Category: A Sampler of Posts
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The danger of relying on “in good standing.”
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No comments on The danger of relying on “in good standing.”Today’s gospel, Luke 18:9–14, is a story about two particular people and two particular types: but “tax collector” and “Pharisee” aren’t the types, that’s just background information. All tax collectors aren’t represented by the character in the story Jesus tells; all Pharisees aren’t represented by the Pharisee character either. But often when two people are…
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The new ground rules.
For a couple of years, 2008 or so, I wrote frequently about exercise and eating strategies. Sometimes I wrote about how those intersect with theology of the body, or Thomist morality. I returned to the topic sporadically, but not steadily, since then. It's been a while since I've written much. I wrote all that because…
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All those weight loss posts: Bathwater or baby? (Updated Oct. 2025)
Anyone who has been reading this blog for more than a few years knows that starting in 2008, I wrote a long series chronicling a number of lifestyle changes: learning to run and swim, ending some destructive food behaviors, and dealing with the mental and physical fallout of the significant weight loss that followed. …
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St. John Bosco and how to *not* punish kids (a repost).
St. John Bosco, like St. "Mother" Teresa or St. "Padre" Pio, is one of those whose names started to sound a little weird when their popular monikers got altered by the application of sainthood. He's often "Don" Bosco even though his name is John-actually-Saint-John-now, "Don" being the honorific applied typically to diocesan priests in Italy. I…
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A strange turning point.
In the last couple of weeks, as I rushed around with Mark and without Mark trying to pull items together to help my grandmother when the relative who lives with her was hospitalized, I had the oddest impression. It went like this: This is the week when I began to grow old. …
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Satisfying bleakness.
I left Mark and his dad with my sick kiddo in her hospital room yesterday afternoon so I could go to Mass at a parish on this side of town. The rest of the family will go this morning, the usual place, the usual time. Now that the 9- and 13-yo boys are both serving…
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Temptation at home.
It’s been a long time since I was writing a great deal about weight loss and gluttony*…. (believe me, I will probably need to write more about it sometime after I have this baby… maybe even sooner, because while trying to lose weight isn’t appropriate right now, dealing with old impulses always is…) … and…
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Coming up on Lent.
One weekend left, and in a few days it'll be Ash Wednesday. All this spring I've been coming back again and again to this passage from The Imitation of Christ (Book 2, Chapter 12, "On the Royal Road of the Cross"). What I like about it is that it answers a question I have…
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Ground rules.
"All right, everybody." I took a sip of my beer, set it down firmly and pounded my fist once on the table. "I call this meeting to order." My friend C. put down his herbal tea and said "We're having a meeting? This is a meeting?" I looked over at M., his wife. M. and…
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Imperceptible change.
From today's Office of Readings (Prime). I arranged the paragraph breaks and indentations to highlight the parallelism. We are afflicted… but we are not crushed; full of doubts, we never despair. We are persecuted but never abandoned; we are struck down but never destroyed…. While we live we are constantly being delivered to death for…
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Six degrees to cupcakes.
When I was pregnant with my second child, I read a simple line in a parenting book (Becky Bailey, Easy to Love, Difficult to Discipline) that resonated with me: "In any given moment, ask yourself, do you want to be special, or do you want to connect?" As a child and adolescent, I had wanted to…
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The difference between faith and belief.
"I do believe; help my unbelief!" — Mark 9:24 + + + Darwin excerpts a cordial discussion between some theists and some atheists about the meaning of the word "faith." It's worth reading on its own, and I am not going to respond to the entire excerpt, but just make my own comment and expand…
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