just a few

1. Adult Catechesis and the Sword by Elizabeth Scalia

“The Church,” he said as Joseph Ratzinger, “will become small, and will to a great extent have to start over again. But after a time of testing, an internalized and simplified Church will radiate great power and influence; for the population of an entirely planned and controlled world are going to be inexpressibly lonely . . . and they will then discover the little community of believers as something quite new. As a hope that is there for them, as the answer they have secretly always been asking for.”

Call it Adult Catechesis.

Perhaps sometime in the not-too-distant future, as governments move against her, the Church will be forced into poverty and become subject to the oppression of her earlier days. We may even see martyrs in the Western Church, once more.

But that, of course, is when the Church will triumph. Even if we lose every material aspect—our buildings, the great art vouchsafed to us—the Church will triumph, because it is greater than any structure, innovation, or physicality, which (no matter how meaningful) is nothing at all compared to Christ. This is something a materially fixated world cannot understand: to silence a voice is not to stop prayer; to close a parish is not to end it. The Church is built by the author of Life, and is itself alive with that Divinity. Life will always find a way, which is why man is constantly trying to keep it at bay—another conceit.

2. Emma Watson of Harry Potter fame on modesty.

I find the whole concept of being ‘sexy’ embarrassing and confusing ... My idea of sexy is that less is more. The less you reveal the more people can wonder.

3. We are now on the USCCB's list of vacant dioceses.

4. "Dark Horses," the new song from Switchfoot is fantastic. Jon Foreman, on the new album:

Vice Verses is a record of tension and release. It’s an attempt to describe the polarity of the human experience. The sunlight and shadow. The highs and lows, laughter and pain, hope and fear, doubts and belief.

5. A very positive review of Captain America from National Catholic Register. Consider me interested.