Epigraph for a Memoir Not Yet Written, #2

Here’s a worthy epigraph for a serious memoir, which mine aims to be—serious, that is.

Unlike the first epigraph, which I posted yesterday, this one isn’t by a maybe-Christian pop group, Mumford & Sons, but by a genuine Blessed, for heaven’s sake, a card-carrying Great Catholic Convert.

Furthermore, it’s not a single line but a whole big darn chunk.

Blessed John Henry Newman might have been describing my life and the process of coming to terms with it too when he wrote:

Epigraph for A Memoir Not Yet Written, #1

I imagine that every author comes upon things they wish they had written and then does the next best thing. They use the envied excerpt as an epigraph for their own inferior work.

I have several epigraphs for the memoir I have not yet written, though 70,000 words, give or take, are in the can and many others are on the cutting-room floor.

I will post a few of these epigraphs, but today I found one I particularly like: “Lead me to the truth and I will follow you with my whole life.”

It is from a song by Mumford & Sons. This one:

My Favorite Book of the Bible

The Gospels hold the Word of Jesus, his Voice. But the Acts of the Apostles contain His echo, his thumbprint—the forensic proof that He came, died, and rose.

Last Sunday in Acts we heard that sick people were carried into the streets on the off chance that the shadow of Peter would fall on them. Imagine the power of Christ that the shadow of his follower could have healing effects! No wonder “great number of men and women were added to them”!

This weekend we hear about the apostles in front of the Sanhedrin, who order them to stop preaching. The reading ends with the apostles “rejoicing that they had been found worthy to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name.”

Last week I realized how powerful the aftershock must have been. This week I wonder how much of it still reverberates. Especially in me: Am I willing to “suffer dishonor for the sake of the name”? And rejoice over it?

Our Pastor in the Holy Land

I returned home last night after two weeks away and attended morning Mass today. The Mass was offered in memory of beloved Charlie Amore.

My friend Ferde filled me in on parish events of the past two weeks. I was especially interested to learn (I am out of the loop) that our pastor, Father Barnes, is on retreat in the Holy Lands with Cardinal Seán O’Malley.

Here’s the Cardinal’s blog post about the trip. Sure enough, Father Barnes is in some of the pictures, like the one here.

Pope Francis on the Balcony

I missed the moment live.

When my smart phone told that we Habemused a Papam, I was waiting to start my next match at the National Club Teams Tournament of the US Croquet Association. I was grabbing a lemonade in the clubhouse of the National Croquet Center in Palm Beach, Florida, where the names Harpo Marx, Samuel Goldwyn, and Darryl Zanuck hang in honor, charter members of the USCA Hall of Fame. And suddenly I was thinking, Geez, I hope he has the consideration to come out on the balcony before my match begins. I want to know who he is.

But he didn’t.

Oscar, Shmoscar

I don’t know what conclusions to draw from last night’s Oscars. For one thing, I didn’t watch, so my opinion isn’t worth much. Nor obviously are my predictions.

I was upstairs reading, Katie downstairs watching when the name Christoph Waltz filtered up the well. I said to myself, Bedtime.

There is only one possible explanation for Waltz’s mediocre turn winning best performance by a supporting actor and that explanation is, 21 percent. With five nominees, that’s all the votes it took to win. Waltz outpointing Alan Arkin, Robert DeNiro, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tommy Lee Jones—four top screen actors of our age—is like the Red Sox winning the American League East this year. Winning 21 percent of their games won’t cut it.

In Praise of Michael O’Brien

I have been guilty of faint praise for Canadian Catholic novelist Michael O’Brien. The cause is not envy entirely.

I was thrilled by his Island of the World, about a Balkan refugee, and moved by Theophilus, about St. Luke’s pen pal, who in the novel follows the evangelist’s traces through Israel and Judea.

But I was so-so about the novel O’Brien seems proudest of, The Father’s Tale. For my taste it was overlong by half and had a split personality: a father’s quest for his prodigal son becomes (appropriately) a spiritual journey and then (inappropriately) a spy thriller.

I take it all back.

Memoir Fragment: The Façade of Notre Dame

In 1970—a college sophomore, a lapsed Episcopalian who had dreamed of being a minister—I met a spiritual teacher. I was not the only flower child to do so.

In a previous post, I described this meeting. Five months after this meeting, I began a seven-month grand tour of Europe with the teacher and one other student, my college roommate. Immediately, the three of us began studying the teaching of George Gurdjieff (1866–1949), as laid out encyclopedically in P. D. Ouspensky’s book In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching. The first idea we wrestled with was Gurdjieff’s notion that the “human machine” is comprised of several “centers,” or brains. 

That’s enough context for the following fragment of the memoir I am currently working on. The scene is Paris, spring 1971, a very long time ago. By this time, my roommate had left for home to answer queries from his draft board. . . .

It’s Oscar Weekend: Time to Announce the Benedicts

I’ve seen most of the Oscar-nominated films, and we all know which ones are considered Oscarabile. Mostly, they’re “Lincoln,” “Lincoln,” and “Lincoln.” The crop of films is more religious than ever this year, and we’re a day away from honoring one of the least religious of the bunch.

It’s time for the Catholic Oscars. But let’s call them the Benedicts, just because we love the guy from Bavaria, and we’re going to miss him.

Best Picture
The Oscar will go to “Lincoln,” and it is excellent. I called it “a great film about our greatest president.” Ethical it is, but religious, no. Plus, Spielberg’s already got a closetful of statuettes.

The Benedict goes to . . .

“Zero Dark Thirty” and Faith in One God

I woke up yesterday determined to resume my series of posts about the Catechism and turned to the next section, “The Implications of Faith in One God” (222–227). I ended the day at Hollywood Hits, watching “Zero Dark Thirty” with Katie.

Now I am awake in the middle of the night realizing that there was a theme to my day all along: faith works.

All this despite the fact that my much-loved and respected pastor, Father David Barnes, is being reassigned in phase one of the reorganization of the Archdiocese of Boston.

At such times, faith is as vital as oxygen. The Catechism says faith has “enormous consequences for our whole life.” (222) “Zero Dark Thirty” shows it kicking ass.