Is My Phylactery Showing?: April 2009

Symptoms...

- Crawly feeling and headache

- Body aches

- Chills

- Fatique

Just waiting for the respiratory problems and fever.

I have a final on Friday. If you could add me to your prayer list for a rapid recovery from whatever this is, I would greatly appreciate it.

So far, I don't have an urge to root for morrells.

Apr

Catholic Cage Match: Augustine vs. Pelagius

The Catholic Church owes much of its early understanding of grace to St. Augustine of Hippo. He is frequently referred to as the Doctor of Grace because of the way in which he synthesized and articulated the Church’s teachings on this topic.[i] While not all of his thought has perdured as official doctrine of the faith (for example, his teaching on double predestination),[ii] his theological fingerprints are evident in much of what the Church has taught concerning grace over the last 1600 years.

Apr

Greetings from Lexington

Kentucky, not Massachusetts. It seems like a lovely day (although I'm inside and can't really tell), and the people are quite friendly. I'm doing some training here, and the participants are lauging at my jokes. That's a good thing.

One of them even recognized who it was on my polo shirt.

I'm still frightfully busy. My final is 10 days away, and I have way too much work to do.

Apr

Catholic Social Teaching

My wife brought up a chapter of the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, noting that it was bound to tick of people of a particular political stripe.

My response? There's something there to piss off everybody.

That's what it means to stand for the truth—to tell it how it is regardless of the response.

Apr

Questions for Lecture 6

Describe the move from martyrdom to the life of the hermit as the path to holiness.

Until 313 AD (when the Edict of Milan legalized Christianity throughout the Roman Empire), being a Christian meant that one may be subject to persecution and death. Just deciding to become a Christian required a serious commitment as it frequently meant a loss of status at very least.

Apr

Lecture 5 Study Questions

Comments on Augustine's theology concerning these questions would be appreciated. I've found that most of these lectures are simply not deep enough, nor do they provide much in the way sources references.

Describe the main themes in Augustine's theology of grace.

Apr

New Bass

The band has been working on a number of songs that require a drop D tuning, and a few others that have some low Bs. So I was forced to take advantage of an opportunity posed to me by my stepson—a six-string bass that he needed to move. He got me a very good price for it.

Turns out, it's the same line as my four-string bass.

I'm trying to get used to the new fingerings, and so far, I like. My daughter (a celloist and fledgling bass player) is also pretty happy to have a new toy around.

Apr

I'm back!

Happy Easter to you all! Lots going on here. I really shouldn't even be blogging yet, but I have a paper due tomorrow. That means I'm doing whatever I can to avoid writing anything topical.

So nothing on Augustine's and Pelagius' views on grace!

But I am trying to come up with a good title, and naturally, being a Catholic blogger, by "good" I mean something involving a bad pun. Something like

"How long will he Pelagius?"

Or maybe "Pelagian in the Sandbox of Heresy."

Or not.

Apr

15 Questions About Books Swiped from Julie D

The questions, not the books.

Answer and pass along.

1. Most treasured childhood book(s)?

Hate to say it, but I didn't have one (strictly speaking). However, I probably checked out Meet George Washington about a bazillion times from the school library until I was in third grade. I found a copy about 10 years ago and bought it.

2. Classic(s) you are embarrassed to admit you’ve never read?

The Odyssey.

3.

Is My Phylactery Showing?

Faithful Catholic or modern-day pharisee? Sometimes I might be a bit of both.