What was nutty was that the movie folk were trafficking in illusions in a real world but the real world thought that its reality could only be found in the illusions. Two sets of maniacs.
—Lancelot
Paradise is littered with the rusting hulks of splendid Pontiacs, Olds, and Chryslers that developed vapor locks and dead batteries and were abandoned. Nowadays people buy cars, drive them until they break down, abandon them and buy another. Most of my friends have switched to Toyotas, which have one moving part.
Don't tell me the U.S.A. went down the drain because of Leftism, Knotheadism, apostasy, pornography, polarization, etcetera, etcetera. All these things may have happened, but what finally tore it was that things stopped working and nobody wanted to be a repairman.
On his tape On Writing Well, William Zinsser discusses what he considers the most important aspects of writing: clarity, simplicity, brevity, and humanity. Ignoring these leads to crappy writing. As an example, he cites a passage from the book of Ecclesiastes, first from the King James Bible and then juxtaposes it with George Orwell's translation of the same passage into "modern-day bureaucratic sludge:"
I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill, but time and chance happeneth to them all.
Objective consideration of contemporary phenomena compels the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.
Which one makes more sense? Language matters.
Filed under:
Writing
Truth be told I've tried my best
But somewhere along the way
I got caught up in all there was to offer
And the cost was so much more than I could bear
—Sarah McLachlan, "Fallen"
And I keep hearing from the cellar bin
The rumbling sound
Of load on load of apples coming in.
For I have had too much
Of apple-picking: I am overtired
Of the great harvest I myself desired.
—Robert Frost, "After Apple Picking"
Walker Percy is quickly becoming one of my favorite writers. A religion professor of mine, Dr. David Hammond, turned me on to Percy when he gave me a copy of The Thanatos Syndrome. With Christmas money and gift cards, I bought almost all of Percy's novels (the bookstore was out of one). In addition to Thanatos I have now read The Moviegoer and am presently reading The Last Gentleman.
Anyway, I recently read Percy's interview with himself. Here is an excerpt I found particularly profound:
Q. How is such a belief possible in this day and age?
A: What else is there?
Q: What do you mean, what else is there? There is humanism, atheism, agnosticism, Marxism, behaviorism, materialism, Buddhism, Muhammadism, Sufism, astrology, occultism, theosophy.
A: That's what I mean.
Q: To say nothing of Judaism and Protestantism.
A: Well, I would include them along with the Catholic Church in the whole peculiar Jewish-Christian thing.
Q: I don't understand. Would you exclude, for example, scientific humanism as a rational and honorable alternative?
A: Yes.
Q: Why?
A: It's not good enough.
Q: Why not?
A: This life is much too much trouble, far too strange, to arrive at the end of it and then to be asked what you make of it and have to answer "Scientific Humanism." That won't do. A poor show. Life is a mystery, love is a delight. Therefore I take it as axiomatic that one should settle for nothing less than the infinite mystery and the infinite delight, i.e. God. In fact, I demand it. I refuse to settle for anything less. I don't see why anyone should settle for less than Jacob, who actually grabbed aholt of God and wouldn't let go until God identified himself and blessed him.
Q: Grabbed aholt?
A: Louisiana expression.
If so, buy the "Big Bright Green Pleasure Machine:"
Filed under:
Music
Apparently, in 1995 the Vatican composed a list of 45 "great films." Who knew they were into movies? Two of my favorites made the list: It's a Wonderful LIfe and 2001: A Space Odyssey. Fans of Mickey Mouse will be pleased to note that Fantasia also made the list.
Filed under:
Movies
To do science, one must assume that the universe makes some kind of sense, that it behaves according to some kind of logic, that there is an intrinsic order in the universe. If there was no intrinsic order in the universe to discover, there would be no point in doing science. One big question that pops up, then, is the source of this intrinsic order.
St. Athanasius, in his Discourse Against the Pagans, gives the Christian's answer to the source of the order in the universe and insists that this intrinsic order lends support to Christian belief. Writing in the 4th century he says:
For if the movement of the universe were irrational, and the world rolled on in random fashion, one would be justified in disbelieving what we say. But if the world is founded on reason, wisdom and science, and is filled with orderly beauty, then it must owe its origin and order to none other than the Word of God.
. . .
By his eternal Word the Father created all things and implanted a nature in his creatures. He did not want to see them tossed about at the mercy of their own natures, and so be reduced to nothingness. But in his goodness he governs and sustains the whole of nature by his Word (who is himself also God), so that under the guidance, providence and ordering of that Word, the whole of nature might remain stable and coherent in his light.
There are, of course, alternatives to the notion that the universe was endowed with order by its creator. One could always take the multiverse hypothesis: that there are an infinite number of universes popping into and out of existence all the time and we just happen to be in one that appears to make sense. I mean, what with an infinite number of universes, one that makes sense would have to pop up eventually. Infinite universes, yes, that's it! No, we can't really prove their existence, but believing in them without any proof is far more reasonable than the God hypothesis.
Reference: Excerpt from St. Athanasius, Discourse Against the Pagans, in The Liturgy of the Hours Vol. III, Office of Readings for Thursday of the first week of Ordinary Time, pp. 67–68; New York: Catholic Book Publishing Corp., 1975.
And so, to the doctors of death, we proclaim, "Screw off!"
Filed under:
Faith, Hope, Charity, Just Plain Awesome
Something to think about as our Commander-in-chief who, having just accepted the Nobel Peace Prize, is escalating the war effort in Afghanistan:
This lust of sovereignty disturbs and consumes the human race with frightful ills. By this lust Rome was overcome when she triumphed over Alba, and praising her own crime, called it glory. For, as our Scriptures say, "the wicked boasteth of his heart's desire, and blesseth the covetous, whom the Lord abhorreth" [Psalm 10:3]. Away, then, with these deceitful masks, these deluding whitewashes, that things may be truthfully seen and scrutinized. Let no man tell me that this and the other was a "great" man, because he fought and conquered so and so. Gladiators fight and conquer, and this barbarism has its meed of praise; but I think it were better to take the consequences of any sloth, than to seek the glory won by such arms.
(City of God, book 3, n. 14)
