A friend of mine who's done lots of community theater emailed me about her first audition for a professional acting troupe. She did not make call-backs, and might have had a shot at chorus, but because she didn't know tap, they didn't consider her. It struck me that my reply is filled with so many gems [...]
I am reading as many books as I can by Fr. Stanley Jaki, in preparation for my one-man show, Science and Religion, in which I will portray Fr. Jaki at the Portsmouth Institute Conference next June. One of the fun things about reading Fr. Jaki is that he makes intriguing off-handed comments in all of his [...]
Above: Colonel Sanders O'Hara and his daughter Scarlett on board My Old Kentucky Dinner Train. Comments at my previous post have inspired me to elaborate a bit about one of the major stumbling blocks in Literary Criticism. We were at the Missouri Governor's Mansion performing our comedy murder mystery Gone with the Passing of the Wind. [...]
I've figured it out. It explains so much. A great many of my Catholic friends are simply Protestants. They object to and Protest not only many basic Catholic teachings, but the whole tenor and worldview of the Catholic Church. Included in this are a great many self-consciously "real Catholics" and "uber-Catholics". Now of course it's tricky [...]
I hate people, and it turns out that might be a registered trademark. Let me explain. My daughter Kerry talked us into driving down to Lafayette Square last Sunday to get brunch. Lafayette Square is a trendy St. Louis neighborhood where rehabbers live, surrounded by the ghetto on four sides. But once a year all the [...]
We know that at the moment of the Immaculate Conception, the New Testament silently begins. It begins in a hidden way, without any fiat from Mary or her mother. It begins entirely with grace, as everything begins. The Kingdom of Heaven at Mary's Immaculate Conception was smaller than a mustard seed, less noticeable than a pinch [...]
Pictured: Theater of the Word programming director, Sid the Christmas Elf, planning Theater of the Word's televised Christmas schedule My actress Maria Romine, who knows these things, tells me that some of the Christmas-themed programming from Theater of the Word Incorporated will air on EWTN this Advent and Christmas season. Our episode A MORNING STAR CHRISTMAS [...]
The UK Telegraph reports today that the Vatican newspaper says there are "few doubts" that Shakespeare was a Catholic. That's obviously the case, as anyone who has read Joseph Pearce's two books on the subject (The Quest for Shakespeare and Through Shakespeare's Eyes )can tell you. Indeed, the documentary evidence alone (which Joseph covers in The [...]
Anglicans share a "deep seated belief that God always and everywhere is the arbiter of good taste," a friend of mine observed in an email to me. "But the Holy Spirit doesn't mind tacky," I shot back. My correspondent thought that in saying this I was, perhaps, advocating bad art, or even tacky liturgical music (Marty [...]
Here I am as philosopher, madman, atheist, and syphilitic poet Frederich Nietzsche. Chuck Chalberg provides the balance. From Season Six of The Apostle of Common Sense on EWTN.
