Interesting NR Review of Brookhiser's "What Would the Founders Do?"

The modern free state was born in late-17th-century England, and the American Founders were close enough to the English example to preserve its most sensible features. Like a lawyer who prepares a new contract by marking up the last one, the Founders lifted words, phrases, arguments directly from the English precedents. At the same time, Brookhiser observes, the Americans designed their republic in blissful ignorance of the next great moral and spiritual upheaval: The “Romantic age came too late for the Founders. It was as remote from them as Marx, Freud, or post-modernism. By missing the Romantic revolution, they missed the urge to uncover an authentic inner core, which we, as Romanticism’s late children, still feel. The Founders were always either learning, via their senses, or learning to control themselves.”

The pre-Romantic mind of the 18th century was, T. S. Eliot said, a “mature mind: but it was a narrow one”; John Henry Newman complained of the “dryness and superficiality” of the neoclassical sages. The poetry of the 18th century means less to us today than that of the ages that preceded and followed it; but where constitutions are concerned, the qualities of maturity and self-control valued by the Augustan temperament were wholly a blessing. Their love of order and restraint enabled the chief political actors to resist the utopian impulses that Romanticism was subsequently to nourish. When, at length, an American statesman shaped by the Romantic tradition appeared, and obtained power in a revolutionary moment, he devoted his genius not to overthrowing but to protecting the Founders’ 18th-century achievement. At Gettysburg and in the Second Inaugural Address, Abraham Lincoln used Romantic techniques to strengthen the neoclassical Constitution. The Romantic mind gloried in the highly colored poetry of the past; Lincoln rallied the North with a quasi-religious rhetoric derived from the Bible and the country’s earliest spiritual inspirations.

By contrast, countries without an 18th-century political tradition — regimes founded solely on a Romantic inspiration — have fared less well. The difference between Lincoln and his contemporary Otto von Bismarck is instructive. Bismarck, like Lincoln, had been influenced in his youth by Byron and the poetry of Romanticism; his rhetoric, like Lincoln’s, was pregnant with the figurative language of the past. The philosophy of “blood and iron” was shot through with the spirit of the primitive Teutonic myths and romances — but Bismarck used this poetry, not to strengthen free institutions, but to destroy Prussia’s fledgling liberal tradition. No wonder Americans are grateful for their 18th-century revolutionaries, narrowness and all.

Now That's Somethin'

I'm hyp-mo-tized by anyone living in America who is so removed from popular culture that they don't know the movie Brokeback Mountain is about two gay cowboys. Yet my sister-in-laws husband's parents rented the movie because they "liked Westerns" and were none-too-pleased.

In the Last Days of Bill Clinton's...

...administration all we heard about was his legacy. He was said to have cared deeply about it despite his pardoning people at the end of his second term in exchange for contributions to his library, at least by appearances. Michael Burleigh writes in Earthly Powers:

Fame, the opinion of posterity, displaced the judgement of God. As Diderot wrote: 'Posterity is to the philosopher what the next world is to the religious man.'

Another neat observation from the book is:

There was not a great gulf between Jansenists who believed that God had turned away from a corrupt world and philosophical Deists who claimed that, in the absence of providential intervention after the initial act of creation, the natural world functioned like a clock according to the laws which science might uncover.

I’m always grateful for the bay of light that rips through the book room as the sun begins its descent. It’s a west window and I suppose I’m not much of a morning person so it’s well I have the opportunity to see late day sun turn the rosewood finish amber. June is a month loaded with nostalgia, carrying the cargo of the peak of early summer as well as my birthday. In July there are already back-to-school sales and premature dead leaf litter but in June there is nature's guarantee of freshness and perfection. The cottonwood trees have just finished their magical gauze-snow and the first lightning bugs are ready to take their place. The fireflies greet me as if in anticipation of my birthday, leaving shortly thereafter. This month of the strawberry moon contains the days for great saints of St. Anthony and St. Thomas More and seems redolent of the Pogue’s “Fairytale of New York”.
__

There’s something electric about those gilt-edge’d pages declaring the Faith, declaring God’s interventions. The sign of love is presence and God is always present - though for us carnal types the more palpable the better. We’re hungry for his consolations and interventions; on this day, Pentecost, we read of the Apostles receiving the wind and fire and Baptism of the Holy Spirit. Now we baptize and confirm without fire or wind or speaking foreign languages and we are tempted to say that means less is expected of us. The apostles received much but incipient enviousness is checked by a shudder at the cost: i.e. the shipwrecks, imprisonment and martyrdom of Paul and the upside down Crucifixion of Peter to name two. And here I get upset over a dental visit.
__

Was at a large party over the weekend, 90+ there, and a family member wanted to use the prayer at dinner as an evangelistic opportunity. “Did I do well?” I was asked. I understand the impulse but prayer is intrinsically valuable, it’s end is not evangelism anymore than Mass should be so used. The by-products should not be confused with the main purpose which is to invoke God and be in unity with Him. The only Christian witness that "works" has an unconscious aspect to it because it has nothing to do with us but everything to do with God. Unconscious not only, in this case, as far as what words to use in prayer but even a kind of indifference as to whether God will use us or not. Perhaps that is too quietistic but there it is.

I think nothing has been more challenged by modernity than the doctrine of grace. William James’s “Varieties of Religious Experience” was all about using religion as a means to an end rather than it being an end in itself. Bill Moyers wrote a big bestseller “The Power of Myth” to the same effect. It’s affected us in ways we scarcely realize (Kathy Shaidle says that like it or not “we’re all Modernists now”) and it’s hard to put the genie back in the bottle. We are in the position of needing his grace more than most generations due but that is counterintuitively a good place to be since to stand in need is to be poor and to be poor is to be blessed.
__

The great thing about family is that you’re stuck with them. God as Father means he’s stuck with you, regardless of your lack of ability to please Him. And for that I praise the Lord! Because he has made us family and he’s stuck with us!
__

Oh I love the Psalmist. Who cannot relate? He sounds so modern - like a manic-depressive! One minute he’s complaining of God’s inattention and the next he’s “Praise the Lord!” sometimes in the very same psalm.

If you'll permit the indulgence, wrote about this photo.

Musings on My Wife's First Communion Picture

Why am I so entranced by
her early pictures?

She looks like the child I would design
had I the chance to design a child.

First, she would be a “she” because,
as the song goes,
Thank Heavens for Little Girls.

She would have blonde hair the color of the sun
and her forehead would tilt forward
in shyness or anticipation.

The white of her Communion dress
would contrast with pocked-grey siding
and the sun would cover half her face
like Moses’s at the Burning Bush.

There would be a fence in the background
symbolizing spiritual safety and her right
hand would clasp the Crucifix like a nun’s,
her index finger upon His breast.

You Don't See...

...that caption too often. Larger image here.



Found here, via Steven Riddle.

Bakker Excerpt

Televangelist Jim Bakker's I Was Wrong is surprisingly engaging. Who knew he bunked with Lyndon LaRouche in prison and read Solzhenitsyn? And it's so fruitful from the viewpoint of sobering oneself up. It is a tragedy that men seem to learn only from tragedy. So we must constantly read of other's nightmares in order to prevent our own --with God's help that is.

A particularly poignant moment is when, in prison, Christ's preacher realizes he'd forgotten who Christ is, or rather never knew Him in the first place. After a dream in which he imagined Jesus pulling out a slice of His own eye (as if a contact lens) handing it to Bakker saying, "I want you to see everything and everyone through My eyes" Bakker writes:

I began to ask, as much to myself as to God, "How can I see everything and everybody through the eyes of Jesus?"

The answer, whether from God or my conscience or my own mind, was crystal clear: I must read every word Jesus said, because if I know Him and His words, then I can see everything through His eyes.

Instead of reading my usual two motivational or inspirational books each day, I began reading the Gospels every day. I got a red-letter edition of the Bible from the chapel library, the words in red indicating the words of Jesus. I literally wrote down every word Christ spoke as recorded in Scriptures. Then I wrote a condensed version of the verses to help me remember them. For instance, "Love your neighbor." "Love God." "Do not sin." I began to see things in the Bible that I had never seen before. I made up my mind then that I was going to ask God all the difficult questions I'd skirted over in my busy years. The first question I asked God was, "Why are there so many dying people here, and why can't I help them? What can I do?"

I was surprised at the answer I heard from God: "You are arrogant. You think that you are the only person I have in this prison. I have many others here. I am God." And then God said to me, "I did not bring you to prison to minister. I brought you here to get to know Me."

Very Cool!



Just received my copy of Bill Luse's book. Bill did the cover art too. Gotta love the attribution "Bernebie Productions" (Bern being one daughter, "Ebie" the other.)

Mourning the Appearance of the Rajah but With Reason for Hope

News came yesterday that the Astros signed the great Roger ("Rajah") Clemens. Since my beloved Redlegs are but a hair's breadth ahead of said Astros in baseball's premiere division (the NL Central), one can safely say that no good can come of this. In recent years the Reds have forced me to give great attention to the early season since they're normally out of it by the advent of warm weather. The 1969 "miracle Mets" had a nice alliterative ring to it and it's getting more difficult to believe the "miracle Reds" of '06 will prove descriptive. In 1990 they led the division wire-to-wire. In 2006 they led from the 1st week of May to the third week of May. Meanwhile we face the insanely good St. Louis Cardinals - men among boys.

But it's not over till it's over! Was it ovah when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Did FDR raise the white flag at San Juan Hill? Did Johnny Appleseed quit planting seeds when he got to Arizona? No, no and no! Did Sergeant Carter give up on Gomer Pyle? Did Mr. Douglas of "Green Acres" quit his agarian dream? Did Herman Munster undergo plastic surgery? NO, no, and no! Did Gilligan give up joking despite a tough and very limited crowd? Has John Daly stopped drinking? Did Marsha Brady fold when she got bopped on the nose by a football? No, no & no! Did 'Liz Hurley give up men after Hugh Grant? Did Tom drop Disputations after Chris Sullivan found his blog? Did the Washington Generals give up after losing to the Globetrotters the millionth time?

What they all had in common is they were able to sing (for best results sing along with me now): "To dream the impossible dream, to fight the unbeatable foe, to bear with unbearable sorrow, to run where the brave dare not go. To right the unrightable wrong, to love pure and chaste from afar, to try when your arms are too weary, To reach the unreachable star. This is my quest, to follow that star -- no matter how hopeless, no matter how far. To fight for the right, without question or pause, to be willing to march Into hell for a heavenly cause. And I know if I'll only be true, to this glorious quest. That my heart will be peaceful and calm, when I'm laid to my rest."

Can you picture those words on the lips of an Oliver Wendell Douglas or a Herman Munster or a Washington General? I can, and remember the word "can" is right inside the word "can't". And so, to the Reds I dedicate a familiar poem:

When things go wrong,
As they sometimes do,
When the road to the pennant seems all up hill,
When the wins are few and the payroll is high,
& you want to smile,
but you have to sigh.
When Clemens is pressing you down a bit,
rest if you must but.......

DON'T YOU QUIT!
OH NO! DON'T YOU QUIT!

Partial List of Traumatic Injuries in the Spiritual Life

victim of PPS Syndrome

I'm not holy enough to have experienced many of these symptoms but I'm sure many of you readers have:

1) Blood Sugar Fataltosis: This can occur as soon as two hours after beginning a fast, when the blood sugar falls so steeply as to induce paralysis and death.

2) Extraocular muscle tears: This can occur when the effort to gain custody of the eyes was too abrupt.

3) Lip & Tongue Lacerations: This happens when you bite your tongue or lips in an effort to avoid saying a mean-spirited remark.

4) Juvenile-induced insanity: This happens sometimes to parents of large families but contrary to the slogan "a mind is a terrible thing to waste" to lose one's mind in the service of having children is a badge of honor.

5) Knee Fallaoffitis: Knees have been known to fall off due to overuse in prayer.

6) Levitation Sprains: After levitating, some saints are said to have had rough landings although we have little documented evidence of this particular injury.

7) PPS (Premature Pruning of Skin) Syndrome: This can occur with too frequent application of Holy Water.

8) Ave Carpal Tunnel: Those saying over fifteen decades of the rosary daily are at risk.

Musings & Bemusings

I'm often surprised at the difficulty the Resurrection poses for many. But if one believes in God it is completely understandable that He can change the laws of the universe at his discretion. Miracles I don't have too much of a problem with. But what is always hard to get my head around is that God loves and cares about what to Him must seem like complete minutiae. As complex as we imagine we are, we are to God what a rock or stone is to us. And God loves created things that are even less complex than us, like sparrows as the Scripture passage goes. The amazing thing isn't miracles but that he isn't completely bored by us. I recall reading the blogger at Korretiv write,

"Why did I join the Catholic Church? Out of boredom, when it comes right down to it. Everything else bored me to death -- except God's love, God's majesty, God's infinite intimacy and yet infinite distance, His mystery. And only in the Catholic Church are those preserved. Everywhere else under the sun is a yawning chasm of yawns and boredom unto death."

I can quite understand the sentiment expressed but I'm also glad that God isn't bored by me even though I might not have a clue why he isn't.

__

For those watching for signs of the Apocalypse, I just found another -- saw a bumpersticker yesterday that said "I My Granddog".
__

For those who think all sin is equal, the predicted result is either high despair or high presumption, though the chance of self-righteousness is lowered. For those who see great differences in sin, the chance of self-righteousness increases but there is perhaps a better balance between despair and presumption.
__

One of my favorite mysteries of the rosary is that of Christ's Baptism. I'm fascinated by it. Why did God the Father gave his imprimatur on such a seemingly small act? "You are my beloved Son" came not after the Sermon on the Mount, or after a spiritual or corporal work of mercy, or after a miracle or after prayer. Instead it came after an act of humility, by being baptized by a man (John) who was doing something that God could (and would, with the Holy Spirit) do better. The other supreme act of humility was the Cross, after which God the Father glorified Him far beyond what he did at the baptism of John. And just as Peter initially avoided having his feet washed John initially recognizes his unworthiness to (water) baptize the Lord. This mystery is particularly relevant because it shows how God wants to use human, flawed instruments (although admittedly John the Baptist was a great saint - greater than even all the OT saints).

A Two Sentence Recap on Third Parties

Peggy this this time is different. John asks why should it be when the two parties survived two wars and a depression.

Walker Percy

Mere Comments mentioned the birthday of Walker Percy on May 28th. He would've been 90. I hope WP's in Heaven; I squirmed while recently reading about him joking about it with Foote in one of his letters: Percy: "Yeah: Percy, O'Connor and Foote. A fine trio. Two at least will never get to heaven." Foote responded, of course, that he was sorry to learn that Walker and Flannery O. wouldn't be joining him there.

A commenter on Mere Comments wrote: "What I find strange is that even some liberals like Percy. Makes me wonder if they are reading the same books as I am." Not to equate liberals with agnostics, but that reminds me of (I've written of this before) how a co-worker emailed me saying, "the first time I read Love in the Ruins (early '80's) I was a devout agnostic. As a recent convert to Catholicism (less than a year ago) I can say, without giving anything away, that it struck me *completely* differently when I recently reread it."

WYSIWYG

Michael Novak on the braveness of George Bush.

The Vinny Code - Chapter 3. (Previous chapters here).

I dreamt I was eating breakfast at Mel's Diner in Paris, Tennessee and everything was rife with filmic associations. Big belly'd guy named Mel. A waitress named Flo. Another man looked the spitting image of Bill Murray in Groundhog Day and I heard him tell Flo that someone was going to drop a plate of dishes seconds before they did. I looked out the window and there were baseball players coming out of the cornfield. Coincidence or conspiracy? I started to suspect the Vatican.

I finished my eggs and read the local news. The elderly curator of the local "Early Television History" museum had been murdered and investigators were asking the services of a symbologist from Aztech Community College. A mystery wrapped in an enigma, I thought. Take away reason and accountability. Perhaps my friend Dan Tan would write another book.

I woke up and remembered I was to meet Dan that afternoon. He knew his audience. He had surfed the Zeitgeist well. Three hundred zillion copies in print before the paperback and the obligatory movie version. Reputations were hurt by the book, which was surprising given that it was clearly labeled as fiction. Variety, the Hollywood paper of record, patiently explained that Costner wasn't divine, Elvis wasn't gay, and the Vatican hadn't arranged a conspiracy to keep the film industry down. But there were many who believed in Tan's vision and there was a growing sense among the non-believers that Tan's followers were proof that God gave man too much rope intellect-wise. It seemed a good education was too much a prerequisite, though hardly sufficient, for faith in Christ over Costner.

I met with Dan daily after he cashed his royalty checks since he was always in a good mood then. I mentioned how a poor education seems to affect one's view of the Divine and thus one's view of everything. He shrugged and told me I should ask Colonel Parker. So the next day I asked Colonel Parker.

"Well now the way I see it is everybody's in a state of dupery. It's just some are more duped than others. It takes humility to admit that son. That's not to say the facts ain't important, 'cause they are, but there are worse things than ignorance. Like pride. Like thinkin' you refuse to be duped and you have to know God's particulars in a way you hain't earned. Let me put it this way: ain't nobody on earth real clear on what their own glorified body will be like. Ignorance is part of the human condition of man and thank God for it since it's the only thing that keeps some people humble."

I was going to object and say that it didn't work that way since no one thought of themselves as ignorant even if they were.

"Well, What we need to know, we do know - although with a lack of instruction fewer are receiving what they need to know and that's what bothers me. Look at Tom Cruise--"

"Grace, my boy. Don't underestimate it," he said, offering me a fine handrolled cigar.