Love in practice is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.
The South Bend Catholic Worker community now has a website. I’m very happy with the photo I took for it.
Paula Xenopus is now blogging her SBCW adventures at The Walnut Picker. She even blogged the hiking talk I gave Friday night. Thanks to all the Notre Dame students and Sierra Club members who showed up and packed the Catholic Worker’s living room.
You can also follow the SBCW at Flickr and Pie and Coffee.
The Catholic Peace Fellowship has (finally) posted their third podcast in the “Warcast for Catholics” series.
Mike Griffin continues his interview with Joshua Casteel, an honorably-discarged conscientious objector to the Iraq War, and Mike Schorsch offers more thoughts on issues of war and peace in the early Church.
(I’m posting this because I’m proud of the small role I played in getting this podcast on-line.)
Some links to things mentioned in the most recent Saint Kermit podcast.
First, Jim Henderson and Mike Benedetti discuss poverty and race:
Interview: Jean Hay Bright, running for Senate against incumbent Olympia Snowe in Maine. Jean Hay Bright has a diary at DailyKos. TIME on Olympia Snowe: “. . . she is also known as one of the most effective advocates for her constituents.”
Music: Ad Frank, “World’s Best Ex-Boyfriend”
Sports: The crew talks with Seth Mnookin about his book Feeding the Monster and the Sox.
Note: No, I am not going to blog every St Kermit from now on.
Happy Labor Day! School is out, the pools are open.
This morning, while recording commentary for Saint Kermit, Jim Henderson and I were lamenting the lack of economic diversity amongst our politicians. I was reminded of a passage from Tom Cornell’s Labor Day 2006 sermon:
By the middle of the 19th Century, the Catholic Church had to deal with the devastating effects of the industrial revolution on its people. In countries where the bishops were chosen from the sons of the powerful, the Church was very slow, too slow to respond to the crisis, and Pope Pius IX lamented, “We have lost the working classes.” In England, where the Catholic population was small and mostly Irish and poor, and in the United States, where the bishops were, almost every single one of them, sons of workers, the response was quick and positive.
I’m curious to know if Kaihsu agrees that “Catholic Social Teaching is the envy of our fellow Christians in [other] denominations.”
Jan Griffiths: There was a second prayer vigil for Jan Griffiths yesterday.
Catholic Worker blocks garbage truck: Catholic Worker Liza Apper of the Fresno CW interfered with the city’s attempt to roust a bunch of homeless people, as pictured below. Indymedia and ABC have the story.
When I visited the Fresno CW a couple years ago, they were running a soup line outside the county jail, and had a pretty good rapport with the police. Liza told me how the experience had changed her: “I realized that the Body of Christ is more than just liberals and poor people.”
Photo: Indymedia
Paxton vs. Lukes: WCCA has posted the video of City Councilor Konnie Lukes interviewing Brendan “Buck Paxton” Mellican. I was disappointed that the first topic of discussion was not CitySquare or the idiocy of the City Council, but instead ICANN.
CPF on BBC: Mike Schorsch was interviewed by the BBC for a program you can listen to on-line. (You can listen to it, but I can’t; those confounded limeys use the Real Audio format.) Mike is involved with both the Catholic Peace Fellowship and GI Rights hotline.
Worcester graffiti: Indymedia has a nice story about my main man Asa Needle and his dad cleaning up sidewalk graffiti outside a boarding house run by the social service agency SMOC.
Worcester money: Indymedia also has a list of the top 100 best-paid city employees. The only two non-cops in the top 25 are the City Manager and the Superintendant of Schools. The best-paid woman seems to be Helen A. Friel at #54.
Pablo Ros did a great job in today’s South Bend Tribune, collecting questions that people planned to ask the politicians at South Bend’s immigration “forum”. As it turned out, audience questions and comments were not allowed.
Here’s one from Neris Gonzalez, a friend of the South Bend Catholic Worker:
Why, if people who work the fields and in factories are willing to work so hard, aren’t you willing to give them a livable minimum wage?
Here’s one from Rev. Christopher Cox, St. Adalbert Catholic Church:
[US Rep Chris] Chocola owns up to half a million dollars worth of Wal-Mart stock, according to a financial disclosure published in the Washington Post. Wal-Mart was fined $11 million last year for employing hundreds of illegal workers. Mr. Chocola, wouldn’t it be socially responsible of you to sell your Wal-Mart stock?
Chocola gave the Tribune a response that doesn’t answer the question:
“I voted for the U.S. House Immigration Reform bill that included an employer verification program that will give employers no excuse for hiring illegal immigrants,” Chocola replied Friday. “It also includes tough punishment for those that employ illegal immigrants.”
The followup question would be: Given that Wal-Mart has broken laws about employing illegals “hundreds” of times, why do you think they’ll follow new ones? Wouldn’t it be more ethical to divest yourself from a corporation that thumbs its nose at these laws? Shouldn’t you be putting your money where your mouth and votes are?
Well, I’ve made my podcasting debut as part of the team on Saint Kermit #36. Haven’t listened to it yet, but I believe that my contribution was to ramble about needle exchange and the modified WoMag cover.
I heartily invite you to subscribe to Saint Kermit and catch all the action.
Podcasting from the Catholic Peace Fellowship office.
I had all sorts of technical difficulties, and couldn’t stay connected for more than a couple minutes at a time. Interesting to hear how they stitched these bits together into a coherent conversation.
The main sanctuary at Mission San Miguel (est. 1797) in Central California was severely damaged by the San Simeon Earthquake in 2003 and has been closed ever since. The Diocese of Monterey says it doesn’t have the money to repair it and it can’t get public funds, despite being a California Historic Landmark, since it’s an active place of worship. So volunteers have been doing their part by, among other things, casting 5,000 adobe bricks just like they used to back in the old days. The L.A. Times has the story.
Saint Kermit: Jim Henderson and I are interviewing Maine Senatorial candidate Jean Hay Bright next week for the podcast Saint Kermit. If you’d like to suggest a question for her, post a comment here or e-mail pieandcoffee@gmail.com.
Silk Hope Catholic Worker: Long article about them, with plenty of quotes from South Bend’s Mike Baxter.
Lechner on “Z”: Tom Lechner (who recently gave me a place to crash in Portland–thanks again) had a cartoon on the cover of June’s Z Magazine. (Here’s a great cartoon he drew while I was out there.)
Genius on genius: Vern reviews THEY LIVE.
Brandon is a Zombie: Out debut performance was not our best effort, but it was fun and we’re hoping to do another open mic before I leave South Bend. Dawn took some photos from the back of the bar.
Duluth News Tribune: “Diocese cancels nun’s Duluth talk because of anti-Bush newspaper ad”
Church Cancels Speech by Sister Helen Prejean Over Criticism of Bush
In Minnesota, the Catholic Church of Duluth has uninvited the well-known nun, Helen Prejean, from speaking at an upcoming fundraising dinner. Sister Prejean is the author of the book Dead Man Walking. The church said it canceled her speech after her name appeared in ad in the New York Times calling for the removal of President Bush from office.
August 11: Sister Helen asks that her name be withdrawn from the ad. (The final version of the ad contained pro-abortion language that she could not endorse.)
Think the diocese has ever cancelled a talk by someone who’s made pro-Bush or pro-war statements?