Month: December 2011

The Poetry Of Latin Mass

Robert Fay wonders why there aren't great contemporary Catholic writers like Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, and Flannery O’Connor. Fay blames the Sunday morning Mass, updated in the 1960s:

In the wake of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965), Waugh’s worst fears were realized as English replaced Latin, priests suddenly faced the people (as if to entertain them), and the reverential tradition of kneeling at the altar rail to receive communion on one’s tongue was replaced with the breezy practice of taking the host standing and in the hand. In short, what for centuries had seemed eternal, mysterious, and rich in symbolism — the very marrow that feeds artists — was suddenly being conducted in the same language as sitcoms, TV commercials, and business meetings.

In 2007, Pope Benedict XVI released the document Summorum Pontificum, allowing parishes worldwide to celebrate the “Latin Mass," or the Tridentine Mass. Frank Wilson cheers the change:

I thought this remark, from the comments, interesting: "But seriously, a widespread reinstating of the Tridentine Mass is just going to bleed Catholic membership in most Western countries. It does seem alienating …" Alienating? To whom? To the millions who buy CDs of Gregorian Chant or who go to see a film like Into Great Silence? Given the response I have been getting to my article [on a popular Latin Mass in Philadelphia], it looks to me as if a lot of people find it anything but alienating.

(Video: A clip from Into Great Silence, a documentary about life inside the Grande Chartreuse, the head monastery of the reclusive Carthusian Order in France.)

Eating From The Tree Of Knowledge

Mark O'Connell expresses his agnostic admiration for the book of Genesis:

We need to know things, but we lament the loss of innocence that our need — which is our nature — must inevitably bring with it. All of life, and not just childhood, is an ongoing process of disillusionment, of trading innocence for knowledge. Just being alive means losing forms of innocence we often don’t even recognize until they are lost. Which is why the myth of the Fall is one of the saddest, truest, and most beautiful stories ever told.

Confronting The Apocalypse

Francis X. Clooney, S.J. finds grace in Melancholia's portrayal of depression and end times:

Justine is in tune with a reality others do not see, from which they hide themselves; she was depressed because reality is depressing; she felt, before knowing why, that the ordinary life of wealth and pleasure and business, partying and marrying, had no point at all, since everything was about to change, absolutely. By ordinary standards, Justine is simply clinically depressed. In a larger perspective, in light of what actually happens, she is right. She has seen what no one else can see. 

Brett McCracken compares the film to Malick's Tree Of Life:

There’s a sense in which every human instinctively knows the Earth will not last forever and that fiery destruction is in some way deserved. There’s a reason why, if we’re honest with ourselves, disasters and mass calamity confront us as things simultaneously horrific and transcendent, visceral reminders of our finitude and God’s sovereignty. It’s what Malick was getting at in Life: Every human—like every dinosaur millions of years ago—is here for a brief time and then gone, terminated by a rogue asteroid, a wartime bullet, a freak accident or a wayward planet called Melancholia.

Jonathan McCalmont examines Justine's depression through a religious lens:

Under Christianity, pain and suffering had been tangible proof of God’s promise that the meek would inherit the Earth and that worldly happiness is only fleeting when compared to the infinite joy of union with the Godhead. Under the grand ideologies of the Enlightenment’s children, pain and suffering were things to be extinguished either by revolution (surgery) or by reform (chemotherapy). Now our culture no longer sees misery as divine, it sees it as something to be eradicated and avoided at all costs.

Lindsay Zoladz has an interesting take on the director Lars Von Trier's own depression, and how it influenced his portrait of Justine in the film.

How We Grieve

Colin Dickey reviews two new books on how Americans mourn the loss of loved ones:

Death, after all, is messy, and so too is the way we respond. We do not comfortably assume the posture of mourning; we lash out, laugh inappropriately, meander radically between emotions, struggle to hold it all together, sometimes hold it together all too well, creak and babble and moan and weep and everything in between. It is this inappropriateness, this failure to conform to expected postures of mourning, that has become particularly unwelcome in our current moment.

On a related note, Vaughan Bell responds to a video of people dancing with a recently deceased baby. He reminds us that grief is universal, but our reactions aren't:

The belief behind the ceremony is that when young children die they become angels and go straight to heaven. Therefore, these deaths are not an occasion for sadness, as many might assume, but a cause for a goodbye celebration. … This may seem shocking or disrespectful to people accustomed to sadness and distress-based mourning, but in its own community it is the single most respectful way of saying goodbye to a recently blessed angel.

Ron Beating Mitt In Iowa

Yes, a third place in Iowa doesn't condemn you to defeat. Remember Michael Dukakis? But it isn't looking good. 43 percent of voters of other candidates put Newt as their second choice. And Cain's votes haven't been redistributed entirely yet. My money is on a Ron Paul surprise. He's put in the groundwork, unlike Gingrich. And I can hope, can't I?

Live-Blogging The Huckabee Forum

BOBBLEMITTAlexWong:Getty

9.59 pm. Bottom line: creepy ideological litmus test grilling. Huntsman was very smart not to fall for this. Gingrich knew his elderly audience very well – from starting with George Washington and ending with the Alinskyite that is deliberately destroying Washington's achievement. It's deranged, of course. But it may work – to Newt's advantage at first and then surely to Obama's.

9.55 pm. Santorum focuses mainly on America as a moral enterprise and "we are sick from the inside." He cites abortion and marriage under attack. He will not surrender.

9.53 pm. Gingrich focuses entirely on Obama hatred. He focuses on Obama for eight years as a disaster and then tries to soften himself by asking people not to support him but to be with him. He knocked Romney out of the park. Because he has such an intimate, effortless grasp of what turns the base voter on. They will be roused by one thing: hatred of this president, and the marshalling of any evidence of any problems in America as a way to defeat him.

9.52 pm. Ron Paul pitches states' rights as his final message – and reinstating nullification.

9.51 pm. Rick Perry rambles on about forcing the US Congress to be part-time, and then claims he has a purpose-driven life.

9.50 pm. Romney says that America is at risk of being a country governed by the government. Not exactly red meat to cite David Brooks in his first sentence.

9.47 pm. What Wiki says is in Bastiat's La Loi, Ron Paul's favorite book:

In The Law, Bastiat states that "each of us has a natural right — from God — to defend his person, his liberty, and his property". The State is a "substitution of a common force for individual forces" to defend this right. The law becomes perverted when it punishes one's right to self-defense in favor of another's acquired right to plunder.

Bastiat defines two forms of plunder: "stupid greed and false philanthropy". Stupid greed is "protective tariffs, subsidies, guaranteed profits" and false philanthropy is "guaranteed jobs, relief and welfare schemes, public education, progressive taxation, free credit, and public works". Monopolism and Socialism are legalized plunder which Bastiat emphasizes is legal but not legitimate.

9.44 pm. No, he would not get rid of all federal labor laws! A dangerous wobble, as Cuccinelli frowns. I don't think he helped himself with this performance; while Newt did fine. Which means that Romney's slow fade and Gingrich's sudden rise seem fated to continue for a bit. If anyone is watching this.

9.43 pm. Yes, he is orange. Like Gore in that infamous second debate with Bush.

9.39 pm. Romney defends a federal role in education as a way to counter federal teachers' unions. Unlike all the others, he stands by No Child Left Behind. He's coming off more liberal than the others – which may be a liability in this context. Then he clumsily ducks the question over a federal role over school lunches.

9.36 pm. Romney says he looks forward to being challenged by Obama on the similarities between his healthcare proposal and Obamacare. Coming after Paul, you suddenly get a blast of complete phoniness.

9.33 pm. It's Stepford Man! First up, he cites the EPA as a means to crush the free enterprise system! I mean" seriously. He's claiming that Obama officials are gathered behind closed doors to plotting how to destroy the private sector economy! It's not just that this is an unfortunate by-product of environmental regulation; it is designed to destroy the private sector.

133051307

9.30 pm. Ron Paul, asked to name a book Americans should read, cites "The Law" by Frederic Bastiat. Wow. He's different from the others because he rally does seem like a human being, thinking in real time sincerely, offering answers that no focus group would ever provide or even know about. I remain a big fan. And he has done more to improve the GOP's foreign policy and civil liberties debate than anyone else on the planet.

9.28 pm. Ron Paul cites Prohibition as the worst constitutional amendment. Great call.

9.25 pm. How to get rid of Medicare? And the Federal Reserve, of course – with transitional programs. Yes, there's a reason he cannot get off the ground. And then he wants a one-year spending cut of $1 trillion, which would effectively initiate a global depression. Sigh.

9.23 pm. A reader writes:

So, Perry seems to want term limits for justices, assuming we do not abolish the judicial branch altogether, plus tons of amendments to the Constitution, but he does not want the Constitution changed?  Am I that drunk already?

I wish I were. But I always enjoy me some Ron Paul.

9.20 pm. Ron Paul insists again that the US's meddling in the Middle East is the root cause of 9/11. I simply don't understand how abolishing the EPA and soft enforcement of environmental laws will not lead to dirtier water and dirtier air. And it is a fact that the Republican proposals on healthcare do leave millions of Americans uninsured, compared with Obamacare. That's not an outrageous statement. It's just a fact. If you want everyone to have access to affordable healthcare, the GOP has nothing for you.

9.18 pm. Terrorism is a crime! Finally we come to life. You can imagine how much this dooms him with a large section of the authoritarian Christianist base. And yet he seems neither defensive nor rattled … just sincere.

9.16 pm. Ron Paul favors the federal government enforcing the Bill of Rights. And he basically argues that the Patriot Act was an effective repeal of the Fourth Amendment.

9.15 pm. Good call, governor Huntsman. This is really grueling. But Ron Paul is up! Yay!

9.12 pm. It's fascinating that these Republicans vie with each other to prove their federalist credentials and yet all agree that on matters they really care about – abortion an marriage – there should be one federal answer for the entire country enforced through a constitutional amendment.

9.11 pm. Bachmann goes for the Kelo decision as the worst in the past fifty years. Good call. At least she knew of one.

9.07 pm. Abolishing the Department of Education will not be enough! Getting rid of the Bush legacy and the Race To The Top are somehow integral to educational reform. Bachmann is arguing that we can do without the EPA, even when states' environmental policies conflict. But she's completely dumbstruck by the consequences of abolishing the EPA. She clearly hasn't thought this through for more than a couple of minutes.

9.04 pm. I'm struck by the anal retentive constitutionalism of the questioners, and their insistence on vetting each of the candidates on these Tenth Amendment issues alone. Maybe that's what the base is interested in. But it's going to sound rather abstruse to others. Ron Paul has indeed made an impact – before he has even appeared.

9.02 pm. Bachmann! I'm getting a little blurry but I think we have an argument that Obamacare includes – gasp – available contraception; and that the country should spend over $130 billion to round up illegal immigrants and send them home.

133333422

8.54 pm. Perry explains that the Constitution's meaning is self-evident. There is no need for any interpretation. Just like the Bible. Then a goofy, adolescent gesture with his lapel mic. Next!

8.51 pm. Another Constitutional Amendment – to ensure that liberal judges can be thrown out and the federal judiciary is even more thoroughly politicized.

8.48 pm. More grilling on the Tenth Amendment. Now it's education – and Perry backs ending federal support for school meals or the GI bill. He'd also abolish the Department of Education.

8.43 pm. Perry actually does a pretty god job in defending states' rights. The consensus here seems to be that the federal government really shouldn't exist in large swathes of its current authority.

8.39 pm. Now we've got Perry. He looks better sitting down and the hair is perfectly dyed. But he still cannot answer how he, as the executive, can render a Congressional law null and void. He can't. Cuccinelli points out just how implausible this week.

8.36 pm. It's a little odd that Huckabee himself is doing nothing in this forum. He asks no questions at all, presumably because it would put him in the position of being a partisan, depending on the nature and force of his questions. And so we have this kind of Star Chamber format, in which the most hardcore Christianists and anti-government fanatics grill candidates on their political correctness. Which means the Romney section is going to be fun.

8.34 pm. A lie: Obama is enforcing DOMA; he is just not defending the law in court. Which Santorum is fine with. If the courts find DOMA unconstitutional, he'd come up with another version. He asserts that the judiciary is not the final arbiter of the Constitution.

8.31 pm. Now we have a question the premise of which it is outrageous for the federal government to enforce environmental laws and protection. Jeez. Santorum pledges not to enforce regulations when environmental laws are not automatically re-authorized. It's been a while since I saw a political party so brazenly hostile to environmental protection.

8.29 pm. Santorum backs a federal constitutional amendment to ban marriage. He wants the Constitution to be a guide to moral principles: hence his support to amend it to ban marriage equality and all abortion.

8.27 pm. Santorum is whiffing on how to encourage the family through the politics. His welfare point seems dated to me, after welfare reform. Then we just get blather about "promoting marriage". No laws, just preaching about marriage and fidelity. 

8.25 pm. We were not apparently dealing with terrorism before 9/11, according to Santorum. Really? Santorum criticized the suspension of habeas corpus under Lincoln but not under George W. Bush.

134709308

8.20 pm. Another attempt to understand his ad with Pelosi. He seems to be saying that it was a mistake because Pelosi's radioactivity obscured his conservative environmental argument. Then a daring, provocative embrace of George Washington.

8.18 pm. It's anti-American to back separation of church and state in public high schools. Anti-American. Why can't the Republican party move past its McCarthyite instincts?

8.16 pm. Ok. A shot every time we hear the words "Washington bureaucrat". This is getting like a Politburo meeting in which various party members are required to prove their adherence to the party platform.

8.09 pm. The far right anti-gay Virginia AG Cuccinelli finally puts the boot in. Newt on healthcare says he backed the individual mandate to prevent Hillarycare. Huh? And he still has no defense of his embrace of Nancy Pelosi on climate change. Against all these sane heresies, Gingrich puts out there his conservative credentials.

Now Cuccinelli wants to know how Gingrich will be able to enforce hard right ideological purity in his administration. Gingrich blathers.

8.05 pm. Now we're getting a propaganda message from three hardline Republicans. I love the fact that these people are now guardians of the Constitution. None of them said a word during the Bush administration's truly radical expansion of executive power, including the suspension of habeas corpus and the insitution of torture, even against US citizens on American soil.

8.03 pm. Oh shit. This is going to be two hours and no one is allowed even to mention other candidates. The hardball questioners include Republican state attorneys general. No journalists allowed. In fact, is this the first ever presidential debate in which not a single journalist is present? It's kind of a seminal moment in the cooptation of the GOP by FNC.

Electronic Ecstasy

Rave

Olivia Solon reports on what could be the next wave of recreational drugs:

One scenario [Rohit Talwar] imagines would make use of biological proteins manufactured with information-processing technology to deliver effects that could be triggered by electromagnetic stimulation. He imagined that they could be used in a club environment where the DJ would release nanoparticles that the audience could ingest. These could then be used to trigger the desired state at a particular point during his or her set using an electrical stimulus (from a headset) into the crowd’s brains.

(Photo by Murilo Cardoso)

This Ugly Farce Of A Party

Take it away, John Danforth:

What have been the big applause lines in these debates? Well, a statement that the governor of Texas is responsible for killing 234 people on death row. Or that we favor torture. Or that we’re creating a fence on the Mexican border that electrocutes people when they try to cross it. Or when people show up at the emergency room at hospitals and they’re not insured don’t treat them. And that, I mean these are the big applause lines, people just hoop and holler when they hear all that. […]

It doesn’t have anything to do with the Republican party that I was a part of. This is just totally different. And all of these people who are saying this, y’know, and claiming that, y’know, they’re for all this stuff, they also sort of ostentatiously say, “Oh, we’re very religious people. We really, we’re just very pious, Christian people.” They were for torture, and electrocution of the people on along the border and all of that. That doesn’t have anything to do with, is contrary to the Christianity that I understand.

Nor the Christianity I understand. It's pretty close to its opposite.

Losing Your Cyber-Virginity

Alexandra Molotkow shares her experience:

I remember the rigours of typing with one hand. I remember careening toward orgasm and politely sticking it out until the guy finished. I remember guys who logged off prematurely, and how easy it was to find someone else to help finish the job. I remember the reliable mix of disgust and pride afterward, and I remember that pride always won out after not very long. Although it felt dangerous, I believed it was safe. I never gave out my real name, my phone number or my address. I never expected to meet any of these men—most of the time, I would have blanched at the thought—and each tryst ended with the simple closing of a window.