“To minimize suffering and to maximize security were natural and proper ends of society and Caesar. But then they became the only ends, somehow, and the only basis of law — a perversion. Inevitably, then, in seeking only them, we found only their opposites: maximum suffering and minimum security.” A Canticle for Leibowtiz

"We are assured that the world is getting more and more united and growing into a brotherly community by the reduction of distances and the transmission of ideas through the air. Alas, put no faith in such a union of peoples. By interpreting freedom as the multiplication and the rapid satisfaction of needs, they do violence to their own nature, for such an interpretation merely gives rise to many senseless and foolish desires, habits and most absurd inventions." Father Zossima, The Brothers Karamazov

The children's book Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak is coming to the big screen in October.  Dave Eggers wrote the screenplay and Spike Jonze directed.  I read about the novelization first , then found the trailer on the web, and saw the preview on the big screen before the latest Harry Potter movie.  At first I thought, Oh no.  Does everything have to become a movie?  And turning Max's mom into a single mom with a younger boyfriend  - UGH.  Way too Lifetime Movie-ish.  Or After-School Special- ish, for those of us who remember those.

But the trailer's won me over.  It yanks you into its world and makes your heart swell.  Maurice Sendak himself has been very involved in the film and gives his two cents here .

The book is not a particular favorite of Brigid's, nor do I remember it well from my own childhood, but I do love it now.  When I read it to her and we came to the line, "And Max the king of all the wild things was lonely and wanted to be where someone loved him best of all."  I asked Brigid, what does that mean?  And she replied, he misses his mommy.

We never see the mother, but we know her love reaches all the way to where the wild things are, down deep and says, all is forgiven, come home.  I am a mother and I know I am loved like that.  I hope Brigid knows she is loved like that.

Who loves you best of all?  

" As the absolutely gratuitous gift of God, hope bursts into our lives as something not due to us, something that transcends every law of justice. Gift by its nature goes beyond merit, its rule is that of superabundance. It takes first place in our souls as a sign of God's presence in us, a sign of what he expects from us. Truth — which is itself gift, in the same way as charity — is greater than we are, as Saint Augustine teaches[88]. Likewise the truth of ourselves, of our personal conscience, is first of all given to us. In every cognitive process, truth is not something that we produce, it is always found, or better, received. Truth, like love, “is neither planned nor willed, but somehow imposes itself upon human beings”[89].

Because it is a gift received by everyone, charity in truth is a force that builds community, it brings all people together without imposing barriers or limits. The human community that we build by ourselves can never, purely by its own strength, be a fully fraternal community, nor can it overcome every division and become a truly universal community. The unity of the human race, a fraternal communion transcending every barrier, is called into being by the word of God-who-is-Love. In addressing this key question, we must make it clear, on the one hand, that the logic of gift does not exclude justice, nor does it merely sit alongside it as a second element added from without; on the other hand, economic, social and political development, if it is to be authentically human, needs to make room for the principle of gratuitousness as an expression of fraternity."

Pope Benedict XVI, Caritas in veritate

A new encyclical from Pope Benedict!  How excited am I?  Very!  I read it very quickly and posted some quotes on Facebook, but here's a few more...

"..."the development of peoples goes awry if humanity thinks it can re-create itself through the “wonders” of technology, just as economic development is exposed as a destructive sham if it relies on the “wonders” of finance in order to sustain unnatural and consumerist growth."

"Even peace can run the risk of being considered a technical product, merely the outcome of agreements between governments or of initiatives aimed at ensuring effective economic aid. It is true that peace-building requires the constant interplay of diplomatic contacts, economic, technological and cultural exchanges, agreements on common projects, as well as joint strategies to curb the threat of military conflict and to root out the underlying causes of terrorism. Nevertheless, if such efforts are to have lasting effects, they must be based on values rooted in the truth of human life. That is, the voice of the peoples affected must be heard and their situation must be taken into consideration, if their expectations are to be correctly interpreted. One must align oneself, so to speak, with the unsung efforts of so many individuals deeply committed to bringing peoples together and to facilitating development on the basis of love and mutual understanding. Among them are members of the Christian faithful, involved in the great task of upholding the fully human dimension of development and peace."

 

"Just because social communications increase the possibilities of interconnection and the dissemination of ideas, it does not follow that they promote freedom or internationalize development and democracy for all. To achieve goals of this kind, they need to focus on promoting the dignity of persons and peoples, they need to be clearly inspired by charity and placed at the service of truth, of the good, and of natural and supernatural fraternity."

Well, dear readers, I'm still around.  I've been doing a ton of spring cleaning.  As you may have noticed, it's summer (even here in Chicago - finally).  I'd been very good at putting it off so I decided to give myself a deadline.  Thus I'm hosting a dinner party this weekend, and so the place is almost clean.  Oh, and there's a huge freakin' hole in my dining room wall that's not going to be repaired in time, but no one will notice, right?

I'm making pasta with roasted pepper sauce, because I've made it several times before and it's quite good and easy to make for a crowd.  I really wanted to make risotto but then realized I don't have eight matching bowls.  Plus I've never made it from scratch before, so I'd be nervous.  Dessert will be this strawberry tart.

What else, what else?  Work is busy and stressful, other personal stuff going on, etc. etc.  I've been meaning to blog about several things, such as an article by Sarah Coakley in this publication, and I also had a Fashion Friday planned about a Battlestar Galactica tee-shirt, but obviously haven't gotten around to either.  Hopefully I will sometime soon.

Last week at church we started some new changes in our liturgy.  The minister is now using the fixed altar and facing east while performing the eucharistic liturgy, instead of using a makeshift altar and facing the congregation.  I couldn't find the email he sent detailing the explanation for the change, but here's some info from someone else:

"Despite all the variations in practice that have taken place far into the second millennium, one thing has remained clear for the whole of Christendom: praying towards the East is a tradition that goes back to the beginning. Moreover, it is a fundamental expression of the Christian synthesis of cosmos and history, of being rooted in the once-for-all events of salvation history while going out to meet the Lord who is to come again. Here both the fidelity to the gift already bestowed and the dynamism of going forward are given equal expression...

The turning of the priest towards the people has turned the community into a self-enclosed circle. In its outward form, it no longer opens out on what lies ahead and above, but is closed in on itself. The common turning towards the East was not a "celebration towards the wall"; it did not mean that the priest "had his back to the people": the priest himself was not regarded as so important. For just as the congregation in the synagogue looked together toward Jerusalem, so in the Christian liturgy the congregation looked together "towards the Lord." ...it was much more a question of priest and people facing in the same direction, knowing that together they were in a procession towards the Lord. They did not close themselves into a circle, they did not gaze at one another, but as the pilgrim People of God they set off for the Oriens, for the Christ who comes to meet us."

-Joseph Ratzinger, The Spirit of the Liturgy

For the first part of the service including the sermon, everyone is sitting in a semi-circle (I think; I was teaching Sunday School and missed that part) but when the eucharist begins, we leave our seats and gather around the altar area.  There's about 10 of us so we're able to to do that.  Most of us were on the steps up to the altar area in a semi-circle. 

I'm guessing this is new for everyone in the congregation.  I think it worked well.  I liked it, which I realize is a rather lame and insufficient way of putting it right now, but over the next few weeks I'll let it sink it in more and report back again.

Random Star Trek thought a week late:  Why did Winona Ryder, who's in her late thirties, play Spock's mom?  Why not give the part to some awesome actress who actually would be old enough to be his mother?  (For instance, I mean.  In reality I don't think I'd want my BSG and Star Trek mixed.)

Speaking of, Caprica is next in my Netflix queue!

And, how could this article not even mention BSG?

I have the post-vacation blues, am very cranky and looking for things to upset me.  Like this new campaign from The United Methodist Church.  I understand what it's trying to do.  It's just, you know, I think I've written this blog post before.  How does this distinguish the church from the Rotary Club or Amnesty International? 

"Seen from the outside – from the perspective of seekers just looking for a place with an open door where they can make their own relationship with God – it seems like all we have to offer is our positions on various issues. We are becoming a smaller and smaller church of fewer and fewer people who can agree to a longer and longer list of positions on issues." from Episcopal Life Online , h/t my pastor.

Okay, it is better than the Open Hearts,Open Minds, Open Doors campaign.  I like some of the spots better than others.  Ecology part of theology, yes.  A journey that could change the world - well, that makes me twitchy because I prefer to focus on remembering that the world was already changed.  I guess they're trying to capture that "I can save the world!" energy of the youth.  I get the "church does this, church does that," it's not just about Sunday morning message.  And ending malaria, who's against that?

But where is Christ in all of this?  

That was the first vacation I've had in years.  Usually I take vacation time to go visit family, but that's not a vacation.  My best friend and I went to her family's cottage on a lake somewhere in rural south Michigan.  It was splendid.  We drifted around the lake on a pontoon boat for the better part of two days, sunbathing  and reading.  We went to the Amish bakery and ate apple pie for breakfast for two days.  (How is apple pie different than apple danish?  It doesn't have icing and is thus healthier.)  We made a campfire two nights, roasting marshmellows, making smores, and talking about Life, the Universe and Everything.  We went to the local dive bar/restaurant's famous "Thursday Taco Night."  It was packed.  Went back on Saturday night and it was dead. 

I'd set aside four books to bring with me, but accidentally left them behind.  Thank goodness, there were several books at their cottage already.  I started a book about Wales, but wasn't interested enough to finish it.  I read A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson and re-read To Kill A Mockingbird.  

My cell phone worked for the first night we were there, but then must have realized how far away it was from everything, and gave up its signal for the rest of the weekend.  So, no cell, no Internet, and while there was a TV, we only turned it on to watch a DVD one night - Happy Go Lucky.

I did have insomnia one night, which was a drag, but I remembered a dream I had last week where I was hiding from the police, which in turn reminded me of this dream.  So I spend my sleepless night crafting the dream into a novel, which exists only in my head so far, but look for it on the bestseller list someday.  

I haven't been that relaxed in over a year.  We saw herons and red-winged black birds and listened to bird songs all day.  Last week I would've said I wasn't much for nature; I'm a city girl through and through, blah blah.  Or that I prefer vacations where you do things, like visit and tour new cities, etc.  I take it back.  I still love city life, and have decided I want to go to Greece or Italy when I turn 40, but this little break was bliss.