By Lawrence “Mack in Texas” Hall … He was my beautiful boy, and, sure, / The girls they thought so too: his eyes, his walk; / A man of Newfoundland, my small big man, / Just seventeen, but strong and bold and sure.
By Ian Wilson (Rated PG-13) The filler-rod crackled and hissed in the mid-morning light as I dabbed the molten metal onto the two pieces of rebar I was welding together. I lifted my welding hood to examine my work. It was a good weld; smooth, not a single pocket. I lit my cigarillo off the […]
By Ian Wilson (Rated G) Little is known of the life of Irenaeus, one of the great theologians of the Early Church. It is believed that he was born in Smyrna in Asia Minor (modern Turkey) around the early part the second century, AD. There, he heard Polycarp, another early church father, preach. Irenaeus served […]
By Lawrence “Mack in Texas” Hall … Every man is a father after the Order of Saint Joseph / Every child is his to nurture and protect / A man must practice wisdom and honor / In order to pass them on to a new generation
By Cordelia Fitzgerald … If there’s one thing that the human race, as a rule, doesn’t excel at, it’s communication. Our struggle with this basic need is so great that, even when God, in His perfection, gets involved, we still find some way of muffing it.
By T.K. Wilson (Rated G) Aloysius Gonzalga was born in the midst of the decadent Renaissance, in the most decadent of countries at that time, Italy. He was the firstborn son of the prestigious Gonzalga family, and his father wanted him to become a great soldier, but Aloysius wanted a different life. When he was […]
By Cordelia Fitzgerald … Music, as many people much more educated than I can expound upon, has profound effects on the emotions, making it the perfect accessory, or even main conduit of information, in film. This role of music as communicator is not limited to musicals, but is rather spread throughout every genre, to their great benefit.
St. Ephraem (also known as Ephrem or Ephraim or Ephraem the Syrian) was born around 306 A.D. in Nisibis, Mesopotamia (modern Turkey). He converted to Christianity as a young man thanks to the teaching of St. James, Bishop of Nisibis.
By Lawrence “Mack in Texas” Hall … Once upon a time people regarded public and school libraries as repositories of thousands of years of civilization, open to all, with John Milton shelved uneasily close to Geoffrey Chaucer and with Phyllis Wheatley a few aisles away from Margaret Mitchell. An old saying is that if a library doesn’t contain books with which you vehemently disagree, it’s not a good library.
By Cordelia Fitzgerald … our good Lord understands of this need of ours for that commiseration, in a way, perhaps, that our fellow men fail to. This God that made us and understands us both from a mechanic or inventor’s point of view and from our very experience, since He too was one of us.
By Lawrence “Mack in Texas” Hall … When we were children we were proud of our new shoes / Our once-a-year shoes in situational poverty / Although we went barefootin’ most of the time / As long as the weather and parents allowed
By Lawrence “Mack in Texas” Hall … Life is a pilgrimage from cell to cell: / The bedroom of one’s childhood, the college dorm / The noisy barracks, merry in spite of all / Eighty conscript soldiers bunked out in rows
By Ian Wilson (Rated G) Bernardine had always been pious, even as a youth. Born to a wealthy family of Tuscany in 1380, Bernardine was orphaned at the young age of six, and raised by his aunt. He was known to practice many spiritual disciplines at his tender age, and had a great heart for […]
By Lawrence “Mack in Texas” Hall … A child and a puppy playing on the lawn / Tumbling through soft grass in the bliss of June / We joy in their celebration of life / Everything is new / Except that it isn’t
By T.K. Wilson (Rated G) Irene, Great-Martyr of Thessalonica, was born Princess Penelope to pagan parents. Afraid his daughter would be influenced by Christianity (as no doubt the stories of other high-born ladies who dedicated themselves to Jesus had reached him), he locked her up in a tower with thirteen other girls. Because God finds […]