Wisdom from… [19 Feb]

IRENAEUS OF LYONS (140–200): The teachings of God

To preserve men and women from sin and from being unworthy of himself God commanded them to love him and taught them to be just in their dealings with other people. By the Ten Commandments he prepared them to live in friendship with himself and in harmony with one another. This was simply for their own good and it was all God asked of them. It conferred great glory on them and gave them the friendship with God they had lacked, but it did not benefit God, for he had no need of their love. The need was all on their side: they needed the glory of God and could obtain it only by serving him. This is why Moses said to the people: Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him. In this your life consists.

And so God has abolished the laws which were given as a sign of their servitude but has amplified the natural laws which are of universal application and befit people who are free. This he has done in his generosity by freely making us his children, so that we might know him as our Father, love him with our whole heart, and unswervingly follow his Word.
(Adversus Haer. 4, 16, 2-5: SC 100, 564-572.)

A bishop of Lyons, Irenaeus wrote a monumental work Against the Heresies. At the heart of his theology is a vision of the unity and the the recapitulation of all things in Christ.

ST AUGUSTINE: Maintaining Sound Doctrine

Sound doctrine must be maintained. We must never judge in arrogant haughtiness persons who do not embrace our mode of life. We must never say that it is no use for them to live chastely in the married state, to direct their houses and families in a Christian way, or to heap up for themselves heavenly treasures by their acts of mercy.
-- Letter 157, 39

Prayer. Lord, you get angry but remain calm.
-- Confessions 1, 4

ST FRANCIS DE SALES: Interior conversion

An interior conversion, a change for the better in one's life, is an indication of the presence of the Holy Spirit. Saint John the Baptist was sanctified in the womb of his mother; likewise, those who receive the Holy Spirit are transformed. So when you want to know if you have received the Spirit, keep a clear watch on your works; they will answer the question accurately.
(Sermons 47; O. X, p. 72)

GK CHESTERTON:

THERE are two rooted spiritual realities out of which grow all kinds of democratic conception or sentiment of human equality. There are two things in which all men are manifestly and unmistakably equal. They are not equally clever or equally muscular or equally fat, as the sages of the modern reaction (with piercing insight) perceive. But this is a spiritual certainty, that all men are tragic. And this, again, is an equally sublime spiritual certainty, that all men are comic. No special and private sorrow can be so dreadful as the fact of having to die. And no freak or deformity can be so funny as the mere fact of having two legs. Every man is important if he loses his life; and every man is funny if he loses his hat, and has to run after it. And the universal test everywhere of whether a thing is popular, of the people, is whether it employs vigorously these extremes of the tragic and the comic.
('Charles Dickens.')

Be Protestant?

Get less pope with your hope!

I try to be unpartisan in my partisanship. Yuk yuk yuk.

(In response to a quasi-gauntlet thrown down under my little Catholic bumper sticker.)

Wierd and strnage…

Dropping guests off at the bus station last night, I drove around the block and, to my right, I saw two scooters in flames. One had ignited the seat of the scooter on its right. I, of course, had to park and get some shots, for pseudo-journalistic purposes, but also at a fundamental level to satisfy the ancient masculine love for fire! A man from the bus station ran by me to get some help and a taxi was honking to raise an alarm. I circled back around the block for a second look but then the one-way road was blocked by a honking squad car. I tried to back up but behind me was a taxi, behind which was a fast approaching, howling am-boo-lans, so then I just drove around the squad car to make my exit. By now ten scooters were engulfed in flames as smoke poured out from the overhanging building and glass sparkled on the street. The last thing I sensed was a wave of heat into the windows and the hissing, burping sound of what I think was a gas tank also about to make its exit. Wierd and strnage.





Then as I was driving home this evening, I was watching the back of a sedan ahead of me and then something caught my eye. Lo, a small round object tumbling under the axle, like a football with legs! My eyes widened a moment and suddenly the football stopped rolling and ran, yelping, from the car, which kept trundling into the concrete horizon. The puppy veered left to a nearby house but by the time I turned around to check on it, I couldn't find it. I assume it ran into the abandoned hovel by the road, or it was taken in by its owner. Wierd and strnage.



A little farther up the road I stopped on the side of a back road I take to and from work. I am excited to stretch my legs with my new camera, a Canon EOS 400D. I dismounted but a moment later a car was coming up the road behind me, so I pushed my motorcycle a little more off the road, pressing it, I discovered five minutes later, onto my computer bag, whereupon the outer flap and its plastic seam melted and curled up to their owner's great surprise!

Be Catholic…

Get more Bible for your baptism!

Wisdom from… [17 & 18 Feb]

POPE ST LEO (400–461): Lent: a special time of renewal

The paschal celebration is especially characterized by the rejoicing of the whole Church in the forgiveness of sins. This forgiveness is given not only to those then reborn in holy baptism but also to those already numbered among God's adopted children.

Although we receive new life in the first place by our rebirth in baptism, we all need a daily renewal to make up for the shortcomings of our mortal nature, and no matter how much progress we have made, every one of us is called to greater holiness. We should therefore make a real effort not to let the day of our redemption find us still falling into the same old sins.

What the Christian should be doing at all times should be done now with greater zeal and devotion, so that the Lenten fast enjoined by the apostles may be observed not simply by abstinence from food but above all by the renunciation of sin.
(Sermo 6 de Quadragesima 1-2: PL 54, 286)

As bishop of Rome, St. Leo left many letters and sermons to attest to his teaching and preaching.

ST MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR (580–662): God's desire for our salvation

God's will is to save us, and nothing pleases him more than our coming back to him with true repentance. The heralds of truth and the ministers of divine grace have told us this from the beginning, repeating it in every age. Indeed, God's desire for our salvation is the primary and preeminent sign of his infinite goodness, and it was precisely in order to show that there is nothing closer to God's heart that the divine Word of God the Father, with untold condescension, lived among us in the flesh, and that he died, suffered, and said all that was necessary to reconcile us to God the Father when we were at enmity with him, and to restore us to the life of blessedness from which we had been exiled. He healed our physical infirmities by miracles; he freed us from our sins, many and grievous as they were, by suffering and dying, taking them upon himself as if he were answerable for them, sinless though he was. He also taught us in many different ways that we should wish to imitate him by our own kindness and genuine love for one another.
(Ep. 11: PG 91, 454-455.)

Maximus, a Greek theologian and ascetic, was a monk of the monastery of Chrysopolis and also a prolific writer who possessed an outstanding synthesizing faculty. His right hand and tongue were cut off to prevent him from further defending Christological orthodoxy and he died in exile.

ST AUGUSTINE:

You Approached Me

O eternal Truth and true Love and beloved Eternity: you are my God, and for you do I sigh night and day. When I first began to know you, you lifted me up that I might see that there was something to be seen--but I was as yet not able to see it. Then you drove back the weakness of my sight, shining upon me most powerfully, and I shook with love and fear.
-- Confessions 7, 10

Prayer. Lord, you first sought me out and brought me back on your shoulder.
-- Commentary on Psalm 69, 6

The Inner Light

I entered into my inmost self with you, Lord, as my guide; and this I was able to do because you were my helper. I entered in and saw with the eye of my soul, the unchangeable Light, very different from earthly lights.

It was above my mind but not the way oil is above water or heaven above the earth. It was superior because it made me, and I inferior because I was made by it. Those who know the truth know this light, and those who know it know eternity: it is charity that knows it.
-- Confessions 7, 10

Prayer. Lord, you are the light of my heart and the bread in the mouth of my soul.
-- Confessions 1, 13

ST FRANCIS DE SALES:

Take for yourself the maxim of the apostle, "May I never boast of anything but the cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ!" [Gal 6:14] Put Jesus crucified in your heart, and all the crosses of this world will seem to be roses. Those who have felt the punctures of the crown of thorns of the Savior Who is our Head will in no way feel any other wounds.
(Letters 1420; O. XVIII, p. 221)

Our Savior has instituted the most august sacrament of the Eucharist, which really contains His flesh and blood, so that whoever eats of it shall live forever. Therefore, whoever turns to it frequently and devoutly builds up his soul's health in such a way that is is almost impossible for him to be poisoned by evil infection of any kind. We cannot be nourished by this flesh of life and still suffer death within us. Just as the first man and woman dwelling in the earthly paradise might have avoided bodily death by the power of that living fruit which God had planted in it, so also can we avoid spiritual death by virtue of this sacrament of life. Tender fruits such as cherries, apricots and strawberries are subject to subject to decay, yet they are easily preserved for a whole year with sugar or honey. Is there any wonder then, that our heart, no matter how frail and weak, is preserved from the corruption of sin when sweetened by the incorruptible flesh and blood of the Son of God?
(INT. Part II, Ch. 20; O. III, p. 116)

GK CHESTERTON:

SOME people do not like the word 'dogma.' Fortunately they are free, and there is an alternative for them. There are two things, and two things only, for the human mind––a dogma and a prejudice. The Middle Ages were a rational epoch, an age of doctrine. Our age is, at its best, a poetical epoch, an age of prejudice. A doctrine is a definite point; a prejudice is a direction. That an ox may be eaten, while a man should not be eaten, is a doctrine. That as little as possible of anything should be eaten is a prejudice; which is also sometimes called an ideal.
('What's Wrong with the World.')

THERE are some people who state that the exterior, sex, or physique of another person is indifferent to them, that they care only for the communion of mind with mind; but these people need not detain us. There are some statements that no one ever thinks of believing, however often they are made.
('The Defendant.')

The trouble with simulacra…

The trouble with simulacra is that they all too quickly lose the simul- sense of their origins. What is meant to be a mere derivative copy, turns into an independent mutation. What is meant to be a stale ripoff, becomes its own vibrant riptide. What is meant to be a universal clone, strikes roots in the local soil and casts its own local seeds. The simultaneity of simulacra is dispersed by the manifold complexity of geography and local tastes. This is why even the cheapest simulacra can become hallowed antiques. They were once a Many among a larger Many, but over time, this Many becomes a small one––a boy's cherished toy, a mother's design keystone––and perhaps in time, entangled in the twists and turns of history, it become a big One, an icon of a past age, or a harbinger of an old age made new again. Sheer clones have a way of shedding the first two letters and insisting on being independent ones.

The above is the inspiration for the story I came up with today, tentatively titled "Copied Right Copyright". It deals with the problem of a literary figment being used as the basis for an, ultimately autonomous, AI program, which, in turn, insists its past quotes and actions are not the property of the author who wrote them before the AI unit became "sentient." Sort of like a CD compilation growing legs and suing the bands claim rights to the tracks that constitute its own "identity". The songs are not the bands' property, since they are in fact the very body of the litigious CD. Whatever hold the bands had on the songs, is lost when the songs become something larger than a mere product, namely, the heart and liver an gonads and eyes of sentient "beinglings" (my neologism for quasi-beings as haphazardly dreamt of by AI gurus…or crafted as the "friends" of a J.F. Sebastian.

For the long-haulers here at FCA, this train of thought should ring a bell over my story "From the Forest Itself". The question that story addresses––indeed, forced me to grapple with––is at what point a work of art or literature ceases to be the creator's property, and becomes its own autonomous entity, with its own "voice" and "points of articulation". I suppose the matter also relates to the problem of donated tissue for cloning purposes. Can one have a copyright on a person's genes, regardless which came first in time (the genes or the person cloned "around" them)?