the same! And the discussion below contains several key insights into how these sorts of arguments work and how to get beyond propaganda to the core of the real issues - quite helpful for those whose model for ecumenism is ecumenism by return. Delightful.

Fun folks to read, they even defend us from time to time. Fascinating world they must live in.

One temptation to resist is to use these digested web-logs as substitutes for my own digging into primary sources, or at least good secondary sources. Quite a temptation because, though I have a passing interest in this sort of subject, my time is finite and I have a lot of other stuff to do. John Cassian and Isaac the Syrian are far more important scholarly concerns if I had the time to pretend to be scholarlike, credibility theory if I had the time to pretend to fulfill professional obligations, the Greek Septuagint if I had time to pretend to fulfill etc etc. In short, it's not that high on my priority queue and my spiritual and professional well-being are a bit more important than chasing the references of so many heretics twice or thrice removed from Christ's Church arguing about how far the second leap-frog is from the third.

Maybe I should just be a sandwich delivery biker and devote my time to higher pursuits rather than being an aspiring quaestuary. Or something.