Retribution at Walter Reed

From the Army Times: Walter Reed patients told to keep quiet. Steps taken to make it harder for them to speak to media.

The SSPX and the Latin Mass

Interview with SSPX Bishop Fellay; another with Archbishop Malcom Ranjith; another from a Mexican newspaper.
A major problem with any talk of reconciliation with the SSPX is its hostility to Jews, ecumenism,  and religious liberty. If these are not addressed openly … there will be problems.

On Closing a Parish

dotCommonweal reports that Cardinal Egan called a priest to his office; while he was there, the Cardinal sent security guards to change the locks on the church of which he was administrator.
New York Post tells the story:
“This church has been here for 102 years. We’re supposed to have a 12:15 p.m. Mass today and [...]

When in Rome …

A new exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science: Imperial Rome. I went to the media preview last week; the lines were long at the buffet and the bar (with men (and women!) in Roman soldier costumes roaming the area), so my son and I went straight to the exhibit.
Lots of busts of emperors, [...]

Walter Reed’s Shame

I spent two and a half months at Walter Reed twenty years ago. Yikes, how time flies! Now, the place is in the news for scandalous warehousing of combat veterans.
Another example of stupidity on the part of civilian bureacrats who didn’t count the cost before going to war? Partly.
Yet this kind of thing happened then, [...]

Did You Hear the One about the Church Signs?

What did one church sign say to the other?
See here.

Adventists and Ash Wednesday

Julius has a post that leads to interesting discussion at ProgressiveAdventism.com.

When Your Mother Reads Your Blog …

She calls you up when you haven’t posted for three days to wonder if you’re out of town. I’ve simply been busy with work and other things, and when on-line I’ve been updating The Oak Tree and my other webpages.
One thing I can say about this week: I gave a talk Sunday at a local [...]

MS Expression Web

OK, I downloaded and tried out Expression Web.
If you’re starting from scratch, get it.
If you have a large existing webpage–forget it. It will not easily convert it. It will tell you about all kinds of errors due to changes of HTML terminology (font, align, border, etc., are all gone; all pictures must have an “alt.”).
If [...]

Cardinal Pell on Global Warming

Keeping a cool head amid warming hysteria.

The C. S. Lewis Battle

Christianity Today has a summary of old arguments over an unpublished C. S. Lewis manuscript. Bottom line: The Dark Tower may be bad, but it is Lewis’s work, pace Kathryn Lindskoog.

The Talmud in Song

“Musical comedy designed to demystify Jewish tradition.”

Bruce Metzger, RIP

Bruce Metzger has died at 93.

“War–What It Is Good For”

Sensible commentary by Jonathan Turley in USA Today, jumping on negative reaction to a December 11, 2006, column in Washington Post by Brigid Schulte, What the Birthday Boy Wants: A War, about a birthday party for her 8 year old son, Liam, which had a World War 2 theme. Some parents refused to send their [...]

Web tools

AOL got me started on the internet, and my first webpage was done with AOL’s Personal Publisher. Next came AOL Press.
Then I started using the FrontPage Express that came with my first computer. Then I bought FrontPage ‘98, and upgraded through 2000, 2002 and 2003.
Now MicroSoft is discontinuing FrontPage in favor of Expression Web. [...]

Healthy Dioceses

Dom has some good thoughts about the Crisis  magazine report about so-called “healthy dioceses,” linking to some responses the Crisis solicited. Dom highlights, and so do I, this comment by Russell Shaw:
Consider: Of the three criteria used in ranking sees, two (priestly morale and priestly vocations) concern clerics, while the third (“effective evangelization”) refers to [...]

Bridge to Terabithia

Christianity Today interviews Katherine Paterson about the upcoming film of her classic children’s book, Bridge to Terabithia. When I was a Lutheran pastor in Montpelier, Vermont, her husband, John, was pastor of the Presbyterian Church in neighboring Barre. I had breakfast with her once; it was a Good Friday ecumenical breakfast at her husband’s church, [...]

Nooma.

What’s a Nooma?

The Bishops and Public Policy

Speakers debate U.S. bishops’ role in addressing U.S. social policy. Unfortunately, no one addressed the really important issue–Did not the bishops in their economic and other pastorals overstep, and intrude into the domain of the lay apostolate?

Free Pancakes at IHOP

Free short stack at IHOP a week from today on what they call National Pancake Day ( in parentheses they say, “also known as Mardi Gras, or Shrove Tuesday”).
All we ask is that you consider making a donation to support local children’s hospitals through Children’s Miracle Network, or other local charities.

Divergent views

Liberal Seventh-day Adventist Johnny Ramirez, writing at the Spectrum Blog (associated with the liberal Association of Adventist Forums), is shocked at the “divergent views on the abortion debate” being advanced by “Amazing Facts,” a long established Adventist apologetics organization. They are speaking in “opposition to well respected Adventist perspectives,” he says. Now I find it [...]

The Vagina Monologues

This is the time of year when Eve Ensler’s play, The Vagina Monologues, is read on many college campuses around the country. The Cardinal Newman Society has made a name for itself by protesting those Catholic college campuses where it is read.
Some comments on the subject: Paul Cat and Christina Dehan are against it, “Sr. [...]

The Dixie Who?

A group that got a Grammy may be gloating … but I don’t know who’s playing their music. I haven’t heard a single song of theirs on the air since they made rude and insulting comments about our president and our nation in a foreign country.

“The Day of the Dolphin”

Navy training dolphins for anti-terrorism?

Accents

I’ve lived so many places I can fake almost any accent. But it looks, according to this quiz, like my many years in Northern Illinois (5th grade through high school) were determinative.

What American accent do you have?
Your Result: The Inland North

 

You may think you speak “Standard English straight out of the dictionary” but when you [...]

Houston.

Houston means one thing in the minds of much of the world–NASA.
And NASA is an important part of the Houston community. When NASA suffers a tragedy, it isn’t just a headline from far away, it is something that hits this city in multiple ways.
Lisa Nowak, subject of much water cooler joking, is a member of [...]

Futility?

fu·til·i·ty (fyū-tĭl‘ĭ-tē)
n., pl. -ties.

The quality of having no useful result; uselessness.
Lack of importance or purpose; frivolousness.
A futile act.

Clint Eastwood says he made his Iwo Jima movies to show the futility of war. He says he wanted to show we are all the same.
Perhaps Mr. Eastwood didn’t pay attention to the [...]

“Hart’s War”

I stumbled onto the 2002 film Hart’s War while flipping channels today. It starts off well enough, a story of racism in the army in World War 2, with a court martial being conducted by American military personnel in a German POW camp. We eventually learn that there is more going on here than it [...]

Justification

Paul McCain links to a post at Concordia blog about justification. He’s worried about things he hears within Lutheranism:
I’ve been growing more and more concerned by articles and comments in Lutheran publications that wax on about the Incarnation but do not mention the Atonement, or articles that talk about “the real presence of Jesus” or [...]

Young Adult Catholics–frozen in time?

New book summarizes old research, and so gives rise a new book tour, and articles in the media. American Catholics Today: New Realities of Their Faith and Their Church is a rehashing of Gallup data from 1987, 1993, 1999 and 2005. The article makes lots of claims about young adult Catholics, but I for one [...]