Life is Short. Pray Hard.

My mom wore her brand-new Clinton Portis jersey to my brother’s favorite Mahnattan sports-bar on Sunday afternoon. But, as we know, it was to no avail.

Redskins 2008: 8-8.

Let’s define “substantial fan encouragement” as: the Redskins putting together two winning seasons in a row.

Our decade-and-a-half-long drought with no substantial fan encouragement continues.

Portis, on Monday:  “I have no intention of having anything to do with exercise until February or March.”

On New Year’s Eve we consider how fleeting is our life on earth. Here’s a resolution: In 2009, my top priority will be getting to heaven. (Hopefully this will be a renewal from 2008.)

 Happy New Year!  Here’s a poem for your meditation.

“Elegy Written in a Country Church-Yard” by Thomas Gray

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o’er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds:

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree’s shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude Forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

“The rain it raineth every day”

Sir Andrew Aguecheek and Sir Toby Belch

–William Shakespeare, “Twelfth Night,” Act V, Scene 1, line 415.

Now, before you accuse me of being random in this blog, consider this:

The Bard himself wrote a play named after January 6th, and there is not a single reference to Epiphany or Christmas in the entire play. Not one! Talk about random.

“Twelfth Night” is an upstairs, downstairs play.

Upstairs, there is a bizarre love triangle. The Duke of Illyria, Count Orsino, longs to court the Lady Olivia. But she mourns for her dead brother, refusing all suitors.

Viola masquerading as Cesario

The shipwrecked Viola puts on men’s clothing and masquerades as Cesario to work as Count Orsino’s messenger. Viola promptly falls in love with the lovelorn Duke.

When Orsino sends Cesario to beg Lady Olivia to consider his suit, Olivia falls in love with Cesario!

Meanwhile, downstairs (where we witness the drinking of much wine): Olivia’s uncle Sir Toby Belch has recruited Sir Andrew Aguecheek to woo niece Olivia. But Sir Andrew cannot manage a coherent sentence even with the lady’s maid, Maria.

Aguecheek is so exquisitely funny that he makes Sir John Falstaff look like cookie-cutter, central-casting comic relief by comparison.

October 19, 2008

St. Isaac Jogues with missing fingers

Generally speaking, on Sundays we do not keep the saints’ feast days. So today we did not keep the feast of the North American Martyrs. Nonetheless, it is good for us to call them to mind. Their blood shed for the faith sanctified this continent and made it a fertile ground for the Church.

They were Jesuits and lay men who accompanied the Jesuits to New France in the early 17th century. The two most famous among them are St. Isaac Jogues and St. John de Brebeuf. St. Isaac Jogues had two of his fingers bitten off by hostile Indians. He was given special permission by the Pope to continue to say Mass. Then he asked to be allowed to go back to North America, where he was killed.

There are two beautiful shrines of the North American Martyrs, both of which are very much worth visiting. One is located near Albany, New York, in Auriesville. This is the place where St. Isaac Jogues was killed.

North American Martyrs Shrine in Midland, Ontario

Even more wonderful is the shrine in Midland, Ontario, north of Toronto. This is where St. John de Brebeuf was killed.

In addition to the beautiful shrine, there is also a reconstruction of the original Jesuit mission, which is evocative down to the last detail.

The Hurons lived a rough life there. They liked to season the dried fish they ate in the winter, but of course they had no salt. So they used ashes from the fire.

Clinton Portis and Co.

On a much more mundane note: Clinton Portis is awesome! It was not a pretty game. We will, however, take the W.

And poor, poor Dallas…losing to those scrubs, the St. Louis Rams. Maybe the Rams are actually not so bad after all.