Friday, November 30, 2012

Is it ok to just endure the horrible liturgical music silently?

More liturgical singing in this vein would be nice


Or must we also sing along?  According to Fr Z, it's fine to just listen.  I look upon it as a penance.

I agree with Fr Z that it would be even better if there were no hymns at all, but only antiphons.  That's what the clerics above are probably singing. 

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Don't care for Turkey? How about giant clams and garbanzo beans?

Can you imagine a re-enactment of this tableau at your local public grammar school?


That's what they ate, along with pork, oysters and lots of wine, at the very first American Thanksgiving, which took place at St. Augustine, Florida, in  September, 1565.  800 Spaniards, led by Admiral Pedro Menendez de Aviles, sat down with Timucuan Indians to eat a meal of thanksgiving, after first celebrating Mass together.  Relations between colonists and Indians at the time were very friendly; relations with nearby Huguenots, not so much.  Eponymous Flower has more here.

Thursday, November 8, 2012

We won't have white male hegemony to kick around any more

No more of this?


These days, there just aren't enough angry white guys to elect a candidate like Romney.

A friend suggests that to win future elections the Republican party will need to nominate more latino, black, asian and female candidates.  This analysis assumes that white males will vote for an ideologically congenial candidate of an incongruent race or sex, though other groups tend not to do so.  Does this mean white males are the least racist/sexist group in America?  I, for one, have always found it so.

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

It was a dark and stormy morning.

"Christ Ruler of All Things,"  Cathedral of Hagia Sophia


As we ponder yesterday's electoral disasters, let us bear in mind the following prayer from today's Office of Lauds:

You are sole master of the future:
  keep us from despair and the fear of what is to come.