Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Reflections on Dante's Divine Comedy - Pt 10-14 The Inferno




Canto 25 - Thievery and Aristotle's notion of the entelechy. I suspect one could only find such a juxtapositon here.

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

On St. Patrick's Day

Because of the work being done updating our website there has been precious little attention given to our weblog recently. And just to prepare those who may visit here on this Google Blogger site we will be moving our blogging to our new web site once it is up and running sometime around the end of March. This site will remain available as long a Google allows but new postings will appear on our new website.


Having been raised in a fundamentalist Baptist tradition we were taught that Catholicism was the Devil's haunt and was filled with myths and lies all meant to deceive and mislead. So, I always believed that St. Patrick was a mythical character until I read the historical accounts of his life when I was an adult. Since that time, and having subsequently been received into the Catholic Church, I have found the spirituality evidenced by St. Patrick and those who followed him to be an inspiration. The lyricism of the Breastplate of St. Patrick has often stirred me to greater devotion and conviction to follow Christ and his Church.

Today at breakfast with friends one of the assembled had brought a book of poems by Seamus Heaney and graced us with a reading of his "St. Kevin and the Blackbird". It was my first encounter with this poem. While Heaney would likely have had some sympathy with my Baptist mentors in his opinion of the Catholic Church, he surely seems to have captured something of the spirit of St. Patrick, as well as St. Francis in this poem. But most of all for me it is grounded from first line to last in an act of Christian prayer and, as all good poetry (and prayer) must, leads the reader into life. I encourage any who may read this to follow the link to the poem where it can be read (with the copyright holder's approval) and where you may listen to Heaney read it as well.

Blessings.

Monday, March 09, 2015

Friday, March 06, 2015

Reflections on Dante's Divine Comedy - Pt 10-12 The Inferno




Canto 24 continued: fame leaves a vestige of oneself on earth. The instinct to leave evidence.