Memento Mori

Happy Halloween!

Michelle Rhee Goes National

She & Adrian Fenty tell the story of their efforts to overhaul DC schools.
It wasn't that our predecessors were incompetent, or that we were the smart ones who had all the answers. Far from it. But the political structure wasn't set up for a mayor and a schools chancellor even to make the kinds of decisions that were necessary. Once that new structure of governance was in place (D.C. instituted mayoral control of the public schools in 2007), we were able to chart a new course: to make all of the politically unpopular choices that had been put off for decades.
Such as:

School districts traditionally lay off teachers using what's called the "last in, first out" principle, with the newer teachers let go first. But this is a classic example of putting the interests of adults above those of children. There were heroic veteran and new teachers alike doing great things for kids every day in their classrooms. In any industry or organization, keeping employees based only on their years of service, regardless of their contribution to success, is simply not good policy. So we decided to allow principals to make the layoffs based on the quality, value and performance of their staffs.
This did not sit well with many in the city, to put it mildly. In particular, it outraged the unions—and not just the teachers union. At a rally in D.C.'s Freedom Plaza—fully outfitted for the occasion with a stage, lighting and port-a-johns—the leaders of the Washington Teachers Union and the American Federation of Teachers were joined by Richard Trumka of the AFL-CIO. They denounced us for making children victims and guinea pigs. A few thousand demonstrators showed up, some of them holding signs with statements like "This is not Rheezistan," accusing us of tyranny and union busting. Hundreds of school districts across the country were laying off teachers at the time, but the union establishment protested en masse only in D.C., where for the first time someone dared to question an entrenched practice that had only served the interests of adults.

On re-negotiating union contracts to get rid of tenure and reward success:

That D.C.'s teachers finally endorsed this revolutionary new contract shows that they, too, are ready for change. When we were negotiating with the union, we heard one thing over and over again from the leadership: "Our members are never going to accept this." In truth, when the union finally allowed them to vote, the teachers passed it overwhelmingly, by 80% to 20%. Given the chance to be treated as professionals and to be rewarded for their achievements, they grabbed it.

Note the capitalism in this revolution:

• It rewards great teachers who accept a higher level of accountability with some of the highest teacher pay in the nation—up to twice as much as they were previously making.
• No longer do educators have a job guarantee for life. Ineffective teachers are immediately dismissed from the system. Minimally effective teachers do not receive a pay step increase and have one year to improve their performance. If that doesn't happen, they are subject to termination.
• If layoffs are necessary, the decisions about whom to dismiss are based on quality and performance instead of seniority.

Preliminary results after their 4-year tenure?

Washington went from being the worst performing school district in the country to leading the nation in gains on the national gold-standard test, the National Assessment of Educational Progress. It was the only jurisdiction in which every student subgroup raised its performance. Graduation rates have increased, and this fall the D.C. public school system saw its first jump in enrollment in 41 years.
The improved achievement of our secondary students was unprecedented in D.C.'s history and unparalleled anywhere in the country, with an uptick of 14 points in reading and 17 points in math in three short years. SAT scores of District students are also rising: up 27 points this year, on average, with a 40-point jump for African-American students and a 54-point jump for male students.
At Sousa Middle School, which was failing when we took office, there is now a dynamic new leader, who is disproving the myth that kids in poor neighborhoods are doomed to fail because of race or poverty. Within months after Dwan Jordon took over, we started to hear from parents that something was different, and in just one year, Sousa gained 17 percentage points in reading proficiency and 25 in math, meeting federal benchmarks for progress for the first time in the school's history. This means that Sousa more than doubled its student proficiency rate in math, and increased its proficiency rate in reading by 70%.
On a recent visit to the school, it was clear why. Before, the students had not been engaged, and walked around with iPods blocking out the dismal environment. A year later, they were in uniforms, and they swarmed excitedly around visitors to talk about the school, their work and their goals. The school had been renovated, and the staff had motivated students to take pride in the new environment, keeping it a clean and positive place for learning. When we told teachers at Sousa that we didn't expect such huge gains every year, they replied that "the horse is out of the barn now." 

Naturally, the people who achieved these things were kicked to the curb in the Democratic primary. Which only goes to show that "home rule" is really union rule. Yet another argument against DC statehood.

The exciting thing is how quickly things can turn around when there is a modicum of liberty and incentive introduced into the system.

Tolerance Does Have Its Limits

And here they are, all laid out. Gotta love that spirit of loving dialogue and evangelization.

Bush Excerpted

In which we zero in like a laser on the popery:

In the chapter "Stem Cells", Bush describes receiving a letter from Nancy Reagan detailing a "wrenching family journey".

But ultimately, Bush writes: "I did feel a responsibility to voice my pro-life convictions and lead the country toward what Pope John Paul II called a culture of life."

In the book, Bush describes an emotional July 2001 meeting with the Pope at the pontiff's summer residence.

Savaged by Parkinson's, the Pope saw the promise of science, but implored Bush to support life in all its forms.

Later, at the Pope's funeral -- and after a prodding from his wife that it's a time to "pray for miracles" -- Bush found himself saying a prayer for the cancer-stricken ABCNEWS anchor Peter Jennings. 

Hmm. Two Protestants who felt the pope's funeral was a privileged moment of grace?

Could Be Anybody

Dear NPR: Let the record show that I am thinking no unauthorized thoughts about all the bomb-on-cargo-plane scares today.

Disincentives

Eldest Weed just asked if he could make pizza from scratch because he had a bad day and is frustrated.

Um, yes. And what can I do to annoy you every night at this time?

What Obamacare Will Do

Let's Repeat The Non-Conformists' Oath

Anyone remember Steve Martin's bit about the non-conformists' oath? Thought of it today when I saw the following bumper sticker (on a prius, natch, with a bunch of other stickers as well).

Annoy Conservatives: think for yourself.

That could go in the "annals of self-awareness" file, except that I got to free-associating about what it means to think for yourself, and decided that "thinking for ourselves" in the manner the bumper sticker envisions is precisely our problem. That kind of thinking for yourself usually precludes learning anything about the topic or listening to anyone.

Which sort of relates to this piece I had in my reader (I am too lazy to make a 2nd post and that's all the segue I can muster) but decided was too funny not to give more attention to it. It's about how "natural" ain't human...or at least about how very selective we are about what we deem "natural." If you read me, you're already familiar with the argument. But the picture captions amused me. And it all winds up to this defense of art and holiness, neither of which is "natural."

Cutting down and processing trees to make paper, grinding bone and plant matter to make ink—all artifice, perfected over centuries. All true poetry is profoundly artificial, a laborious distillation of language: who talks in iambic pentameter?
Even charity is a kind of artifice: we’re not born with the ready-made ability to love our neighbor. Our hearts have to be molded like clay until they start to resemble something beautiful. But that beautiful thing, the thing only achieved in fear and trembling, is our deepest self. We’re made in the image of the great Artist, the great Technician, and our charge is not only to tend the garden, but to complete it.

Me Want Pet Lion

Lion recognizes the woman who rescued him as a cub.

Shockingly, The Press Has It Wrong

John Allen on how the Synod on the Middle East has not been the anti-Israel-fest some headlines would have you believe. All kinds of problems, such as: poor translation, taking one guy's comments for a "Vatican" line, and the guy didn't mean it quite the way the press heard it in any case.... but the nub is:

I realize that there’s a tendency to leap to Machiavellian assumptions about everything that happens in the Vatican -- that everything is somehow scripted from on high and no official or visiting prelate would dare speak out without explicit papal approval.
In truth, however, things are far more loosey-goosey. There’s no “war room” in the Holy See where spin doctors meet at 8:00 a.m. to work out the day’s message; there’s no script approval when senior officials or bishops meet the press.
In that sense, the real story here may be more about the Vatican’s continuing PR problem than any change in its theology of Judaism.
In any event, if one wants to know the official teaching of the Catholic church vis-à-vis Judaism, there’s a wealth of material to draw upon -- beginning with the Vatican II document Nostra Aetate and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. A one-off comment from a single prelate does not, and by definition cannot, carry anything like the same weight.

Isn't it the press that's supposed to champion the free and open exchange of ideas? Yet it's always angry when the Vatican allows people at synods and conferences to say what they actually think -- with the concomitant debate, criticism and acceptance or rejection of the argument.

"Imagine" Rational Thinking. It's Easy If You Try

And now for another round of Die, Boomers, Die! In which boomerism is dissected line by line, without any insult to children's poetry; and John Lennon's "Imagine" gets a second round of scoffing.

What Anti-Catholicism?

The priest in this postcard is wearing an "ignore the poor" button. It's being sent by Minnesota DFL (Democrat-Farm-Labor) party. This is their mailing for campaign season. Their website says:

The Minnesota DFL supports and works to enact the ideals and principles of the Democratic Party and strives to sustain the foundations in our Party’s grassroots history.

Ah, the Know-Nothing grassroots!

(This is rank bigotry --why don't they just cartoon Catholics as rats and have them driven into the sewers? But I have to ask what their complaint can possibly be. Dollars to donuts whatever economic program they're pushing the local bishop also supports.)

Curtsy: Matt Archbold

Update: As I expected, their beef is in favor of Obamacare, which the American bishops support in principle --they just want the abortion funding and conscience crushing out. And the guy they're running this ad against is an evangelical preacher. Apparently no matter who or what your position is, it's always safe to make a dig at the Cat'lics.

Another Tingle Up The Leg On The Campaign Trail

Shamelessly pinched from CMR

How The Decider Decided

People Who Make Me Nervous On Airplanes

In the spirit of Juan Williams, I confess to having to conquer my inner fears about sitting next to these people on airplanes. Rational and experience-induced fears.

• the morbidly obese
• the unshowered
• infants with ear problems
• practicing witches
• chatty salesmen
• newlyweds
• Muslims who listen to NPR

Name That Tune

Shamelessly pinched from CMR

I think they're singing One Hand, One Heart from West Side Story. Or possibly Koko's "I've Got A Little List" from the Mikado.

A Letter From Joe

Yesterday the Vice President wrote to thank me for all I'm doing to support the President's agenda. Today he's asking me for $3 more.

Remember when the GOP was in control?

They drove up record deficits to pass tax cuts for the wealthy at the expense of the middle class.

And now they want to do it again. If they take over Congress, Republicans have promised to go back to the "exact same agenda" that drove our economy into a ditch.

You can't make this stuff up. The exact same agenda.

So I'm going to do everything I can to make sure they don't get the chance. We have a plan in place and 13 days to get it done -- but each and every one of us needs to do what we can today.

Please donate $3 today to help us keep them out of power.
For months, our opponents sat on the sidelines while you helped the President and our allies in Congress move America forward.

Republicans are still clutching that same political playbook.

And folks like Sharron Angle in Nevada, Ron Johnson in Wisconsin, and Tom Corbett in Pennsylvania want to go beyond the failed policies of the past. Backed by millions in special interest money, some Republicans want to cut the minimum wage, gut Social Security, and end Medicare as we know it.

But Barack and I don't believe economic growth in America has to come at the expense of the middle class.

In fact, we believe we're only making progress when hard-working families are doing better -- and, with your help, we're getting there.

Thanks to health insurance reform, no one will have to choose between keeping their home and getting the care they need.

Thanks to student loan reform, more parents can send their kids to college -- even if it looked out of reach in years past.

Thanks to our investments in clean energy, entrepreneurs are creating jobs and writing a new energy future for this country.

That's change we can all believe in. That's change that doesn't discriminate between Democrats, Republicans, or independents. That's the kind of America I believed in growing up in Scranton and raising my boys in Delaware.

Barack and I are going to keep fighting for that America -- and right now, you get to decide how this fight plays out.

Donate $3 or more today and help us finish strong:

https://donate.barackobama.com/CantGoBack

Thanks for all that you do,

Joe Biden

 I'm thinking I could afford to send each of those campaigns $3. You can't make this stuff up.

Wuerl-wind

The Archbishop of Washington is getting a new hat and opening a new seminary. And I think I never got around to linking to his pastoral letter on the new evangelization.

Chaput For Three

Chaput the Great just delivered himself of three addresses at a Religion in the Public Square conference in Victoria, BC.
The middle of the triptych is on the renewal of Catechesis, but begins rather chillingly with a teacher's description of how her kids responded to Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" 20 years ago versus now. I recall reading it freshman year of high school, and the outrage of my fellow students at the ending. My own take-away at the tender age of 14 was the obvious moral bankruptcy of Catholicism. What the hell were these nuns feeding us kids intellectually --because it seemed obvious to me we were being taught to accept the shocking ending. Apparently things have disintegrated from there. You can read Chaput's texts for further spoilers if you need them, otherwise proceed:

Haugaard described one classroom discussion that -- to me -- was more disturbing than the story itself. The students had nothing to say except that the story bored them. So Haugaard asked them what they thought about the villagers ritually sacrificing one of their own for the sake of the harvest.
One student, speaking in quite rational tones, argued that many cultures have traditions of human sacrifice. Another said that the stoning might have been part of “a religion of long standing,” and therefore acceptable and understandable.
An older student who worked as a nurse, also weighed in. She said that her hospital had made her take training in multicultural sensitivity. The lesson she learned was this: “If it’s a part of a person’s culture, we are taught not to judge.”
I thought of Haugaard’s experience with “The Lottery” as I got ready for this brief talk. Here’s where my thinking led me:
Our culture is doing catechesis every day. It works like water dripping on a stone, eroding people’s moral and religious sensibilities, and leaving a hole where their convictions used to be.
Haugaard’s experience teaches us that it took less than a generation for this catechesis to produce a group of young adults who were unable to take a moral stand against the ritual murder of a young woman.  Not because they were cowards.  But because they lost their moral vocabulary.

He's right, and I love what follows about the new barbarism and how it can only be met by people who actually believe what they profess.

I would only add that I suspect the relativism he describes is more shallow than it appears. When I was teaching high school (early 90s at what had been at one time a prestigious Catholic girls' school in the city), on the first day of school I asked the kids whether there was such a thing as truth or if everything we believed about right and wrong was derived from culture and upbringing. To a gal, with the exception of one Greek Orthodox girl in the Sophomore class, they all agreed that we couldn't know right or wrong.

I pressed them pretty hard on this. This was at the height of boycotts of South Africa, and I asked the girls if that meant that we had no argument to make against Apartheid. Was Martin Luther King, Jr. just opining -- not necessarily right?

Their response to that was painful, because there's nothing a teenager hates as much as injustice, and you could see the gears in their heads turning, every fiber of their being straining against bigotry, but they had no way to articulate an argument against it, and in the end my black students just hung their heads, defeated. I almost wept to see it.

But I didn't let up. "So...was what Hitler did wrong?" I asked them.

Silence. And then, hesitantly, in every single class, someone reluctantly raised her hand to say, "...but he really believed it."

"Not what I asked," I replied,  "I didn't ask you about his sincerity. I asked if he was right."

"But we can't judge," they said.

"I'm not asking you to tell me if he's in hell," said I. "I'm asking you if he was right or wrong."

Crickets.

"Would it be right for me to come in with a service revolver and pop off the students in the front row?"

Silence.


That opening class ticked a lot of them off, quite frankly. Got a lot of journal entries from my Seniors that week with poetic entries such as, "Ballad for My Red Sky," stickin' it to the Ma'am (me) for daring to suggest that truth was the right object of search even in Religion class (where they'd been making "Me" booklets and collages previously).


But there were no relativists in any of my classes by the end of the semester. There were serious Christians and some dogged atheists, and some gals who weren't sure what to think but were grateful to have their questions taken seriously. But the relativism didn't go that deep, it had just never been challenged....which Chaput sort of hints at, when he says half the barbarism is caused by the indifference of the faithful.

He opened with: The First Freedom: Religious Liberty as the Foundation of Human Liberty; and closed with: Life in the Late Republic: The Catholic Role in America After Virtue.

Never Has A Political Ad Made Me So Happy

I just heard a radio ad for Steny Hoyer. I have never heard one, though the man has been in office since I was a wee tiny thing.

Do you realize what this means? Steny Hoyer -- a man with a district as gerrymandered as any in the Union-- has to spend money on himself this year.

Go Charles Lollar!  The Hill confirms my ears' suspicions.

Unfortunately for Steny, unlike in 2008, he is the target of the demand for change in 2010. Further, he isn’t getting to run against a tomato can, as Republicans nominated Lollar, whose fiery rhetoric has stirred passions not only in the Tea Party, but also among both the large veteran and African-American communities that Hoyer has traditionally depended upon for his victory margins.

Whether or not he pulls it off, Lollar is doing something important for the country:

Hoyer is now stuck in the district for the remainder of the campaign, as opposed to making appearances for colleagues around the country. ... Like the Marine he is, Charles Lollar is keeping Hoyer pinned down in Maryland, rather than allowing him to ride to the rescue around the country. Win or lose, come Nov. 2, the country will owe Charles Lollar a gigantic thank-you for having the courage and willpower to run in a district where all the “smart” people said it was a waste of time. Sounds like just the kind of guy we need in Congress.

Sobran Judgments

I've been wondering how to note the passing of Joe Sobran, whom I hadn't seen in years but once counted as a friend. He was a gentle, kind soul and yet, as the cliche about the Irish goes, also someone who broke the heart of anyone who ever loved him, and so far no one has been able to remember him without glossing over either the good or the ugly, leaving only caricature. Matthew Scully gets its exactly, exactly, exactly right in this wonderful piece.

As a generation of NR readers will attest, along with friends who knew Joe Sobran longer and better than I did, such talk [about his flaws] does a grave injustice to a good man, to his work, and to those final years when even his judgment deserted him. And it’s certainly no way to speak of the finest writer ever to pass through National Review. To paraphrase Joe in his defense of Laurence Olivier (another Sobran hobbyhorse) against the disparagements of fellow actors, the critics might as well belittle him; there is no hope at all of rivaling him.

Part of the delight of the article is simply so many excerpts from Sobran himself --certainly the most elegant essayist of our time, and for reasons Scully captures perfectly.

His case for the Earl of Oxford rested in part on “voiceprints,” the signature patterns, technique, and tone that could be no one else’s. Joe left his own on 40 years’ worth of essays, columns, and reviews that someone needs to finally gather up into a published collection by our era’s master of plain-English prose. Don’t bother checking his house for the old clips, either, because Joe himself hardly thought to save his own writings, and this in a way was part of his secret: He wrote with so little self-regard. It was a style so natural, comfortable, and unpretentious that even praise like “graceful,” “elegant,” or “polished” — though it was all of those — doesn’t exactly fit Joe’s writing because it suggests intended effect, a desire to impress. And Joe was so convincing because he couldn’t have cared less about impressing — which might also help explain his troubles later on.

Scully pulls out these excerpts for example.

There are natural limits to our sympathies, limits liberalism can only condemn, never respect. And there is no reason to credit its attitude with “idealism.” A robin that took worms to every nest in the forest would not be an ideal robin; it would only be an odd bird.

Joe elaborated:

Nothing is easier than to imagine some notionally “ideal” state. But we give too much credit to this debased kind of imagination, which is so ruthless when it takes itself seriously. To appreciate, on the other hand, is to imagine the real, to discover use, value, beauty, order, purpose in what already exists; and this is the kind of imagination most appropriate to creatures, who shouldn’t confuse themselves with the Creator.

The highest form of appreciation is worship. I don’t insist that there is a correlation between formal religion and conservatism. But there is an attitude prior to any creed, which may make a healthy-minded unbeliever regretful that he has nobody to thank for all the goodness and beauty in his life that he has done nothing to deserve. One might almost say that the crucial thing about a man is not whether he believes in God, but how he imagines God: as infinitely good and adorable, or merely as an authoritarian obstacle to human desire? The opposite of piety is not unbelief, but crassness.

RTWT.

Gary Cooper & Thomas Merton

You may recall this obituary of Patricia Neal, which tells the story of her affair & abortion with Gary Cooper and subsequent conversion to Catholicism and the pro-life cause -- a conversion for which Maria Cooper (Gary's daughter) was the catalyst and Mother Dolores Hart (herself once an actress) was the instrument.

Just to round out the story, I discovered from a snippet in the latest First Things and confirmed through googling that Cooper, too, repented of that abortion and of his womanizing, converted to Catholicism, and made a strained marriage (he and his wife Rocky were separated for four years) into a good one.  Here's Maria Cooper writing about that -- and about an exchange she had with Thomas Merton about her father's passing.

Potpourri of Popery, SS Andre Bessette & Mary Mackillop Edition

Our brothers up north have a new saint today: Andre Bessette. Ditto our friends in Oz, whose Mary Mackillop was likewise canonized, along with four others. (I'm highlighting saints you can speak English to.)

The Montreal Gazette has a wonderfully done piece on how the Vatican recognizes miracles. It seeks outside Church circles for scientific explanations. The article quotes an atheist doctor who was consulted in one such case, without being told who was asking:

It was only after Duffin submitted her report that she learned the Vatican had commissioned her study to verify the story of an alleged miracle attributed to Marguerite d'Youville. Founder of the Grey Nuns, d'Youville was recognized as a saint -the first born in Canada -in 1990.

The Church wasn't looking for a rubber stamp.

"What the church was looking for from me was not to declare that it was a miracle, but to give a scientific explanation, and I didn't have a scientific explanation for why she was still alive," Duffin said. "If I could have provided a scientific explanation, then they would have moved on and looked for a different case."

Loads of other Church news. For example, did you think the Pope was resting at home after his highly successful (there's Benedict bounce and I have the fruits to prove it) trip to Great Britain? Wrongo! Two weeks later he was off to Sicily to confront the Mob --only slightly more smug & imperious than the BBC.

After acknowledging the hardships of living under mafia rule and expressing his desire to strengthen their faith by his presence, the Pope delved into the day's readings, which happened to be about faith and humility.

Jesus taught his disciples to grow in faith, to believe and to entrust themselves increasingly to him, in order to build their own lives on the rock. For this reason they asked him "increase our faith!" (Lk 17: 5). What they asked the Lord for is beautiful, it is the fundamental request: disciples do not ask for material gifts, they do not ask for privileges but for the grace of faith, which guides and illumines the whole of life; they ask for the grace to recognize God and to be in a close relationship with him, receiving from him all his gifts, even those of courage, love and hope.

Which by itself might be a bit bleak, but he goes on:

Jesus, without directly answering their prayer, has recourse to a paradoxical image to express the incredible vitality of faith. Just as a lever raises something far heavier than its own weight, so faith, even a crumb of faith, can do unthinkable, extraordinary things, such as uproot a great tree and plant it in the sea (ibid.). Faith trusting in Christ, welcoming him, letting him transform us, following him to the very end makes humanly impossible things possible in every situation. The Prophet Habbakuk also bears witness to this in the First Reading. He implores the Lord, starting with a dreadful situation of violence, iniquity and oppression. And even in this difficult, insecure situation, the Prophet introduces a vision that offers an inside view of the plan that God is outlining and bringing to fulfilment in history: "He whose soul is not upright in him shall fail, but the righteous shall live by his faith" (Hab 2: 4). The godless person, the one who does not behave in accordance with God, who trusts in his own power but is relying on a frail and inconsistent reality that will therefore give way, is destined to fall; the righteous person, on the other hand, trusts in a hidden but sound reality, he trusts in God and for this reason will have life. 

In a very lovely homily he says some things about humility and how God works in us, and concludes essentially by urging them to take back their streets:

Dear people of Palermo and dear Sicilians, your beautiful Island was one of the first regions of Italy to receive the faith of the Apostles, to receive the proclamation of the Word of God, to adhere to the faith in such a generous way that, even amidst difficulties and persecutions, the flower of holiness always sprang from it. Sicily was and is a land of Saints, belonging to every walk of life, who have lived the Gospel with simplicity and wholeness. To you lay faithful, I repeat: do not fear to live and to witness to the faith in the various contexts of society, in the many situations of human existence, especially in those that are difficult! May faith give you the power of God in order to be ever confident and courageous, to go ahead with new determination, to take the necessary initiatives to give an ever more beautiful face to your land. And when you come up against the opposition of the world, may you hear the Apostle's words: "Do not be ashamed then of testifying to our Lord" (v. 8). One should be ashamed of evil, of what offends God, of what offends man; one should be ashamed of the evil done to the Civil and Religious Community by actions that would prefer to remain in the shade! The temptation of discouragement and resignation comes to those who are weak in faith and those who confuse evil with good and to those who think that in the face of evil that is often profound there is nothing that can be done. On the contrary, those who are firmly founded on faith, who trust totally in God and who live in the Church are capable of conveying the devastating power of the Gospel. This was how the Saints who flourished in Palermo and throughout Sicily down the centuries behaved, as likewise the lay people and priests of today who are well known to you, such as, for example, Fr Pino Puglisi. May they always keep you united and nourish in each one the desire to proclaim, with word and deed, the presence and love of Christ. People of Sicily, look at your future with hope! Bring out the full radiance of the good that you desire, that you seek and that you possess! Live courageously the values of the Gospel to make the light of goodness shine out! With God's power everything is possible!

Similar message for bishops, priests and religious -- except he tells them to be men and women of prayer so they will have something to communicate to others --and to keep alive the memory of many heroic Sicilian saints, especially: 

The Church of Palermo recently commemorated the anniversary of the barbarous assassination of Fr Giuseppe Puglisi, who belonged to this presbyterate, killed by the Mafia. His heart was on fire with authentic pastoral charity; in his zealous ministry he made a lot of room for the education of children and young people and at the same time strove to ensure that every Christian family might live its fundamental vocation as the first teacher of the faith to children. The same people entrusted to his pastoral care were able to quench their thirst with the spiritual riches of this good pastor, the cause of whose Beatification is under way. I urge you to keep alive the memory of his fruitful priestly witness, following his heroic example. 

Following his example...meaning, unto death if necessary. Strong words. Strong words for young people, too, though he takes a slightly different tack than usual. He tells the story of a recently beatified girl and her family to illustrate the power of faith and of family ties. After telling her story, he tells the young people that they know people like her:

In Sicily too there are splendid examples of young people who have grown up like beautiful, vigorous plants, after germinating in the family with the Lord's grace and human collaboration. I am referring to Bl. Pina Suriano, Venerable Maria Carmelina Leone and Maria Magno Magro, a great teacher; to the Servants of God Rosario Livatino, Mario Giuseppe Restivo and to many young people whom you know! Often their activities do not make the headlines because evil is more newsworthy, but they are the strength and future of Sicily! The image of a tree is very significant for representing the human person. The Bible uses it, for example, in the Psalms. Psalm 1 says blessed is the man who meditates on the law of the Lord: "He is like a tree planted by streams of water, / that yields its fruit in its season" (v. 3). These "streams of water" could be the "river" of tradition, the "river" of the faith from which to draw the vital sap. Dear young people of Sicily, be trees that sink their roots in the "river" of good! Do not be afraid of opposing evil! Together you will be like a forest that grows, silent perhaps, but capable of yielding fruit, of bringing life and of deeply renewing your land! Do not give in to the suggestions of the Mafia, which is a path to death incompatible with the Gospel...!

Straight at 'em, once again. He makes an interesting remark at the beginning of that address, too.

The Bishop of Rome goes everywhere to strengthen Christians in the faith, but he then goes home strengthened by your faith, by your joy and by your hope! Therefore, young people and families, we must take seriously this gathering, this get-together, which cannot be solely an occasional or functional event. It has a meaning, a human, Christian and ecclesial value.

In other words, when you visit the Pope, you are not an autograph-seeker. You are seeking and having an authentic religious experience which will give you renewed spiritual energy. This is what the media --and its counterparts among those sour Traditionalists who never think the fuss is really worth the trouble-- miss. He is Peter, and his visits have a power to confirm the brethren, which is the purpose of his office. He picks this up again at the conclusion:

Dear Friends, I know your difficulties in today's social context. They are the difficulties of the young people and families of today, particularly in the south of Italy. And I also know the commitment with which you seek to react to and face these problems, supported by your priests who are authentic fathers and brothers in the faith to you, as was Fr Pino Puglisi. I thank God for having met you, because wherever there are young people and families who choose the path of the Gospel there is hope. And you are a sign of hope, not only for Sicily but also for all Italy. I have brought you a testimony of holiness and you offer me your own: the faces of the many young people of this land who have loved Christ with Gospel radicalism; your own faces resemble a mosaic! This is the greatest gift we have received: to be Church, to be in Christ a sign and instrument of unity, of peace, of true freedom. No one can take this joy from us! No one can take this power from us! Courage, dear young people and families of Sicily! Be holy! At the school of Mary, our Mother, make yourselves fully available to God. Let yourselves be moulded by his Word and his Spirit and you will be even more, and increasingly, the salt and light of this beloved land of yours.

"No one can take this joy from us! No one can take this power from us!"

Other big news: the Synod for the Middle East is underway. Here's the pope's meditation for the opening. A profound theological reflection on theotokos which I will have to ponder. I'm fascinated by a remark he makes about the 81st Psalm (because of number differences, I think it's this one), however, in connection with Christ's cross. He is speaking of Israel's gradual shift to monotheism:

In this Psalm, in a great concentration, in a prophetic vision, we can see the power taken from the gods. Those that seemed gods are not gods, lose their divine characteristics, and fall to earth. Dii estis et moriemini sicut nomine (cf. Ps 81: 6-7): the weakening of power, the fall of the divinities.

This process that is achieved along the path of faith of Israel, and which is summed up here in one vision, is the true process of the history of religion: the fall of the gods. And thus the transformation of the world, the knowledge of the true God, the loss of power by the forces that dominate the world, is a process of suffering. In the history of Israel we can see how this liberation from polytheism, this recognition "Only He is God" is achieved with great pain, beginning with the path of Abraham, the exile, the Maccabeans, to Christ. And this process of the loss of power, spoken in the Book of Revelation, chapter 12 continues throughout history; it mentions the fall of the angels, which are not truly angels, they are not divinities on earth. And it is achieved truly, right at the time of the rising Church, where we can see how with the blood of the martyrs comes the weakening of the divinities, starting with the divine emperor, from all these divinities. It is the blood of the martyrs, the suffering, the cry of Mother Church that brings about their fall and thus transforms the world. 

What follows made splashy headlines (as if the "anonymous capitol that enslaves men" might be Washington, DC) but he is speaking of mammon:

This fall is not only the knowledge that they are not God; it is the process of transformation of the world, which costs blood, costs the suffering of witnesses of Christ. And, if we look closely, we can see that this process never ends. It is achieved in various periods of history in ever new ways; even today, at this moment in which Christ, the only Son of God, must be born for the world with the fall of the gods, with pain, the martyrdom of witnesses. Let us remember all the great powers of the history of today. Let us remember the anonymous capital that enslaves man which is no longer in man's possession but is an anonymous power served by men, by which men are tormented and even killed. It is a destructive power that threatens the world. And then there is the power of terroristic ideologies. Violent acts are apparently made in the name of God, but this is not God: they are false divinities that must be unmasked; they are not God. And then drugs, this power that, like a voracious beast, extends its claws to all parts of the world and destroys it: it is a divinity, but a false divinity that must fall. Or even the way of living proclaimed by public opinion: today we must do things like this, marriage no longer counts, chastity is no longer a virtue, and so on.

These ideologies that dominate, that impose themselves forcefully, are divinities. And in the pain of the Saints, in the suffering of believers, of the Mother Church which we are a part of, these divinities must fall.

Other addresses: to the media

• To the elderly at a home for the aged in the UK. Charming!
• Prayer vigil in Hyde Park
• Homily for the beatification of Card. Newman
• Very interesting reflection on Beethoven v. Arvo Part.

And he's off again -- to Spain-- at the start of November.

Potpourri

• Vatican: JP II elected 32 years ago today; Fr. Samir on the Mid East synod; synod entrusted to new saints. Pope says family is the key to solving economic problems. Lots of interesting stuff on the synod and Muslim-Christian relations at zenit. Rumors of early-Nov consistory.
• Chile: miners out, one of their rescuers to be deacon; Pope kept Chilean miner's flag in his apt.; The resilience of the 33.
• China: Heh. China-EU meetings on religious freedom called "dialogue of deaf." Nobel prize to Liu Xiaobo a boost, however; prayer vigil for imprisoned bishops held in Hong Kong.
• Great Britain: as above, the Anglican bishop of London is the first high-level cleric to announce he's poping under the new Anglican privilege. Post-visit round-up.
• India: Mumbai seminary celebrating 50th anniversary 
• Malta: fighting a proposed divorce law.
• Philippines: population control legislation
• U.S. Obama's Marian devotion? New bishop for San Antonio; KS supreme court allows criminal investigation of Planned Parenthood; is Obamacare killing Catholic hospitals? more from Boston; beige Catholicism; rosary ban in public schools in Colorado Springs (see why); Intercessors of the Lamb shut down. Phoenix diocese adopts Manhattan Declaration, related seminar under fire. Fr. Dubay passes away.

And finally: nun fight

Seeing The Mountain-Top?

A spy who was for a time one of the most highly-placed pro-life lobbyists (if that is not an oxymoron) sent me this AP story, rightly thrilled by the lede:

NEW YORK — An unusually large contingent of female Republican candidates with strong anti-abortion views is heating up debate on the issue and could change the political equation in the next Congress.

He writes:

How long have we waited for this story? Is this the greatest first line every written in an AP story or what? 

He refers to the media's studious 40-year ignorance of the fact that the pro-life movement is the real women's movement. Woman-led, woman-driven, woman-powered --and far outnumbering the so-called "women's movement."

No One Died Of Cancer Before The Discovery of Fossil Fuels

Or so says the Daily Mail.

Cancer is a man-made disease fuelled by the excesses of modern life, a study of ancient remains has found.

I blame the Bush CIA.

He Drilled, Baby, He Drilled

The wonderful story of the rescue of the Chilean miners has an American twist: their rescue was engineered primarily by an American named Jeff Hart, who's made himself into the world's foremost drill expert.

Jeff Hart was drilling water wells for the U.S. Army's forward operating bases in Afghanistan when he got the call to fly to Chile.
He spent the next 33 days on his feet, operating the drill that finally provided a way out Saturday for 33 trapped miners.
"You have to feel through your feet what the drill is doing; it's a vibration you get so that you know what's happening," explained Hart, a contractor from Denver, Colorado.

Update: David Gergen with more on American contributions to this rescue.

In Western Pennsylvania, two companies long-trained by mine collapses in that region rushed to action. They had UPS ship south a specialty drill, capable of creating shafts large enough to fit the men without collapsing, within 48 hours. And UPS did it for free.
Then, working with Chilean crews, Geotec's Kansas-based partner came up with the plan to get the miners to the surface almost two months earlier than the Christmastime date originally projected.

That plan was more or less: Jeff Hart:

Expert driller Jeff Hart, a contractor from Denver, Colorado, was called from Afghanistan, where he was helping American forces find water, to man the machine. The 40-year-old drilled for 33 days straight, through tough mineral ore, to reach the men trapped more than 2,000 feet below.
His comment after breaking through last week? "We got the job done."

Plus there's NASA:

Three NASA doctors have provided advice on how to keep the miners healthy, both physically and mentally. And the design of the rescue pod is the brainchild of NASA engineer Clinton Cragg. Cragg drew on his experience as a former submarine captain in the Navy and directed a team of 20 to conceive of a small 13- foot-long tube to carry the miners one at a time to the surface.
All told, about a dozen Americans decamped to the desert, and many more labored from home, to rescue the miners. The display of generosity and technological ingenuity shows our finest face to the world.

2nd update: Thanks to reader GS (a spy I didn't know I had in NM) for sending me a Catholic angle. One of the American engineers who helped mastermind the rescue is studying to be a deacon. 

Extending The Tax Cuts

Click to enlarge. Shamelessly pinched from Mercatus.org

Instacurtsy

Pop Quiz

Haven't done one of these in awhile. Who said this?

Our federal wallet is stretched to the limit by illegal aliens getting welfare, food stamps, medical care and other benefits, often without paying taxes.... Safeguards like welfare and free medical care are in place to boost Americans in need of short-term assistance. These programs were not meant to entice freeloaders and scam artists from around the world.

Wussington Post

At WaPo, not only can you not cartoon Mohammad, you can't not cartoon him, either. Behold the Wiley cartoon pulled from their October 3 edition.

Curtsy: Big Hollywood whose Greg Gutfield asks:

Why is it that the media keeps reminding us that we shouldn’t exaggerate the threat of a small group of radicals – but completely changes tack when it comes to their own personal safety?

Because Everyone Already Posted the Stereotypes Maps

Click to enlarge. Shamelessly pinched from Happy Catholic.

Collapse of the First Amendment

It's getting so the only response I ever have to any story is Geez Freakin' Louise. 

How to Celebrate Columbus Day

Here. (Really this time.)

The Obvious Rejoinder

Macbeth, The Comedy

Macbeth update. Of the four weedlets, interestingly, it is Youngest Weed (on the cusp of seven) who is utterly enthralled. The others like it well enough (after initial resistance), but he likes to read the biggest parts (we switch roles each night), always knows exactly where we left off the night before, and talks most excitedly about it.

Tonight he read Malcom in Act IV scene 3. May I just say you haven't laughed until you've heard your sweet, innocent, earnest, soon-to-be-First-Communicant proclaim that there's "no bottom, none, in my voluptuousness" and no number of wives, daughters or milkmaids could "fill up the cistern of my lust."

He did not inquire what this meant, and we did not tell him.
/giggle

Too Big To Heal

Here's a story outrageous eight ways to Sunday. McDonald's is probably going to drop its health care coverage thanks to Obamacare. We won't rehearse the abomination that program is to individual health and the health of the republic.

But get this. McDonald's is asking for a rule waiver, and HHS might grant it because so many employees are involved. If big companies are going to be exempted in a variation on "too big to fail," then the entire damn thing is just a massive tax on small business.

More importantly, if the rules can merely be waived, there is no law, there is only the whim of the Sec. of HHS.

Nuns Can't Keep Up

Three Catholic hospitals in PA are selling themselves in part because of Obamacare.

We're ahead of budget for the year. It's more that when we look out over the landscape of health care over the next five years and the needs of these facilities, the needs of this community, we understand a different level of investment will be needed than what we can do on our own," Cook said.

They said much of that required investment is the result of the health care reform bill passed in Washington.

The CEO said it means the need for more spending and less federal reimbursements.

You have to be rich to run a charitable organization now.
Curtsy: Obamacare Watch

A Letter From Barack

In my inbox today. (Yesterday it was Michelle. The President & First Lady address me by my first name, so we're buds).  Notice anything missing?

RC2---
I come into this election with clear eyes.

I am proud of all we have achieved together, but I am mindful of all that remains to be done.

I know some out there are frustrated by the pace of our progress. I want you to know I'm frustrated, too.

But with so much riding on the outcome of this election, I need everyone to get in this game.

Neither one of us is here because we thought it would be easy. Making change is hard. It's what we've said from the beginning. And we've got the lumps to show for it.

The fight this fall is as critical as any this movement has taken on together. And if we are serious about change, we need to fight as hard as we ever have.

The very special interests who have stood in the way of change at every turn want to put their conservative allies in control of Congress. And they're doing it with the help of billionaires and corporate special interests underwriting shadowy campaign ads.

If they succeed, they will not stop at making our work more difficult -- they will do their best to undo what you and I fought so hard to achieve.

There is no better time for you to start fighting back -- a fellow grassroots supporter has promised to match, dollar for dollar, whatever you can chip in today.

Please donate $3 -- and see who wants you to re-commit to this movement.

I know that sometimes it feels like we've come a long way from the hope and excitement of the inauguration, with its "Hope" posters and historic crowds on the National Mall.

I will never forget it. But it was never why we picked up this fight.

I didn't run for president because I wanted to do what would make me popular. And you didn't help elect me so I could read the polls and calculate how to keep myself in office.

You and I are in this because we believe in a simple idea -- that each and every one of us, working together, has the power to move this country forward. We believed that this was the moment to solve the challenges that the country had ignored for far too long.

That change happens only from the bottom up. That change happens only because of you.

So I need you to fight for it over the next 26 days. I need your time. I need your commitment. And I need your help to get your friends and neighbors involved.

If you bring in a new donor today, your $3 donation will become $6. And our Vote 2010 campaign will have twice the resources to make important investments like putting staff on the ground, providing materials for volunteers, and turning out millions of voters come Election Day.

Please donate $3 -- and renew your commitment today:

https://donate.barackobama.com/OctoberMatch

If we meet this test -- if you, like me, believe that change is not a spectator sport -- we will not just win this election. In the years that come, we can realize the change we are seeking -- and reclaim the American dream for this generation.

Thank you for being a part of it,

President Barack Obama

Death By Powerpoint

That's what I've been experiencing as I run back-to-back-to-back conferences. (Want news and observations? Try ninme. I'm trying to stop seeing bullet points when I close my eyes.)

An observation on the perils of reading Shakespeare with kids, though. Every night at dinner since we started Macbeth, someone has to say, "Is this asparagus I see before me?"  

Sigh.

If A Horse Can Be A Senator....

I'd vote for him.

"I Weigh More Than A Duck"

General Tso's Shakespeare

We read Macbeth, IV:1 after dinner this evening. To refresh your memory, it reads in part:

Round about the cauldron go;
    In the poison'd entrails throw.
    Toad, that under cold stone
    Days and nights has thirty-one
    Swelter'd venom sleeping got,
    Boil thou first i' the charmed pot.
ALL
    Double, double toil and trouble;
    Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch
    Fillet of a fenny snake,
    In the cauldron boil and bake;
    Eye of newt and toe of frog,
    Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
    Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
    Lizard's leg and owlet's wing,
    For a charm of powerful trouble,
    Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
ALL
    Double, double toil and trouble;
    Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Third Witch
    Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
    Witches' mummy, maw and gulf
    Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
    Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,
    Liver of blaspheming Jew,
    Gall of goat, and slips of yew
    Silver'd in the moon's eclipse,
    Nose of Turk and Tartar's lips,
    Finger of birth-strangled babe
    Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,
    Make the gruel thick and slab:
    Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
    For the ingredients of our cauldron. 

Eldest Weed, not a fan of the Chinese take-out, said it sounded like tonight's dinner.

Muslims In Defense of Free Speech

Lots of signatories to this document.

We, the undersigned, unconditionally condemn any intimidation or threats of violence directed against any individual or group exercising the rights of freedom of religion and speech; even when that speech may be perceived as hurtful or reprehensible.
We are concerned and saddened by the recent wave of vitriolic anti-Muslim and anti-Islamic sentiment that is being expressed across our nation. 
We are even more concerned and saddened by threats that have been made against individual writers, cartoonists, and others by a minority of Muslims.  We see these as a greater offense against Islam than any cartoon, Qur’an burning, or other speech could ever be deemed.
We affirm the right of free speech for Molly Norris, Matt Stone, Trey Parker, and all others including ourselves.
As Muslims, we must set an example of justice, patience, tolerance,  respect, and forgiveness.
The Qur’an enjoins Muslims to:
* bear witness to Islam through our good example (2:143);
* restrain anger and pardon people (3:133-134 and 24:22);
* remain patient in adversity (3186);
* stand firmly for justice (4:135); 
* not let the hatred of others swerve us from justice (5:8);
* respect the sanctity of life (5:32);
* turn away from those who mock Islam (6:68 and 28:55); 
* hold to forgiveness, command what is right, and turn away from the ignorant (7:199);
* restrain ourselves from rash responses (16:125-128); 
* pass by worthless talk with dignity (25:72); and
* repel evil with what is better (41:34).
Islam calls for vigorous condemnation of both hateful speech and hateful acts, but always within the boundaries of the law. It is of the utmost importance that we react, not out of reflexive emotion, but with dignity and intelligence, in accordance with both our religious precepts and the laws of our country.
We uphold the First Amendment of the US Constitution and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.  Both protect freedom of religion and speech, because both protections are fundamental to defending minorities from the whims of the majority.
We therefore call on all Muslims in the United States, Canada and abroad to refrain from violence.  We should see the challenges we face today as an opportunity to sideline the voices of hate—not reward them with further attention—by engaging our communities in constructive dialogue about the true principles of Islam, and the true principles of democracy, both of which stress the importance of freedom of religion and tolerance.