The ACS's own Kevin O'Brien in the news with his new initiative

Very exciting for the St. Louis area, and anywhere else the troop will travel. I'm keeping an eye on this.

If you are on the Chesterton Society mail list...

you recently got a letter in the mail. As I'd previously mentioned, the letter informed us that quite soon (October) the membership fee will have to go up. You probably noticed that postage rates increased recently (we did) and that translates into $$ lost each issue of Gilbert magazine. In an effort to continue to gain readership (as we are celebrating 10--TEN!--years of publication) and to ensure that we continue to publish the magazine, the annual membership fee (which includes a subscription) will be increasing soon.

That means if you are thinking about joining, join now. If you are thinking about subscribing, subscribe now. If you are thinking about donating, donate now. If you are thinking about making a sandwich, go do it. Then come back and join.

Dr. Thursday's Thursday Post

Making a Prayer at the Cross Road

Given the curious and stimulating discussions about rock-and-roll in a previous post, I was going to write some nonsense about pipe organs (because I once built a little one in my house) or about playing bass (which I have tried, both bowed and electronic). But I shall defer that for a bit.

Instead, I ask you to go quickly to the blogg called Enchiridion and read a very rich and wonderful poem by a young Chestertonian named Sheila, whom I met at a past Conference. Also, please read, not my own witless comment, but her own sensible one. For she has latched on to a very important idea, and one on which we should spend some real thought. Hence this post. Click to read more - but please read her poem first.Here are the words I wish to consider:

My mom likes to go on about Incarnational theology, and I also like to think of Chesterton and the poetry of trains. Can we really say, in an A.D. world, that anything is unpoetic?
[From Enchiridion cited above; my emphasis]

Simply, the answer is - of course not! Everything is now poetic. We assert this truth, Sunday after Sunday, though unless we happen to know a bit of Greek, or perhaps histology, we would overlook it. For when we recite the Nicene Creed, we say "per quem omnia facta sunt" = "Through Whom [Jesus] all things were made." You see, the English word "poem" or "poet" comes from the Greek verb poieo which means "I make". The clue from the branch of medicine called histology is that the "hemopoetic" tissues are those in the bone marrow which make red blood cells.

I wish I had the time to go into a consideration of what some call the "anthropic principle" - the idea that the Universe was made with Man in mind (Man-the-species = anthropos in Greek). But it might be said (as GKC might say) how much more we might really call it the "Christic" principle: God made the Universe with Christ in mind!

But Man has also made things - and his making is also poetic. In a previous posting I hinted at some of the fantastic poetry of the Bridge... so what can "the poetry of trains" mean?
For me, there is one particular Potteresque scene which leaps to mind:

"It is you who are unpoetical," replied the poet Syme. "...The rare, strange thing is to hit the mark; the gross, obvious thing is to miss it. We feel it is epical when man with one wild arrow strikes a distant bird. Is it not also epical when man with one wild engine strikes a distant station? Chaos is dull; because in chaos the train might indeed go anywhere, to Baker Street or to Bagdad. But man is a magician, and his whole magic is in this, that he does say Victoria, and lo! it is Victoria. No, take your books of mere poetry and prose; let me read a time table, with tears of pride. Take your Byron, who commemorates the defeats of man; give me Bradshaw, who commemorates his victories."
[GKC, The Man Who Was Thursday CW6:478-9]

(Just in case you did not get it from the context, "Bradshaw" was the master-reference timetable for British trains.) Nor are trains the only magic we magicians have at our disposal.

Sheila mentions how her poem hangs from the highway lights - GKC also gave a splendid word-painting of such lights:

A great many people talk as if this claim of ours, that all things are poetical, were a mere literary ingenuity, a play on words. Precisely the contrary is true. It is the idea that some things are not poetical which is literary, which is a mere product of words. The word "signal-box" is unpoetical. But the thing signal-box is not unpoetical; it is a place where men, in an agony of vigilance, light blood-red and sea-green fires to keep other men from death. That is the plain, genuine description of what it is; the prose only comes in with what it is called.
[GKC, Heretics CW1:55]

Wow, read those words again, as I fear that perhaps you will not really think about this as you should:

Next time you are out driving, and you see a traffic light, be it red or green (we'll skip yellow) did you EVER consider it to be "the place where men in an agony of vigilance" have kindled the fires - be they simply electronic - with the rich colours of the sea or of blood - in order to keep other men from death!!!

No wonder we call them the CROSS roads.

It may be postulated - and may be true - that long ago, the demons hinted distortions of the truth to the ancient pagans, so as to further their twisted plots. But from very ancient times any intersection of three roads (like a T, especially at the divisions of farm-lands) was considered sacred, and shrines were erected there. That is why one of the names of the Roman goddess Diana is "Trivia" (Latin: "three ways"). But again! There is poetry, mystical poetry here, for we now know the Truth: He who said "I am the Truth" also said "I am the Way"! [Jn 14:6]

Chesterton as usual says it much better than I can:

Mythology had many sins; but it had not been wrong in being as carnal as the Incarnation.
[GKC, The Everlasting Man CW2:308]

No, in an A.D. world, all things are poetic - all things, water and wine, bread and oil, words and stones, cars and roads... and us too!

As GKC says "The greatest of poems is an inventory." [Orthodoxy CW1:267] and it is no wonder that the last psalm (150) is simply a list of musical instruments - all of which are organized that they may MAKE harmony - to praise God. Like this:

Cars and trucks, praise the Lord.
Highways and roads, praise the Lord.
All manner of lights and signals, praise the Lord.
Machines and computers, praise the Lord.
Ye drivers and passengers,
Ye police and fire and emergency workers,
Ye automotive mechanics and fast-food makers,
Ye scientists and engineers,
praise the Lord, give glory and eternal praise to Him.
Amen. Alleluia.

Yes, and tomorrow we'll add some more verses - until the End, when the psalm will stand complete, and then we shall all sing it together.

--Dr. Thursday

Chesterton quote at end of article

H/T: David Z

British Old Time Radio Broadcast of Fr. Brown: The Blue Cross

From the Radio Memories RSS feed:

British Old Time Radio Podcast 34 Father Brown in The Blue Cross
http://radiomemories.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=249354#

Direct mp3 download link:
http://libsyn.com/media/british/british34.mp3

This isn't a reading of the story, it's a dramatization with voices, and it is quite interesting.
H/T: Mike F.

Another cigarette card

H/T David, who asks, "Has anyone seen this image of the big guy before? "

Click the pictures to see them larger. I know this picture of GKC is new to me.

An Essay to read

John is a young Chestertonian, who attended the conference in 06 (and is one of the instigators of the shortcut "ChesterCon").

Iron Maiden and GKC??

From David:

I watched the Father Brown BBC dvd tonight. In the biography on GKC, they mentioned that he was a major influence on C. S. Lewis (we know that) and that Neil Gaiman based one of his characters in his Sandman series, Gilbert, on GKC (some of us know that). Then it stated that Iron Maiden excerpted one of GKC's hymns in their song "Revelation" from their album Piece of Mind.

The song is on iTunes and I was able to listen to the sample of 20 seconds. God willing, I will not have to listen to the rest of it. Perhaps there are some head banger Chestertonians who will do so and tell us about it.

Anyone willing or able to tell us more about this?

Checking out the St. Louis Chesterton Society

As I am currently in St. Louis, I thought I'd check out what's going on with the St. Louis Chesterton Society. Wow, folks, if you live here, you should be a part of this exciting group.

Kevin O. has been just awesome in scheduling GKC's "The Surprise" for presentation September 21-23 and bringing Dale Ahlquist (and Chuck Chalberg) into town for shows September 28-30. Put these dates on your calendar now.
Stop reading and do it!!!!!

Now this is exciting stuff! You lucky St. Louisians!

If You Live in the Area

Come hear a concert and help out the ACS.

The Bridge and the Beloved

From Dr. Thursday:

Much as Jesus called attention to a piece of recent news ("How about those 18 killed by the falling tower in Siloe?" Lk 13:4) and GKC to the June 30 flooding in London including his then hometown of Battersea (ILN July 21 1906 CW27:238) our faithful bloggmistress called our attention to the recent disaster in the Twin Cities, so near to the home of our intrepid and daring friend Sunday - er - I mean the president of the ACS.

In a strange coincidence I happened to just finish re-reading the awesome Builders of the Bridge, D. B. Steinman's biography of John Roebling and his son Washington, who together with Washington's wife Emily are the three great ones whose dedication gave us the Brooklyn Bridge - considered the engineering marvel of the 19th century. These three were great engineers, amazing people, hard workers, heroic exemplars of America.

I wish I had time to review that book, or another text, also awesome - The Great Bridge by David McCullough - but as fascinating as these books and the Brooklyn Bridge are, this posting is about Chesterton, and I will try to keep on topic for once. (Yeah, right.) But perhaps as we pray for those who died or were injured in Minnesota, and discuss the important issues of civil Engineering brought to the fore by this recent event, we might ponder bridges in a somewhat larger - and Chestertonian - approach, for GKC tells us: "It is wrong to fiddle while Rome is burning; but it is quite right to study the theory of hydraulics while Rome is burning." [GKC What's Wrong With the World CW4:43]
Click here to you wish to study the theory of bridges.
Near the end of 1907, GKC wrote about the death of a great English poet, Francis Thompson, who wrote one of the most mystical and entrancing poems I know - "New Year's Chimes". GKC's entire essay is a wonderful introduction, but I shall just give you the one relevant paragraph:

In one of his poems, he [Thompson] says that abyss between the known and the unknown is bridged by "Pontifical death." There are about ten historical and theological puns in that one word. That a priest means a pontiff, that a pontiff means a bridge-maker, that death is certainly a bridge, that death may turn out after all to be a reconciling priest, that at least priests and bridges both attest to the fact that one thing can get separated from another thing - these ideas, and twenty more, are all actually concentrated in the word "pontifical." In Francis Thompson's poetry, as in the poetry of the universe, you can work infinitely out and out, but yet infinitely in and in. These two infinities are the mark of greatness; and he was a great poet.
[GKC, ILN Dec 14 1907 CW27:603-4]

Where does the "beloved" come in? It is a very touching story, and one quite thoroughly in keeping with both the poetic and engineering aspects of bridges. Except for the hint in the paragraph I am about to quote, you will not find it in Chesterton's own work - but Maisie Ward tells us that "Gilbert stood on a little bridge in St. James's Park. It seemed to him in that hour to be the bridge of his first memory, across which a fairy prince was passing to rescue a princess. On this bridge he asked Frances to marry him, and she said yes." [Return To Chesterton 27-8] Indeed! But let us hear Uncle Gilbert tell us of that moment:

It was fortunate, however, that our [his and Frances'] next most important meeting was not under the sign of the moon but of the sun. She has often affirmed, during our later acquaintance, that if the sun had not been shining to her complete satisfaction on that day, the issue might have been quite different. It happened in St. James's Park; where they keep the ducks and the little bridge, which has been mentioned in no less authoritative a work than Mr. Belloc's Essay on Bridges, since I find myself quoting that author once more. I think he deals in some detail, in his best topographical manner, with various historic sites on the Continent; but later relapses into a larger manner, somewhat thus: "The time has now come to talk at large about Bridges. The longest bridge in the world is the Forth Bridge, and the shortest bridge in the world is a plank over a ditch in the village of Loudwater. The bridge that frightens you most is the Brooklyn Bridge, and the bridge that frightens you least is the bridge in St. James's Park." I admit that I crossed that bridge in undeserved safety; and perhaps I was affected by my early romantic vision of the bridge leading to the princess's tower. But I can assure my friend the author that the bridge in St. James's Park can frighten you a good deal.
[GKC, Autobiography CW16:151]

Wow. Leave it to GKC to use the most perfect symbol of unity in its most perfect manner!

Francis Thompson was not the only poet to ponder bridges and their building. A certain fraternity I know makes much of a poem about a bridge-builder who was "going a lone highway" and about a certain Greek conjunction... Curiously, its most recent history concludes with a poem by GKC - a poem which summarises all my own attempts at explanation:

For Four Guilds: II. The Bridge Builders

In the world's whitest morning
As hoary with hope,
The Builder of Bridges
Was priest and was pope:
And the mitre of mystery
And the canopy his,
Who darkened the chasms
And doomed the abyss.

To eastward and westward
Spread wings at his word
The arch with the key-stone
That stoops like a bird;
That rides the wild air
And the daylight cast under;
The highway of danger,
The gateway of wonder.

Of his throne were the thunders
That rivet and fix
Wild weddings of strangers,
That meet and not mix;
The town and the cornland;
The bride and the groom;
In the breaking of bridges
Is treason and doom.

But he bade us, who fashion
The road that can fly,
That we build not too heavy
And build not too high:
Seeing alway that under
The dark arch's bend
Shine death and white daylight
Unchanged to the end.

Who walk on his mercy
Walk light, as he saith,
Seeing that our life
Is a bridge above death;
And the world and its gardens
And hills, as ye heard,
Are born above space
On the wings of a bird.

Not high and not heavy
Is building of his:
When ye seal up the flood
And forget the abyss,
When your towers are uplifted,
Your banners unfurled,
In the breaking of bridges
Is the end of the world.
[GKC, Collected Poems 86-87]

Maybe it's time for us to get out the old hard hat and transit, and work hard towards real unity... for it is right to study civil engineering when a bridge has fallen.

--Dr. Thursday

PS: Just in case you wish to know a little more about the Brooklyn Bridge, or others, here are two from Dover which I have, and can thoroughly recommend: A Picture History of the Brooklyn Bridge and Bridges of the World: Their Design and Construction.

More Practical Distributism

OK, we've heard some things you can do as a consumer distributist. But what about a living & working distributist? One commentor made reference to this: you start doing your hobby, and work it gradually into a home business or self-employment opportunity. But what about some practical advice on how to do this? We have debts to pay off, children to raise; how does one get from corporate job to self-employed safely with a family? How many years is it practical to say that it takes to actually do it? And what if you're scared to leave the so-called security of a job that pays health benefits (and you have children or yourself with health problems or pre-existing conditions)--and you feel tied to the job that will pay the hospital bills?

Practical Distributism

Had an interesting conversation last night with a Chestertonian who wants to know how to put the principles of Distributism into practical action today.

I know you all are much more informed about distributism than I am, so tell me, how do we "do" distributism in this culture, in this world today?

Heard at the Art Fair...

Over the weekend, we were at an art fair (which is why I didn't post, being outdoors in the cold wet rain all weekend is not conducive to blogging) and one of our customers had a remarkable story.

Last year, she had told us that her dog had cancer. This is a precious dog. So, she was going through chemotherapy. For a dog. It was costing something like $4-7000 and of course, she had no doggy health insurance.

So, this year, I asked after the dog, knowing its importance to her, and she informed us that the dog had passed away.

But, she said, she had a grand send out. The dog had a full funeral, open casket, huge gravestone (with picture and the words "Mommy loves you very much") grave (in a human graveyard, with a section set aside for pets) and a minister who gave a eulogy. Price tag: somewhere around $6,000.

I didn't ask who attended the event, wondering what I would do if I ever was invited to such a thing.

It seems to me that something needs to be said about the increasing devotion and attention and money being spent on pets. I think it is a sign of our society's breakdown. When pets are given such high value, and families are neglected; when pets are given chemotherapy and children can't get health care; when pets are loved to such a degree over people; when money is spent on pets which might better be used to feed, clothe, shelter and care for humans; a society that has so much love to expend on pets, and so little to expend on other humans is a sick society. A person who says that their pet was worth more than most of the people she's ever met, is a person with sadly mislaid affections.

The other day, a hairball floated past me and onto a pathway that many people use for running, biking, and walking dogs. As I was walking behind a dog, it quite rapidly and disgustingly sniffed and then ate the hairball before I could react (which I would have tried to do, given time). Dogs are affectionate, but lacking in common sense because they aren't people. And they don't love back. If people mistake the affection of a dog for love, it tells a lot about what we haven't, as a society, learned about love.

Her Patronus is an Ibis: the Safe Middle Road

Nancy Brown's The Mystery of Harry Potter
Reviewed by Peter J. Floriani, Ph.D. (to whom I am grateful-Ed.)

J.K. Rowling's seven books of Harry Potter are complete. All its mysteries are now explained - or at least revealed, for sometimes even things in broad daylight remain mysterious: "The mystic allows one thing to be mysterious, and everything else becomes lucid."[GKC Orthodoxy CW1:231]

In the end, of course, no one but God knows the design, the inner intentions of the author - she may not know herself. It may be, as Gandalf explained to Frodo about Bilbo's finding of the Ring, that the story was planned, and not by its author. Sometimes, in the writing of certain great stories, the true Author of the Story steps in and takes action, as GKC reveals in his play "The Surprise."

Yes, "by their fruits you will know them" [Mt 7:16] - but someone needs to taste the fruit. There are those who are curious about Harry, and wish to know the quality of Rowling's fruits. To assist these, Catholics and parents in particular, Nancy Brown has provided a short guide, The Mystery of Harry Potter: A Catholic Family Guide.

Brown's book takes a classical view of the HP sequence, the view Aquinas took of Aristotle: "I believe that there is a middle field of facts which are given by the senses to be the subject matter of the reason; and that in that field the reason has a right to rule, as the representative of God in Man. ...what man has done man may do; and if an antiquated old heathen called Aristotle can help me to do it I will thank him in all humility." [GKC, St. Thomas Aquinas CW2:429, emphasis added] Hence, Nancy Brown says: "if a fantasy of teenage children attending a school of magic can help reveal more about my faith and how I ought to live, I will use it, and be thankful."

It is quite clear that Brown does not urge this book as to supplant standard texts, nor even as an innovative augmentation. It is simply a popular story, by means of which significantly deeper, useful, and inspiring topics can be addressed. Any book might be so used - indeed, any book, no matter how holy its author, can contain complexities which can confuse or even misguide. One must take the safest approach, which is most often the middle ground. The saints often talked about "moderation in all things" - even the Romans had a epigram: "medio tutissimus ibis" which has nothing to do with the bird called "ibis" - it means "You will go more safely in the middle." Hence Chesterton pointed out "Unless that sagacious bird is allowed to be in the middle, there will be no place for the pelican of charity, the owl of wisdom, or the dove of peace." [GKC, ILN Jan 20 1912]

Ibis-like, Nancy Brown's book neither inordinately praises nor unthinkingly condemns the Potter saga. It has, like any compelling story, a danger of absorbing its reader and distracting from his duties, even from the truth. But because of its attractive treatment of real problems in an interesting and humourous setting, it provokes thought, and suggests contemplation of one's own actions - it can lead to renewed zeal, and the strengthening of the will against evil. True, these dangers and advantages are found in Doyle, in Verne, in Chesterton, in any book - but your child, your nephew, your cousin, you - want to know about Harry Potter now. Here is a place for you to learn - and without spoiling the clever detective-story surprises.

In reading MHP, as in reading HP, one has the sense of a much larger structure, a high and hidden framework. It is a curious coincidence that the author of the Harry Potter books, J. K. Rowling, lives in Edinburgh, about which GKC once said "it is sometimes difficult for a man to shake off the suggestion that each road is a bridge over the other roads, as if he were really rising by continual stages higher and higher through the air. He fancies he is on some open scaffolding of streets, scaling the sky.... The motto of Edinburgh, as you may still see it, I think, carved over the old Castle gate is, 'Sic Itur ad Astra': 'This Way to the Stars'." [GKC Lunacy and Letters 76] Such high bridges can be exceedingly useful as well as dangerous, and it is well to have a guide when facing them. Nancy Brown's book, which fittingly originated within her "Flying Stars" blog, reveals how the Harry Potter books, Edinburgh-like, can also scale the sky.

Feast Day: Assumption of Mary

Chesterton loved Mary, and wrote about her role in his conversion in this exerpt from "Mary and the Convert":

Now I can scarcely remember a time when the image of Our Lady did not stand up in my mind quite definitely, at the mention or the thought of all these things. I was quite distant from these things, and then doubtful about these things; and then disputing with the world for them, and with myself against them; for that is the condition before conversion. But whether the figure was distant, or was dark and mysterious, or was a scandal to my contemporaries, or was a challenge to myself----I never doubted that this figure was the figure of the Faith; that she embodied, as a complete human being still only human, all that this Thing had to say to humanity. The instant I remembered the Catholic Church, I remembered her; when I tried to forget the Catholic Church, I tried to forget her; when I finally saw what was nobler than my fate, the freest and the hardest of all my acts of freedom, it was in front of a gilded and very gaudy little image of her in the port of Brindisi, that I promised the thing that I would do, if I returned to my own land.

GK Chesterton: The Patron Saint of Working Writers?

Apparently, a Chestetonian is about to graduate and become a free lance writer, which seems Chestertonian.

God's Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science

I had a letter from Mr. James Hannam, and I'm passing along his request. Here is his note:

"My continuing efforts to find a publisher for God's Philosophers have taken a new turn. While many publishers think it's a good book, they are not convinced there is a market for a work, however assessible, on medieval science.

So, I want to prove them wrong. I've set up a new web site where you can download chapter one of God's Philosophers. If you like what you read, then please also use the new site to register your interest in purchasing a copy when it comes out. This doesn't commit you to anything, it just allows me to show that a market exists. The resulting database will only be used to send a single email when the book comes out. It won't be used for any other purpose although it's just posssible that publishers will want to send of a few emails to verify the list is bona fide.

Also, it would be fantastic if you could point any like-minded friends towards jameshannam.com. Nothing succeeds like word of mouth recommendations. So if you want to see the historic myth that Christianity blocked the progress of science debunked, we need to get this book out and read.

Thank you all of you who register!

Who is Roy F. Moore?

In a mysterious turn of events, a seret agent has informed the Blogmistress (me) of a thought-provoking mystery(?) in the latest Gilbert magazine. This agent believes the mistake might reveal a pseudonymoninous personage amonst the Gilbert writers.

After all, who is Roy F. Moore? Has anyone ever met him? At a conference, anywhere? Supposedly he wrote a column in this months issue about Distributism. (see page 34). But a careful reading of the Table of Contents either reveals an editing error, or.... (dah, dah, dah--sung in decending ominous-sounding tones) the truth.

I'm off to do laundry and I'll leave you to discuss.

A Great Piece of News for all Dover and Chesterton fans

Dover has reprinted GKC's Tremendous Trifles!!!

This is a great collection of essays which originally appeared in the London Daily News; they are not yet in the CW. Among them are such delights as "A Piece of Chalk" and "What I Found In My Pocket" and (for those studying fantasy) "The Dragon's Grandmother" - but each of the 39 essays is wonderful and has its own power and insights...

Thanks for the info, Dr. Thursday.

UPDATE: The American Chesterton Society has just received a shipment of these books, and will put them on their site shortly for your odering purposes. Thanks for supporting the ACS by buying the books from us. ;-)