Hmm...

Terrifying? Yes. A surprise? Not really.

*Le sigh*

What Teachers Make

Awesome.

Update: Stolen Relic of the True Cross Found

In my post about relics--just over a month ago--I focused on the tragic story of a relic of the True Cross stolen from Holy Cross church in the Archdiocese of Boston.


As a marvelous answer to the faithful's prayers, the relic was recovered by the Vermont State Police on August 9th. (And returned to Holy Cross church on August 15th, the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.)

Thanks be to God!

Scott Pilgrim Rocks

I just got back from seeing "Scott Pilgrim VS the World" and had to at least try to briefly articulate why I still feel so happy.

I'll first admit that I was already looking forward to the movie. The trailers piqued my interest, and I had a cursory acquaintance with the graphic novels on which the movie was based. But trailers are meant to "over-hype" their respective movies, and we all know that--besides some notable exceptions--book-to-film adaptations have a tendency to be rather disappointing. Despite those trends, this movie was awesome.

For a video game appreciating, indie band loving, Torontophile like myself, "Pilgrim" offered absolutely everything my greedy inner geek desired. Countless explicit and implicit video game references, well-choreographed over-the-top fight sequences, excellent dialogue, well-developed major (and minor!) characters and on-site scenes from all around Toronto kept me hooked the entire time. Every scene served a purpose and advanced the plot, allowing the film to dive deeper into the incredible array of characters while avoiding the two possible extremes of a narrative long-windedness or a sense of being rushed. The casting and subsequent performance by the actors both delivered exactly what the story called for. The "shiny" action sequences, complete with their anime-like effects, were as polished and well-crafted as the entire movie.

A perfect movie? No. But I definitely left satisfied and smiling.

1,000,000 points!

A Beautiful Little Piece

I just found this beautiful video for the Topsy Foundation, an organization founded to take an integrated approach to combating HIV/AIDS and its effects in society. The video itself is remarkably simple and beautifully filmed. Paired with a piece of music that is also notable for its elegant simplicity, the entire work exudes hope: hope that this terrible disease can be cured once and for all. Pray for those suffering from AIDS, for the scientists doing research, and for people like those in the Topsy Foundation who minister to AIDS patients and their families!

Self-referential Incoherence

I saw the video posted below on the blog Return to Rome and absolutely had to share it. Deepak Chopra is a modern 'spiritual' guru who has contributed substantially to the current obsession with being "Spiritual but not Religious." He's written the book on it. (Quite a few, actually.) A fundamental tenant of said movement is that clinging to specific creeds or beliefs is unimportant and, at worst, dangerous to genuine spiritual growth. But any remotely reasonable person who looks at that tenant will recognize that it, too, is a creed, a belief. So that leaves the entire movement in a mire of self-refuting, vapid nonsense... which is not a foundation on which I would want to build anything, let alone my spiritual life.

But yes, the man in the red shirt is my hero for the day.

The Glories of Upstate New York

For as long as I can remember I've had a deep appreciation for natural beauty. Growing up, I was always fascinated by animals, captivated by sunsets, and would gladly spend hours romping around in the woods. So thinking that the Finger Lakes and the rolling hills of the Chemung Valley were astonishingly beautiful as I was growing up was nothing out of the ordinary. But it was only after leaving the area for school and other travels that I recognized within myself a new appreciation for the simple beauty that this region of the country so consistently provides every season of the year.

Seneca Lake from Watkins Glen

So it was a great delight to find another "evangelist" for upstate New York in Thomas Merton. As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm chipping away at his spiritual classic The Seven Storey Mountain during lunch breaks and the like. Currently, Merton is telling of his years in graduate school and, specifically, about a trip he and his friends had taken to Olean (near Buffalo) via train from Columbia University. It was with a certain sense of pride--and gratitude to God--that I read the following passage:

"For the first time I saw a part of the world in which I was one day going to learn how to be very happy--and that day was not now very far away.

It is the association of that happiness which makes upper New York state seem, in my memory, to be so beautiful. But it is objectively so, there is no doubt of that. Those deep valleys and miles and miles of high, rolling wooded hills: the broad fields, the big red barns, the white farm houses and the peaceful towns: all this looked more and more impressive and fine in the long slanting rays of the sinking sun after we had passed Elmira.

And you began to get some of the feeling of the bigness of America, and to develop a continental sense of the scope of the country and of the vast, clear sku, as the train went on for mile after mile, and hour after hour. And the color, the freshness, and bigness, and richness of the land! The cleanness of it. The wholesomeness. This was new and yet it was old country. It was mellow country. It had been clearned and settled for much more than a hundred years."

Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain (Harvest Press, 1998: p.219)

Thomas Merton (1915-1968)