Writing about things I don't know ...

Or why I no longer read novels.

That's my blog in a nut cup...

Actually my blog is my journal - a sort of diary - documentation based upon personal observation and experience, opinion and knowledge...

Although, I don't know the machinations behind the politics and scandals and religious debates which resonate throughout the ethersphere.  I'm not sure anyone really does - hence all the conspiracy theories and crazy cults and Facebook likes and dislikes and unfriending and promiscuous friending and following tweet-hearts which goes on online.  What?

So.  That said.  Having said that.  Be that as it may.

So. Anyway.  Whatever.  You know what I mean.  What.  (And I laugh)

• I like the Pope.

• I like the Church.

• I like Vatican II.

• I'm Catholic.

• I like the Ordinary Form of things.

• I like Laudato si.

• Obviously, I'm conservative - but not.

• I'm liberal - but not.

Others may define me however they like ...

But they don't know me as I am known:

Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me. You would play upon me; you would seem to know my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass; and there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ, yet cannot you make it speak. 'Sblood, do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, you cannot play upon me. - Hamlet, Act III, Scene ii

You cannot play upon me.

Now that I've cleared all of that up, Conservative and Conservative Catholics in the U.S. have their own strange history - their own 'mystery' - not so occult as one may imagine.  From Artur Rosman, a Patheos writer:

"American Catholic dissent has a conservative-Republican genealogy as I pointed out in the case of Andrew Sullivan’s important role in mainstreaming gay marriage. It turns out that Kennedy and Cuomo school also has its conservative predecessor: William F. Buckley.

The piece, “The Last Time Conservatives Dismissed a Major Encyclical, It Ended Terribly for Them,” is guaranteed to shake you out of your commonplaces, or at least help you to develop more adequate ones:

Buckley’s feud with the Catholic left came to a boil when Pope John XXIII released the encyclical Mater et Magistra (Mother and Teacher) in 1961, which reaffirmed the church’s support for government welfare programs and coupled them with calls to fight poverty in the Third World and end colonialism. The anti-imperialism of Mater et Magistra was particularly repellent to National Review conservatives, who thought that European domination of Africa, the Middle East, and Asia was essential for fending off communism.
In an angry editorial, National Review described Mater et Magistra as a “venture in triviality.” The magazine also published a joking note saying “Going the rounds in Catholic conservative circles, ‘Mater Si, Magistra no.’” (The joke was first made by Garry Wills, who was playing off a slogan of the Cuban Revolution: “Cuba si, Yanqui no.”)

This conservative-ideology fueled anti-papist crusade did not end there:

Buckley turned to his learned friend Garry Wills to work out a more theoretically satisfying response to liberal Catholics. A former seminarian, Wills tried to resolve the argument by writing a pioneering scholarly treatise on the nature of encyclicals, titledPolitics and Catholic Freedom (1964). In this book, Wills argued that encyclicals are merely advisory, and not binding on specific policies . . . [click below to continue reading--the best/worst is yet to come]" - Read the rest at CosmosTheInLost  (Really cool header BTW)

Not bad for a Patheo-gen, huh?

When I say I don't fit in - I really don't - and I never have.  Just when you think I do - I don't.  I've battled temptations to try to fit in for most of my life - but it is next to impossible for me to do that.  And that is how I remain Catholic and faithful to Catholic teaching.

Sorry to disappoint the Blogosterics.


I'm trying so hard to remember something I forgot.

Bonus pull-quote: For more than three decades neo-conservative Catholics like Michael Novak, George Weigel, and the late Richard John Neuhaus struggled mightily to demonstrate that there is a near perfect congruence between church teachings and the policies of the Republican Party. - Source

I'm against it.

And what's up with the Acton Institute and Fr. Sirico?  Huh?

I'm against it.

You would play upon me; you would seem to know my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my mystery...

You little freak.

How does it feel to be such a freak.

Song for this post here.


What?