I Am Not Hamlet

It's spring (in the northern hemisphere)--so that means about a billion different things.  One thing it means to me is garlic mustard is sprouting again; soon to stretch to adult heights.  So, on Thursday, 4 April, we trekked off to the Martin Hollow to survey that damned plant.  The bad news?  It's still around.  The good news is, thanks to two years of intensive pulling there is a heck of a lot less on our property this year.  In fact, we weren't very diligent, but we only pulled about a half pound or so of that stinking weed.  One of my areas of concern only had about 20 plants in it--that's good considering each adult can contain about 900-3,000 seeds depending on whom you consult.  Now, we make forays on to the neighbor's land--the person is absentee, so you can grumble about trespassing all you want, but he or she is NOT stewarding the property, and if I don't do it, it'll only be back on my land soon enough. public domain photo This s...

     Among the many topics my spiritual director and I discuss, we always return to prayer.  That should be obvious for anyone who knows anything about spiritual directors or anyone who practices a spiritual or religious life.  The discussion turned to speaking in tongues because I think I talk too much when I pray.  I can't shut that nous up, as the Eastern Orthodox sorta say.      Having grown up Pentecostal, speaking in tongues was de rigueur for most of the services I attended--I think I was 15 or 16 years old when I first "spoke" this way myself.  For the next few years I used this gift without knowing much about it.  Mind you, I wasn't the guy yelling in tongues all the time (I don't think I've ever yelled in that language) nor was I the interpreter--I haven't been graced with that charism.  Part of the problem was it wasn't  explained much in my circles--you just did it, if you had it.  If you did...

While listening to the always excellent Mars Hill Audio in which Ken Meyers was introducing a historian talking about the unintended consequences of the Reformation, he briefly mentioned how we Westerners think that limits are ridiculous.  I think about my friends (and in many ways I detest dividing people up by their political beliefs--but here goes) who are more leftish and how many of them would see limits put on an unfettered corporate capitalism or on the unjust use of the Earth either through extraction that pollutes or destroys or over-harvesting some natural resource.  Rightly so, I think.  I think about my friends on the right who would say that there are natural limits to human nature, including sexual expression, and we should respect those limits.  I'd agree with them too.  The problem comes with ideological blinders, however.  None of us (or very few, anyway) seem to see the big picture that with limits comes freedom and human flourishing....

     Last weekend my family attended what was our third Young People's Family Concerts performed by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.Overall, we've greatly enjoyed our time.  It gives us a chance to dress up a bit and listen to something other than hyper-sexualized drivel.  They've played quite a bit of different pieces: the meat and potatoes of Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart (my favorite was the piece from Bach's Brandenburg Concerto ) as well as Copland, Stravinsky, Britten, and even Williams' Star Wars Suite (over which my son swooned).      The conductor, Teddy Abrams, is light and clear in his explanations of setting up each piece and how the orchestra works--though I think he sells it a bit too much when he has told us three times now what a "great audience" we were.  I am a highly satisfied patron.      It's funny the affection I feel for classical/orchestral music.  I didn't grow up in a household th...

autumn olive berries     What does cutting down the invasive shrub autumn olive (Elaeagnus umbellata) on a cold Saturday in January have to do with the Gospel?  Quite a bit, it turns out.      My family has been trying to figure out a way to incorporate community service (a bland phrase, if ever there was one) into our monthly schedule.  So, for our first attempt I took my wife and children to Island Lake State Park in SE Michigan to help restore (in a very small way) an oak savanna.  An oak savanna (or as the old timers called it "oak barrens") was one of a few landscape types found in lower Michigan prior to European/American settlement.  Essentially, it's a prairie with some oaks scattered here and there.  The Indians maintained prairies by setting the land afire occasionally to keep them relatively treeless.  Thus providing habitat for the largest food source available--the American bison.  The Western way of farm...

     I was not at my home church for mass this morning (not that I feel like I have a home church since becoming Popish), but nevertheless my mood was buoyant.  After all, how could it not be.  Here we were standing as brothers and sisters commemorating one of the top five greatest events in the history of reality: the Incarnation.  Yet looking out and listening to the participation of my Roman brothers and sisters, one would think that something less than mundane had happened.  Something BORING, even.  We gathered to remember the God of the universe condescending to take on human dress and all we can do is half-heartedly sing and mumble ancient creeds that people died for?  I remained buoyant despite the lack of mutual awe.      Annie Dillard said waggishly that when people go to church they ought to be wearing crash helmets.  Do they really know who or what they are summoning?  Something more terrible, me...

There are but three social arrangements which can replace Capitalism: Slavery, Socialism, and Property.                                                                                                 --Hilaire Belloc                                                   ...