FINDING TRUTH WHEREVER IT MAY BE FOUND: "Ideologies are simple ides, disguised as science or philosophy, that purports to explain the complexity of the world and offer remedies that will perfect it. Ideologues are people who pretend they know how to 'make the world a better place' before they've taken care of their own chaos within . . . Ideologies are substitutes for true knowledge and ideologies are always dangerous when they come to power, because a simple-minded I-know-it-all approach is no match for the complexity of existence." from Jordan Peterson's, "12
QUOTE II: "Ideologies retool the very religious stories they purport to have supplanted, but eliminate the narrative psychological richness." same source
IN OTHER NEWS:
Last night we celebrated ONE YEAR of Theology on the Rocks! It has been an incredible year. We tackled many topics - sometimes challenging - sometimes fun. Hundreds have been through the doors of D'Agnese's and enjoyed food, fellowship and faith. Thank you to all the pastors and bulletin editors out there for helping get the word out! Of course you can always see what's happening on the Facebook Page.
The next speaker is Lannie Davis-Frecker, president of Julie Billiart schools and advocate for Catholic education for children with special learning needs.
Here are some pictures from last night's event - Mr. Bernie Smith, retired Federal Prosecutor, speaking on the death penalty.
Just in case you would like to know, two members of St. Sebastian Parish will be on the Journey Home program on EWTN this week. Matthew and Elizabeth Akers can be seen TONIGHT (Monday) at 8PM and Tuesday and Friday at 1PM!
This last week there were a couple of priests visiting at St. Sebastian and we started talking about our techniques for distributing ashes. You may think that it's just sticking your thumb in some burned palms and smearing them on a person's forehead - but for practiced ash distributors, there is a developed method. From that night's discussion, this seems to be the most common:
Ashes, as it is well known, are made from the previous year's blessed palm branches. Did you know you that a parish can buy these from a religious goods distributor instead of making their own? I don't know WHAT they do to them, but like wine, the store bought brand is always better than the home made. They stick better, have better consistency, last longer . . . How do they do it? Homemade always seem to be just a little chunkier no matter what and you really have to grind them in to get them to stick! (Sorry St. Sebastianites.)
So, as you well know, this day is a very solemn and dignified celebration requiring the utmost gravitas. The dangerous mix of homemade ashes, an emotionally charged atmosphere and communal expectation makes occurrences that would otherwise not be humorous in the least outrageously hilarious. Such as this:
I think after almost 20 years of doing this, I have FINALLY grown rather immune to this occurrence. But not all priests. The way to determine if the person in front of you had a pile of ashes collect on their nose is to look into the face of a young priest and check for these signs:
This year, the 20th anniversary of the parish coincides with the 100th anniversary of the Diocese of Cleveland.
1950
There had already been three vocations to the priesthood from the parish. The fourth however was an ordination that took place at St. Sebastian Parish. According to a full page article into Sunday, June 4th Akron Beacon Journal, the Rev. J. Lawrence Dannemiller became the second priest ever ordained within the city limits. Normally, priests are ordained at the cathedral in Cleveland. The other priest so ordained was in 1847, just a little more than a century earlier.
The paper ran many pictures of the day including one of the procession to the church in which it stated, “The procession preceding the ceremony wends through the picturesque grounds of St. Sebastian.” More than 600 person were reported to be in attendance.
Fr. Dannemiller was the first son of the parish to be ordained whose entire elementary school education was at St. Sebastian Parish School. He was ordained into the Sulpician order which is perhaps why the ordination was in Akron and only for him. He most likely served teaching in a seminary, the training of priests being a charism of the Sulpician charism.
FINDING TRUTH WHEVER IT MAY BE FOUND: "Don't let the bad be the friend of the worst." Matthew Wyszinski
QUOTE II: "Men seek sins or more startling obscenities as stimulants to their jaded sense. They seek after oriental religions for the same reason. They try to stab their nerves to life, if it were with the knives of the priests of Baal. They are walking in their sleep and try to wake themselves up with nightmares." from G. K. Chesterton's "The Everlasting Man"
IN OTHER NEWS:
HAPPY ST. ASHLENTINE/CYRIL & METHODIUS WEDNESDAY.
Why don't we try to confuse things even more by throwing in Mr. Mastromatteo's painting, "The Sweet Suffering of St. Sebastian."
So I went to throw that pair of shoes away today. It was more difficult than I thought it would be. They are unwearable. I wouldn't even dream of giving them to a St. Vincent de Paul Shop. But there I was thinking, "What if I need them some day?" Ridiculous. So I said my goodbyes, "You were a great pair of shoes. One of my favorites. Thank you," dropped them in the trash and walked away. There's still time to go back and dig them out.
Fr. K sent this in:
When people ask me how things are at the parish I always answer, "They seem fine but I never like to say definitively because God is ironic and you never know what's under the ice getting ready to break through and cause problems." As it turns out our school book company that served us so well for so long is sending home book lists with children that cover topics that are severely controversial. (I have not seen the books, just heard, so I can't really say much more about them. Yet.) Our school is going through the process of choosing a new company. HERE is one article, sent in by CC explaining the concerns.
This is year can be one of the most enthralling, memorable and love enhancing St. Valentine’s Day in 70 years. That is the last time that St. Valentine and Ash Wednesday had to share the same day. If we are smart, we will use it for all that it is worth.
SOME PEOPLE (certainly not you) will see this as a mighty inconvenience. Decisions have to be made: Do I show traditional forms of love to the object of my affections OR do I show my respect to my faith and love of God by following the disciplines of the Church that He founded. The answer is: neither! It is a chance to shine in both arenas.
First a quick note: One of the reasons that couples who do not live together or engage in sexual activity before marriage is that they are forced to find more creative and often very subtle ways of expressing to the other their deep love, respect, and admiration when sexual congress is not an option. Once sexuality enters into a relationship, many of these more subtle yet foundational ways of expressing love gets left at home while its wilder twin parties every night.
For most couples, there will be a time or period in there life when marital relations are not an option. How do you express and understand both how to love and how to recognize and BE loved? If you haven’t had practice at some point in your life at this, it can be difficult to trust and to start.
Well here is a day to find a new, creative, fun, challenging, unique way to show the person you love just how much you love him or her. Step one: put away your credit card. It is a day of fast and abstinence so no chocolate and no big fancy dinner. Corporate America is going to be very disappointed in you. So what can you do that is different on this day than all of the others that will make it clear to the person that you love that they are more special to you than could ever know? What can you do besides just buying the traditional Valentine’s junk that will go on sale for half price the day after Valentines - being pushed aside as the bring the St. Patrick Day stuff out? What will be cherished by the person you love AND show reverence for the faith that you practice AT THE VERY SAME TIME? This is your day and your year to shine!
Due to the severe winter weather we have been experiencing combined with the flu that has been running about and staying at people's homes, this has become a rather regular event at the parish.
Which occasionally leads to a free night without appointments.
But, which in reality and not unexpectedly leads to this:
This was the year a young Ellen Martucci began playing the organ. Mrs. McDonald was the only organist at the time and wanted someone to help so that she could take a vacation. So she went to the nuns and asked who played the piano. “Ellen plays well,” she was informed and so she asked Ellen if she would like to play. She did and Mrs. McDonald was able to get away.
Ellen later joined the choir. Coming to the practice one day, Fr. Zwisler asked to speak with her. “Tomorrow there is Mass at 6:00, 7:15 and 8:00. Be there (at the organ) and then meet me in the rectory for breakfast.”
Ellen worked for her Father at the time at a job she did not particularly enjoy. When her Father said he expected her at the job the next day she responded, “I can’t! Father wants me to work for him playing the organ!” much to his delight and hers.
Ellen served as the official parish organist until her retirement in 2011 although she continues to play for daily Masses. When asked how she was able to work with Fr. Zwisler all those years she said, “I knew what he wanted and how he wanted it done! If you don’t you quit!”
The organ in the original church was Conrad Prestly Organ and was removed in the late 1970s due to disuse and neglect. After the original church had been turned into a hall where children ate their school lunches, Fr. McCann reports, the students would try to throw apples up into the pipes. The organ was then sold.
I've had these shoes forever. The leather tops are splitting, there is a hole in one of the soles. The backs are broken down from slipping them on and off without bothering with the shoes strings and the heels are worn to a terrible slant. So I am giving them up for lent. (My sister will be so glad.)
I've been holding on to them thinking that I might need them. You never know. I MIGHT need to be both semi-dressed up AND need to do something dirty at the same time - like dig a hole as part of a as of yet un-rediscovered Catholic ceremony not unlike Arbor Day. So they sit there at the bottom of the shoe hierarchy awaiting their big day. Which has not come for two years save for one time I wanted to make the point that I COULD still wear them walking the dog.
My life is full of this stuff. I MIGHT need something. Some day. For Some thing. And sometimes that is great. "I've got one of those that has been sitting around for a long time!" is a wonderfully rewarding thing to be able to say. Unfortunately it is usually followed by, "Now where did I see it last?" And truthfully, it only happens about once a year. The occasion to junk space allocation is not good.
So here is one of my Lenten resolves. (Why isn't lent capitalized?) Every day in lent I will give away one thing and discard one thing. First on the list is this ratty pair of shoes (trash) and a pair of cufflinks (give away.) I recommend this as part of your lenten practice. It serves many purposes: un-cluttering your life - discerning what you really need - being aware of what you have - giving to others (charity) - becoming detached from things.
I have been chomping at the bit to get started but learned my lesson a few years ago when I tried this last. The first 20 days - EASY. The next 10 one had to be a little more discerning. The last ten . . . OUCH! (That's about 80 items!) Now two things make it a little easier for me. 1st - we have a Good will truck on our property. 2nd - I am allowed to cheat a couple of times and walk over to the church a make a donation to the Poor Box as part of the give away. But to do that too often is cheating and infringing on others works of charity for lent.
So I offer this to you as something to do for lent - give up your old shoes for lent.
FINDING TRUTH WHEREVER IT MAY BE FOUND: "But the story of the golden calf also reminds us that without rules we quickly become slaves to our own passions - and there's nothing freeing about that." Norman Doidge in "12 Rules for Life"
QUOTE II: ". . . left to our own untutored judgement, we are quick to aim low and worship qualities that are beneath us." same source
IN OTHER NEWS:
THANK YOU! to the anonymous reader who reminded me that Adam's Ale is celebrating
TWELVEYEARS!
(Easy to remember because my dog Sebastian is the same age.)
Here is my annual thanks to Dawn Eden who chided me with, "What?! You don't have a blog? Shame on you!" Thus beginning my twelve year run with you.
Here are some quick details (interesting to nobody perhaps but me):
In twelve years there have 2,642 posts.
The all time most read post was "How Come I Don't Remember?" HERE
The UNITED STATES has the largest number of readers followed by
RUSSIAN, GERMANY, CHINA, and FRANCE
(although I do know I have some very loyal readers in Rome and Slovenia)
TOTAL PAGE VIEWS: 926,549
THANK YOU to the 75 of you who are followers.
Want to see from where Adam's Ale is sent out? Here is a great 5 minute video:
If you want to hear the full story, listen to my homily from the 5th Sunday in ordinary time. It should be posted soon. But here is an excerpt:
I went on vacation about 10 days ago to Florida. When I arrived at the airport at 5AM it was eerily dark. To make a very long story short (too late) it turns out that there had been a giant storm that night which I COMPLETELY missed and it somehow blew out the power at the airport. The only lights that were on were on generators. Everybody's flights were cancelled. There were people everywhere.
One of the things that kept operating was the giant revolving door. Just I was about to enter the terminal I caught sight of another man about to enter. I stepped back so he could go first . . .
The Boy Scouts was a relatively new organization at this time having been founded in 1910. But
even more recent was the institution of a Boy Scout badge specifically for Catholic scouts. Sensing a need for more spiritual development in the Scouting program, the Rev. James E. Dolan created the Ad Altare Dei program in 1926. The aim of the first program Fr. Dolan developed was to recognize those First Class Scouts who had served "with loyalty and fidelity" as altar boys during their tenure as Scouts. He named the program Ad Altare Dei and created the Ad Altare Dei Cross as it's emblem. The English translation of the name means: "to the Altar of God." The first emblems were presented nationwide in 1941. The aim of the program was "an attempt to teach and inculcate a Catholic way of living through the Scouting program." The first set of requirements stated the Scout had to be at least First Class, a member of a registered Troop of the Boy Scouts of America, a resident within the diocese, and had served at the altar in any capacity for 250 hours. To be eligible for the emblem, the Scout had to demonstrate his ability to make all responses in Latin. The Scout's Pastor had to certify also that the Scout was worthy to receive the emblem because of his punctuality, fitness, decorum on the altar, and devotion.
1946 would mark the first time any Scout in Akron would receive this medal. Across the city, twelve scouts earned this medal. Of the the twelve, six were from St. Sebastian.
Before you read this I want to make very clear that I am proud of my seminary, recommend it, and have great faith in what is happening there. These events clearly happened in the past and were limited and are only used as an example.
When I was in the seminary, our entire, official exposure to the Mass as it was celebrated before Vatican II was a videotape played in fast forward by a professor who spent the entire three minutes making fun of the Mass with witticisms such as, “Look how funny they look taking off and putting on their hats.” The clear message was, “Old is bad, only the new is good.” I seethed with anger. This was the Mass my parents, my grandparents, well . . . all of my historical family (and the majority of saints) celebrated and grew in sanctity through. But we stayed silent. Even attendance at one of these Masses were possible grounds to be removed from the seminary.
Fortunately things have changed. The problem with this is the ignorance and error that it promotes. By removing history and our connection to the past, the sole authority becomes the person in power. As proof of this, even the Vatican II documents were called into question. If there were something that directly opposed what a particular professor was saying, the answer was not in debating what was said but a justification was made that the portion of the document in question was clearly a “compromise” (RE: the Holy Spirit was definitely not present in this part of the document) and so it could be ignored - not dealt with - ignored. From there, a person with power can lead you in all kinds of directions in line with or not in line with the Church and their position would be valid until someone with more power would take their place.
However, a Catholic steeped in history, mired in Church teaching, braced by the hermeneutic continuity can only be set adrift so far before the disharmony of his spiritual life and that of the Democracy of the Dead (as G. K. Lewis spoke our 2,000 year shared history of the practice of the faith) helps correct his course.
This concept is not just handy, it is of vital importance and here are two reasons why: Say a set of parents has a child and they have decided not to “force” any religion on their child but rather let them decide for themselves what faith they want to be. Statistically they will choose either nothing or a hodgepodge of convenient things. This is because they have no ground on which to stand in order to judge all other positions. It is all just soup. There is no traction. But as Archimedes said, “Give me a firm place on which to stand and I will move the earth.”
The same thing could be said of a study of Western culture. It is vital that we hand on the culture that has been given to us to the next generation. As much as it may need “fixing” it has gotten us somewhere. It is not a marble statue to be handed on and preserved exactly. It is rather like a clay statue to be improved by every generation. If it is not handed on, then every generation must start from scratch. Instead of being handed a clay statue, they are given a formless lump of clay. This leaves them vulnerable to persons of unchallenged and perhaps unproven power to come along and shape their clay for them and not having anything to which they might compare it, allows for manipulation in the extreme.
History and culture are not weights to be discarded so that we might be free to have a better future, they ARE the very tools we need to create a better future.
FINDING TRUTH WHEREVER IT MAY BE FOUND: "Reincarnation is not really a mystical idea . . . Reincarnation need only extend experiences in the sense of repeating them. It is no more transcendental for a man to remember what he did in Babylon before he was born than to remember what he did in Brixton before he had a knock on the head." from G. K. Chesterton's, "Everlasting Man"
QUOTE II: "Simple secularists still talk as if the Church had introduced a sort of schism between reason and religion. The truth is the the Church was actually the first thing that ever tried to combine reason and religion. There had never before been any such union of the priests and the philosophers." same source.
IN OTHER NEWS:
I did not think I would be posting to you today but my flight was cancelled and I am sitting here in the airport for 5 hours. Yuck.
Of course nobody sent in anything this week but here is some news just the same:
St. Bernard Parish had the dedication of their rebuilt pipe organ. It was a glorious affair! The church was PACKED. Fr. Reed, the pastor, graciously allowed Fr. Simone and me to sit in the sanctuary. The Director of Music at St. Sebastian, Lynn Steward, was the guest organist and put the organ through its paces.
This is Fr. Reed blessing the rebuilt Schantz organ:
My class was ordained on the feast of St. Joan of Arc. My classmate has a little statue of her and I wanted one like it to begin developing my relationship with this saint a little better. I found something I liked on Etsy though it was a little more than I wanted to pay. But I've waited almost two decades to find something I liked and thought I better just go ahead and dive in. Unfortunately this 104 year old statue from France arrived heavily damaged.
The person selling it was sad and very understanding and we worked out a deal that slashed the original purchase price. Now it is matter of a lot of glue and patience. Perhaps she already worked her first favor me. I no longer feel like I spent to much money!
Here is a new Theology on Tap Akron:
Here is a vide about contemporary art that is not the usual diatribe. I don't think it redeems the current situation but it does help me understand it a lot better. I hope you get something out of it.
Here is what happens when we have fewer and fewer priests doing what was, at one time, done by many more hands. Around this time of year, St. Paul, St. Francis and St. Sebastian have their feast days. The priests from these parishes generally get to gather for dinner at this time. This is becoming more difficult every year. This year was ridiculous to the point of humor. It was obvious that we all wanted to be together (considering the great lengths through which we went to do so) but still . . .
We knew one of the priests had an evening Mass so we were going to eat as close to 5:00 as possible. The only problem was, St. Sebastian had confessions until 5PM.
So everybody was notified. "If confessions run long," which of course they did - for which I am always grateful, "please let yourself in and make yourself at home. We will eat as soon as we are finished." (Marcy: Do you like the way I worded that?) The secretary was to turn on the stove at a certain time so everything would be done exactly when we needed it . . .
No fear! We can just eat quickly. Time was running out so we started without Father. Half way through the soup he came running in and sat down to a warm bowl.
Then one of the priests announced:
At one point, between courses, it was just me and Fr. Simone.
So we did! We used the old, fine settings from the 1930's and so, of course, everything had to be hand washed. I was not looking forward to staying up late or facing the tower of dishes and silver the next day and now we didn't have to! Eventually, almost everyone returned and as we waited for the last person to show for dessert . . .
FINDING TRUTH WHEREVER IT MAY BE FOUND: "Ideologies are simple ides, disguised as science or philosophy, that purports to explain the complexity of the world and offer remedies that will perfect it. Ideologues are people who pretend they know how to 'make the world a better place' before they've taken care of their own chaos within . . . Ideologies are substitutes for true knowledge and ideologies are always dangerous when they come to power, because a simple-minded I-know-it-all approach is no match for the complexity of existence." from Jordan Peterson's, "12 
