Drama from the Skies

Dear Catholic Impressario,

I have composed the synopsis and dramatis personae for a theological science-fiction romance thriller set amidst Vatican Intrigue! I'm planning over the next month or two to complete a draft in a mix of natural speech and iambic pentameter, blank verse and rhyme. It divides easily into two parts, or five acts of roughly three scenes each, with occasional "Greek" Chorus narrating.

Do you suppose there might be any market for this?

Cheers,
the untried playwright

Highlights from Chapter 1 of Caritas in Veritate

echo <<eof >>/dev/null

From The Encyclical

Of course, these point to my own biases and prejudice as well; but since the pundits are playing the same game, I thought it'd make an interesting contrast to see how those who strive for orthodoxy might make out. Unlike some pundits, I've preserved note numbers and paragraphs, so you'll have an easier time finding the context.

• 10. ... The correct viewpoint, then, is that of the Tradition of the apostolic faith[13], a patrimony both ancient and new, [LOVE that pairing!] outside of which Populorum Progressio would be a document without roots — and issues concerning development would be reduced to merely sociological data.
  


• 11. ... In not a few cases, that freedom is impeded by prohibitions and persecutions, or it is limited when the Church's public presence is reduced to her charitable activities alone.
  


• Without the perspective of eternal life, human progress in this world is denied breathing-space. [I'm put in mind of a moment in Star Trek VI, where Christopher Plummer declares "We need breathing-room!" and William Shatner replies ... it's knifty knack our Holy Father has for subverting the language of heretics and evil-doers to highlight the real values they have corrupted.] Enclosed within history, it runs the risk of being reduced to the mere accumulation of wealth ...
  


• In reality, institutions by themselves are not enough, because integral human development is primarily a vocation ...
  


• Only through an encounter with God are we able to see in the other something more than just another creature[17], to recognize the divine image in the other, thus truly coming to discover him or her and to mature in a love that “becomes concern and care for the other.”[18]
  


• 12. The link between Populorum Progressio and the Second Vatican Council does not mean that Paul VI's social magisterium marked a break with that of previous Popes, because the Council constitutes a deeper exploration of this magisterium within the continuity of the Church's life[19].
  


• ... on the contrary, there is a single teaching, consistent and at the same time ever new [Yay!][20]
  


• Coherence does not mean a closed system: on the contrary, it means dynamic faithfulness to a light received. The Church's social doctrine illuminates with an unchanging light the new problems that are constantly emerging[22].
  


• 13. ... Paul VI clearly understood that the social question had become worldwide [25] and he grasped the interconnection between the impetus towards the unification of humanity and the Christian ideal of a single family of peoples in solidarity and fraternity.
  


• 14. ... It is therefore a serious mistake to undervalue human capacity to exercise control over the deviations of development or to overlook the fact that man is constitutionally oriented towards “being more”. [This is the sort of "orientation" worth talking about.]
  


• 18. ... In promoting development, the Christian faith does not rely on privilege or positions of power, nor even on the merits of Christians (even though these existed and continue to exist alongside their natural limitations)[44], but only on Christ, to whom every authentic vocation to integral human development must be directed.
  

Wasn't that fun!?

eof

Detachment

We hold that God has made us for His love
And for His sake to give love of our own.
His sake alone: for all our love's from Him
Who beauties made and very light declared
One ancient day of youth, and called it good.
And He made Man with freedom, that we should
Full freely love Him. And in this He shared
With dusty Man His Holy Image bright.
He made us, men and women, love and friend
To share one life, one flesh unto life's end,
Yet not to be life's end: that were God's right.
Pray I may be detached from breath and limb;
Salvation hangs not on thine, nor my own,
But on His cross who died, and lives above.

--some guy on the street

Gross Defficiency

Dear YouTube,

Why, oh why, oh why is there nowhere in youtube a video with soundtrack the original Star Trek theme music interpreted by meowing cats?

Why?

the LOLz are not enough

"Benedicta tu inter mulieres"

echo <<eof >>/dev/null

In some circles, this day recalls the visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary to her cousin Elizabeth, which is also the first look we get at John the Baptist --- `a voice crying out in the wilderness saying "Prepare ye the way of the Lord"'. And what does he do? He leaps for joy in Elizabeth's womb, thus announcing the approach of the Lord Jesus in Mary's womb! Not even born yet and already working in his prophetic ministry. That's pretty cool!

eof

Words of Warning

Dear Lobby of Libertines, Bodily Blasphemers, and God-forsaking Sodomites,

(OK, I know that last one isn't alliterative; but I don't think the Rule of Threes requires it to be so).

I'm tired of your rainbow flags. I'm tired of the rainbow-triangle, too.

The tipping-point for me with the new rainbow was when I saw it on a brochure for on-campus student housing at the Metropolitan University I attend. The same brochure made a loud point that the 4-person appartment units are not co-ed; and yet, there also is the rainbow triangle: it makes me wonder "what is the point?" Whether or not overnight-guests are allowed, if the Metropolitan Student Housing Management acknowledges a definite fraction of cases in which co-dwelling individuals may see eachother as objects of lust and approves acting on such perception however abstractly, howsoever small be the minority of such cases, it can only have forgotten the imperative underlying non-co-ed dormitories in the past.

Is that uncharitable of me? I suppose I can imagine another construction of this effectively hypocritical situation: namely, given that the Sexually Deviant Practice Protection lobby presents a threat of discrimination lawsuit, while co-ed dormitories presents a threat of harassment lawsuit and unintended babies, it's generally a better insurance against suit and scandal to have homogeneous dorm units and to explicitly approve of SDP. That is, however important the students in residence are, avoiding lawsuits and public scandal is more important.

In any case, I'm fed-up with that silly rainbow. Why use a rainbow? The claim is made that it symbolizes "diversity". In representing a political movement with a symbol of diversity, two claims are made:

1. Greater diversity is always good. (Or at least, more of the diversity we represent is always good)
2. We are diverse.

But in fact, greater diversity is not always good. For instance, within any given meal, a person can eat only so much food, and discern only so many flavours each in only so little a quantity: there is a limit to the diversity of foods conducive to an enjoyable meal. Similarly, any beauraucracy can support only so many divergent languages --- e.g. I don't think we've yet reached that point whence a citizen can reasonably insist on being tried or giving testimony in lojban. Anywhere. As for diversity of sexual practices, I have it on good authority that there is only one naturally lawful model of corporeal conjugal union --- and this is natural law backed-up by revelation.

And then, whether or not diverse sexual practices may be licit, in what sense can they be called diverse? Certainly they suggest that between any n people all can "do more stuff". On the other hand, it is underpinned by the propositions that it is always good to follow appetite, and that there is effectively but a single way to fully live out attractions or affections. The depth of universally reserved compassion and charity, and the great variety of chaste self-giving love are effectively portrayed as unimportant and even inferior by this lobby.

In short, to take a rainbow at all for any lobby, and particularly to apply it to this one is intensely dishonest. Never mind that it's usually out-of-order.

The earliest reference to the rainbow I can find is this

12 And God said: This is the sign of the covenant which I will give between me and you, and to every living soul that is with you, for perpetual generations.
13 I will set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be the sign of a covenant between me, and between the earth.
14 And when I shall cover the sky with clouds, my bow shall appear in the clouds:
15 And I will remember my covenant with you, and with every living soul that beareth flesh: and there shall no more be waters of a flood to destroy all flesh.
16 And the bow shall be in the clouds, and I shall see it, and shall remember the everlasting covenant, that was made between God and every living soul of all flesh which is upon the earth.
17 And God said to Noe: This shall be the sign of the covenant which I have established between me and all flesh upon the earth.¹

That's how God intended the symbol of the rainbow. The SDPP lobby has appropriated this symbol for itself, and to deny the work of God in Man and the meaning of that work. So if the rainbow shall no longer mean that God shall not again wash clean the face of the earth, under what covenant will you live and not be swept away by the waters?

Leave the rainbows alone, please.

your loving oponent,
Some Guy on the Street.

¹ Genesis 9:12-17, Douay-Rheims Bible, Challoner Revision.

On the prudence of delgated advocacy, or lack thereof.

Dear Examiner,

May I ask, is there any way you can be more careful about to whom you sell your advertising space?

Thanks,
an alarmed site visitor