The sequel to
"Every Boy Has a Daddy":

Hepburn's Mass
at Heaven's Gate

Katharine Hepburn died at 2:50 PM EDT
on the Feast of St. Peter. 

"The Consecration and Sacrifice effected by the priest (standing in the place of Christ) is, then, the visible manifestation of an eternal and timeless act. After the Consecration, as Gueranger says in The Liturgical Year, 'the divine Lamb is lying on our altar!' Thus we see that the Mass is the visible reality, here and now, of the timeless eternal Mass of Heaven, described in the Apocalypse. Through it we participate in the Celestial Liturgy; through it the gates of Heaven are opened to us and the possibility of eternal life is made available to us."

The Source:

The Church Militant recommends
Defense of the Inquisitions.

For a different viewpoint,
see my May 12 entries.

Every Boy Has a Daddy

Today is the Feast of Saint Peter.

The most timely quote I know of for today's religious observances is from Oh What a Web They Weave, by F. John Loughnan:

"Every boy has a daddy."

This was written as part of an attack on the father of a Latin-Mass Catholic who authored the website Ecclesia Militans, which has the logo

Note the resemblance to the Iron Cross.

Soldier of Fortune magazine, April 2002, contains a brief discussion of the German motto "Gott mit uns" that is relevant to the concept of The Church Militant.

Soldier of Fortune,
April 2002

The actor on the cover, Mel Gibson, also serves to illustrate our meditation for today, "Every boy has a daddy."  See Christopher Noxon's article in the New York Times Magazine of March 9, 2003:

Is the Pope Catholic... Enough?

Noxon attacks Gibson's father Hutton -- like his son Mel, a Latin-Mass Catholic, and author of

Is the Pope Catholic?

A related "Every boy has a daddy" attack appears in the June 2003 issue of Playboy magazine.  An entertaining excerpt from this attack on Joseph P. Kennedy, father of JFK, may be found at Orwell Today.  

Finally, let us meditate on the ultimate "Every boy has a daddy" attack -- by novelist Robert Stone on the alleged father of Jesus of Nazareth:

The New York Times Magazine article mentioned above was prompted, in part, by Mel Gibson's current movie production, "The Passion," about the final 12 hours in the (first, or possibly second) life of Jesus.  If I were producing a Passion play, as Peter I would certainly cast Stone.

See also the 11 PM sequel to the above.

For Fred Sandback:
Time's a Round

The following entry of Feb. 25, 2003, was written for painter Mark Rothko, and may serve as well for minimalist artist Fred Sandback, also connected to the de Menil family of art patrons, who, like Rothko, has killed himself.

The following is from the cover of
"Finnegans Wake: a Symposium,"

a reprint of

Our Exagmination Round His Factification
for Incamination of Work in Progress,

Paris, Shakespeare and Company, 1929.

As well as being a memorial to Rothko and Sandback, the above picture may serve to mark the diamond anniversary of a dinner party at Shakespeare and Company on this date in 1928.  (See previous entry.)

A quotation from aaparis.org also seems relevant on this, the date usually given for the death of author Malcolm Lowry, in some of whose footsteps I have walked:

"We are not saints." 

— Chapter V, Alcoholics Anonymous

Countin' Flowers on the Wall

Today, the birthday of Bob Keeshan (aka Captain Kangaroo), seems an appropriate day to meditate on religious issues.

The death of minimalist artist Fred Sandback on June 23, coupled with my vitriolic attack on Christianity of that same date, suggest that I should give some recognition to defenders of that bizarre religion.

Two of Christianity's most able defenders are singer Martina McBride and professor of English Gerald McDaniel.

McBride has stated loudly and clearly her conviction that

"Love's the only house big enough for all the pain in the world."

I may be mistaken, but this sounds to me like a profession of faith in the Christian church.

McDaniel's Cultural Calendar includes many items of Christian interest (saints' days, etc.) but also includes a greater variety of general cultural history than any other online calendar I know of.  Like all Christian documents, it displays little regard for the truth (dates are often wrong), but its heart seems to be in the right place.  Most important, in light of McBride's persuasive song lyric, is the fact that McDaniel's calendar -- and therefore, perhaps, his church -- does seem to be big enough -- at least in principle -- for some of the pain in the world, as well as some of the joy.  Unfortunately, the church has much less room for truth than for emotion.

For emotion, see McBride's album of that title.  For some thoughts on truth, see McBride's fellow country singer, Patty Loveless (whom I greatly prefer to McBride).

The above reflection was prompted by McDaniel's having a written a document that includes both of the following items for June 27:

• TV's Captain Kangaroo, Bob Keeshan, was born on this day in 1927. He was also Clarabelle the Clown on Howdy Doody.
  
  
• On this day in 1928, an American expatriate bookseller, Sylvia Beach, and her companion Adrienne Monnier, had a dinner party to which they invited James Joyce and Scott Fitzgerald. It was held at her flat above her bookstore Shakespeare & Company....

These two items appear to have been placed by McDaniel in the right date slot.  (Christians may sometimes have the right values, but should never be trusted to have their facts straight.)

Magic

"I really don’t believe in magic. I believe in some kinds — the magic of imagination and the magic of love."

— J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter's creator,
June 26, 2003

Amen, Sister.

ART WARS:
Art at the Vanishing Point

From the web page Art Wars:

"For more on the 'vanishing point,'
or 'point at infinity,' see
Midsummer Eve's Dream."

On Midsummer Eve, June 23, 2003, minimalist artist Fred Sandback killed himself.

Sandback is discussed in The Dia Generation, an April 6, 2003, New York Times Magazine article that is itself discussed at the Art Wars page.

Sandback, who majored in philosophy at Yale, once said that

"Fact and illusion are equivalents."

Two other references that may be relevant:

The Medium is
the Rear View Mirror,

which deals with McLuhan's book Through the Vanishing Point, and a work I cited on Midsummer Eve  ...

Chapter 5 of Through the Looking Glass:

" 'What is it you want to buy?' the Sheep said at last, looking up for a moment from her knitting.

'I don't quite know yet,' Alice said very gently.  'I should like to look all round me first, if I might.'

'You may look in front of you, and on both sides, if you like,' said the Sheep; 'but you ca'n't look all round you -- unless you've got eyes at the back of your head.'

But these, as it happened, Alice had not got: so she contented herself with turning round, looking at the shelves as she came to them.

The shop seemed to be full of all manner of curious things -- but the oddest part of it all was that, whenever she looked hard at any shelf, to make out exactly what it had on it, that particular shelf was always quite, empty, though the others round it were crowded as full as they could hold.

'Things flow about so here!' she said at last in a plaintive tone...."

 "When Alice went
     through the vanishing point"

In memory of Staige D. Blackford: 

Introibo ad Altare Dei

"...they [the clergy] believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly; for I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."

"Stately, thin Thomas Jefferson came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed.... He held the bowl aloft and intoned:
— Introibo ad altare Dei.
Halted, he peered down the dark winding stairs and called out coarsely:
— Come up, Staige! Come up, you fearful editor!"

With apologies to the University of Virginia, to the Virginia Quarterly Review, and to James Joyce.

"Man, it's long...
It's a long, long, long road."

— Frank Sinatra

See also memorials to George Axelrod and Leon Uris, both of whom died at the summer solstice, June 21.

In memory of Leon Uris:

Mate Change Problem

White to mate in 2 moves

H.W.Grant, 1st Prize,
Australian Column 1924

The concept of "mate change," appropriate on this, the coronation date of Henry VIII, is explained at Chathurangam.com, my source for the above problem.

For the connection with Leon Uris, find the "key" to the above chess problem... i.e., the notation for White's first move.

From the New York Times, June 24:

"Reviewing Mr. Uris's 1976 novel Trinity in The New York Times Book Review, Pete Hamill wrote: 'Leon Uris is a storyteller, in a direct line from those men who sat around fires in the days before history and made the tribe more human.'"

Uris, 78, died at the summer solstice... Saturday, June 21, 2003. 

See also Force Field of Dreams.

Night and Day...

Some comments on yesterday's entry that are too good to be hidden under a "comments" link.  References are to Through the Looking Glass.

My understanding of the "Red Queen" was that it was a metaphorical reference to a womans menstrual cycle.

The two queens were representative of a womans behaviors throughout. Or some such thing.

Posted 6/24/2003 at 11:12 AM by oOMisfitOo

Humn. [affects very proper British Accent:]  I suppose then the good reverend is out of his bloody mind?

Posted 6/24/2003 at 11:14 AM by oOMisfitOo

Speaking of religion, blood, and the 23rd, perhaps Sissy Spacek should play both the Red and the White Queen in Looking Glass. Remember her prom night?

See my entry of May 23rd, The Prime Cut Gospel. 

Posted 6/24/2003 at 2:46 PM by m759

For today's musical offering, click here.

Harry Potter
and the Fairy Queen

Lest the incautious reader gain the impression from yesterday's entry "The Real Hogwarts" that Christianity is anything other than a pack of damned lies, or that the phrase "oasis of civilisation" I used yesterday was meant otherwise than with tongue in cheek, I would like to nominate a well-known professional Christian liar as Queen of the Fairies this Midsummer Eve.

The reader is referred to

The Good Book:
Reading the Bible with Mind and Heart,

by the Rev. Peter Gomes, Plummer Professor of Christian Morals at Harvard and pastor of that institution's Memorial Church.

The Rev. Gomes, an acknowledged homosexual, gave a commencement address recently wearing a gorgeously red academic gown.  This comported well with his contention that the real heroine of "Through the Looking Glass" was not Alice, but the Red Queen.  The reason?  The Red Queen, Gomes says, could believe as many as six impossible things before breakfast.  Apparently this is a virtue in Christian Morals, at least at Harvard.

For a RealOne video of Gomes's address, click on the link below:

The Red Queen

(Actually, the queen who discusses "six impossible things" in Chapter 5 of Through the Looking Glass is the White Queen, but clergymen never let a little detail like truth stand in their way.)