#ASonnetADay – 59. “If there be nothing new, but that which is…” cf. Ecclesiastes 1:1-11 pic.twitter.com/jVbKKrUvF1 — Fr. John Zuhlsdorf (@fatherz) October 11, 2020
Doug Ford has apparently said that we must learn to live without friends, and with this, he is on par with his erstwhile-fellow-lockdown leader, Boris Johnson. Besides the obvious differences between the two, there is a similarity: Both overweight, blond-haired bon-vivants, or so we once thought, and so they were once portrayed. Of course, Mr. Johnson is of a more intellectual and educated sort, with an Etonian accent and pedigree, able to quote Thucydides and Cicero, who has studied Greek and Latin, while Mr. Ford, well, he seems a product of our sub-standard socialist educational system, and the less said about that, the better.
Do they have friends? One would imagine they do, and quite rightly, for the need for friendship is taught in no uncertain terms by Aristotle, followed by Aelred of Rivaulx, Thomas Aquinas, John Paul II, with many points in-between. Even Cicero, who was forced to commit suicide by his erstwhile friend-turned-enemy, waxed eloquent about friendship. And need we remind our benighted leaders that the very Word-made-flesh, the Incarnate God, said ‘I call you friends…’, and felt the ineffable pain of betrayal? Nay, even the most Blessed Trinity is a ‘communion of Persons’, and of Love?
Aristotle distinguishes three types of friendship, categorized in Latin under the aspect of ‘amor’, or love, in the general senses: Amor concupiscentiae, love based on the pleasure a friend may give –and such need not be sexual, or the modern ‘friends with benefits’, but any sort of enjoyment, humour, attractiveness, and so on. Then there is amor utilitatis, a friendship based on utility – your friend has a car, and you do not; or a waterfront cottage; or is handy about the house, or can bake scrumptious pies. And, finally, most perfect of all, amor amicitiae, friendship for friendship’s sake, the being loved for one’s own good.
On October 10, 2020, Carlo Acutis was Beatified in Assisi, Italy. What helped to make this ceremony so unique, was that both Carlo’s parents and his brother and sister were present. The reason is that he was only fifteen years of age when he died from leukemia in 2006. I believe that this modern day ‘saint in the making’, Blessed […]
The past three Sundays have featured shocking parables about our readiness, fruitfulness, and decision as to whether to accept and enter the Kingdom of God. The Lord has used the image of a vineyard extensively: a vineyard into which workers are dispatched at different times of the day but who have different attitudes about what is due to them at the end of the day; a vineyard into which two sons are sent, one of whom goes and one who does not; a vineyard in which are wicked tenants who refuse to render rightful fruits to the landowner and who abuse and even kill those sent to call for the harvest, including the landowner’s son.
The parables point to the great and dramatic decision to which we are all summoned: Will we accept the Kingdom of God, entering into to and accepting its terms or not? It is a decision on which your destiny depends
The snippers and stitchers of the Consilium allowed this Sunday’s prayer to survive unscathed in the post-Conciliar editions of the Missale Romanum. The Collect still echoes the ancient sentiments of Holy Church wherever the Roman Rite’s Ordinary Use of Holy … Continue reading →
From my youth I have been a hockey fan. I get that the Stanley Cup is a big deal. It would be pretty exciting to have that on display at a high school! A reader dropped me an email… I … Continue reading →
Homily 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time (A) – October 11, 2020 @St. Mary’s Parish – Ottawa How can I prepare to enter Heaven?