Rome

March 4, 2012

Peace and Good,

I have been in Rome for this week for a series of meetings. We have had our General Definitory. We talked about the situation in so many parts of the world, from Australia to Ireland, the US to Argentina, from Zambia to Italy to India. There was an incredible variety of topics.

Tomorrow I had off to Africa to do a series of retreats: two in Ghana and one in Zambia. I do not know how the internet connections will be, so I decided to do this blog just a bit early.

Early in the week, I found out that I needed a visa to get into Ghana. I had thought that one could get it at the airport. One of our brothers here, Br. Bruno, took care of the details for it for me while I was in our meetings. Bruno is incredible for his service to the community. You just have to think of what you might need, and he is already thinking of a way to arrange it.

I also was asked to represent the minister general at a meeting of major superiors of religious orders present in Canada when I get back from Africa. It is really interesting to make contacts this way with good women and men from all over the world.

I finished a few books:

The Hunters by Web Griffin

This is one of many books that Griffin has written on the defense of our country and those who work behind the scenes to do that. This one involves a secret agency that the president has set up to do what the FBI and CIA and NSA cannot do. The hero is an army officer named Castillo who gathers together a team to investigate the murder of one of our diplomats by unknown assassins. It involves corruption concerning the oil for food program that was running in Iraq before the war and the consequences of all that money that was being spread around as bribes and cheating on sales limits. Griffin explains the action and background well enough that it is easy to follow. His characters are not quite fleshed out, but there is a lot of action. All in all, not a bad read but not exactly serious literature.

Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith

This is an incredible book that was, at times, painful to read. It involves a KGB agent at the end of the reign of Stalin who gets in trouble because he wants to be honest and because he loves his wife (or at least he thinks that he does). He goes through a series of humiliating and dangerous episodes along with his wife whom he eventually truly does learn to love (as she does he). If you ever wanted to know how bad things can become in a totalitarian regime, this is a book that you should read. The actual plot is the attempt to find a mass murderer of children, which in the Soviet Union was all but impossible because the official line of the government was that they did not have crimes like the decadent west. Therefore, the death of these children was never fully investigated, and the police only sought a scapegoat to blame and to cover up the investigation before it became too embarrassing. If you have the stomach for it, this is a must read.

Manituana by Wu Ming

There is a saying that history is written by the victors. This book is an exception. It tells the story of the battle of the Iroquois federation in New York State during the Revolutionary War. They fought on the side of the British, largely because they believed they had a better chance of holding on to their land given the promises the British had made to them. This book gives one an insight into native American life at the end of the 18th century.
The book was actually written by a committee. There is a group of authors living in Italy who write historical novels. You would never guess that this is more than one author. It is well written, and the translation from the original Italian is remarkable. Definitely a must read if you like historical novels.

Hope you have a good week.

Shalom
fr. Jude

London - Rome - Assisi - Rome

February 27, 2012

Peace and Good,

I returned home from London on Monday of this past week. The visit to the various friaries was very good, and I ended up seeing almost all of the friars in the delegation of Great Britain and Ireland.

On Wednesday, the General and I met with a group of pilgrims from the provinces of St. Anthony and Immaculate Conception. A number of them were friars, and the others were our co-workers. These are people who work in our apostolates: parishes, high schools, etc. Every couple of years we offer a pilgrimage to them to Rome and Assisi. It is kind of like showing someone who is visiting where one grew up. Assisi is the very heart of our spirituality. It is great to share this treasure with them. It shows them who we are, or at least who we hope to be.

On Thursday I went up to Assisi to visit with a Korean friar to continue the visitation of his province. He has been working there for seven years, and is a very prayerful person. It was a joy to share some time with him. I also visited some old Romanian friends, and the American friars who are working in the Basilica.

On Friday I returned to Rome and on Saturday and Sunday I met with the last of the Korean friars for the visitation. I am now writing the report that will be presented to our General Definitory here in Rome and to the friars of the province of Korea. As I said at the beginning of the visitation, these visits are done every six years to give the friars encouragement and guide them along the way.

This week we have a week full of meetings, and then this coming Sunday I head out to Africa for a few weeks. I do not know how the internet connection will be there, so don't be surprised if these blogs are a little late.

These are the books I have been reading:

Conspiracy in Kiev by Noel Hynd

This is the story of an woman working for the government who is recruited to undertake a CIA project to check out a Ukranian/Russian mafia figure during the time of a presidential visit to Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. The first part ends is a bloody massacre when assassins try to kill the president. Part two is when this same woman goes to a remote village in Venezuela to investigate threats made against Christian missionaries there. Once again, it ends badly. She had to kill many of the men who are threatening her and the government. This is a Christian novel. Unfortunately, the Christian part does not feel natural, almost as if it was tacked on to make sure that a Christian publisher would sell it. I especially don’t like the fact that the woman whose heritage was Catholic but whose father converted to a Protestant faith is portrayed as having found the truth (subtly implying that Catholicism was not quite there).

White Fang by Jack London

This is the second book I have read by Jack London where he writes from the perspective of a dog in the great north during the Yukon gold rush. This one involves a dog who is actually ¾ wolf. He is treated well or badly by his various owners. He responds to kindness with loyalty, and meanness with greater cruelty. There are some descriptions of nature and how the young wolf/dog responded to it that are incredibly good. Even his image of the wolf/dog thinking of people as a type of god because of their absolute power over him is classic. There is a certain amount of violence all throughout the book which probably makes it unusable for younger children, but other readers would probably enjoy it.

Monsoon: the Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power by Robert D Kaplan

This book is almost a travelogue of someone who is investigating the various cultures that reside all around the Indian Ocean. That is a part of the world that most American don’t know all that well, but the authors premise is that we should. Right now India and China are struggling to become regional powers in the area, and we American have our own interests there as well (given the fact that so much oil is exported through the area from the Persian gulf and Indonesia). The authors descriptions of what is going on in countries such as Oman, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Myanmar (Burma), Sri Lanka, etc. are priceless. By coincidence, I was reading this book as I was flying to the Philippines, and I was passing over many of the areas being described by the author. Definitely a must read for those interested in world events.

Hope you have a good week.

Shalom
fr. Jude

Baltimore - Liverpool - London - Manchester

February 19, 2012

Peace and Good,

This past week I have been travelling around Ireland and Great Britain for a series of conferences to the friars of our delegation. This delegation is part of the province of St. Anthony of USA. That province took charge of the delegation to help it back on its feet after several bad years and a loss of numbers. They now have a number of vocations at their programs in Canterbury and Misshawaka.

Fr. Paul, the delegate in charge of this jurisdiction, asked me to give a report on the activities of the Congress of Nairobi on multi-culturality. As an order, we have more and more friars from the southern and eastern world, and this is changing the complexion of the order. This is a good thing, but it does cause certain challenges as we try to deal with different cultural understandings, different ways of seeing things.

I also informed the friars of a few recent developments in the order. That is an important part of my job - to inform friars about other parts of the world and what is going on. Many of them easily get caught up with the world they are doing (which is most often very good work, laudable) and they can lose track of what other friars are doing. It is great to see how interested and excited they become to learn about friars on the other part of the world.

This past weekend I travelled up to Manchester to our parish to help out. One of our older friars here has been ill lately, so the friars have been coming up from London and Canterbury to help out. This didn't work this week because the sisters of one of our friars passed away, and the friars here had to help him out a bit during this difficult time.

Tomorrow I head back to Rome.

These are the books that I have been reading.

Lord of the Scoundrels by Loretta Chase

The best way to describe this novel is to call it a 19th century British romantic farce. It is about a man who, because of the way he had been treated growing up, turned out to be an absolute scoundrel. He meets his comeuppance when he encounters a young woman who turns out to be as clever, sensual, and insightful as he. There are some sex scenes which sort of fit the tenor of the book for those who don’t want to read those things. But it is clever and funny. Not exactly a heavy read, but once in a while you’ve got to cut loose.


Making History: the great Historians interpret the Past by Allen Gorlzo

This is a series of 24 lectures from the Teaching Company on how historians write about history. It helps one to get behind what is said to the question of why it was said that way. What prejudice did the author have in describing events as he did? Did it approach it as a gradual improvement in civilization, or the result of decadence? Were there religious motives (or political or economic or revolutionary) in what he is saying and how he says it. This series was quite good, although it is the kind of thing that you would really have to be a history lover to enjoy.

Lenin: a Biography

This is a long, detailed biography of Lenin, the father of the Russian Revolution. Service has written a series of three biographies about the founders of the communist movement: this one, one on Trotsky and one on Stalin. He is neither too negative nor positive. It is frightening to enter the mind of someone who is so convinced that he has a monopoly on the truth that he was willing to sacrifice countless lives to bring about his vision (which was not all that consistent either). He sacrificed almost everyone in his life to his ideal, including most of his communist collaborators. While some of what he wanted was laudatory (justice for the oppressed in society), his way of accomplishing it was horrifying. The book is long with enormous amounts of detail, but one never gets the sense that the detail was put there just to pad the book a bit. At the end of reading the book, one has a very good sense of who Lenin was. I am going to read the other two biographies when I get a chance.

I hope you have a good week.

Shalom
fr. Jude

Jonesboro, GA - Jacksonville, FL - Ellicott City, MD - Dublin, Ireland

February 12, 2012

Peace and Good,

This has been a good week. I began it in Atlanta. From there I drove down to Jacksonville on Monday along with two other friars to a retreat house where I would be preaching a retreat for the friars of the two eastern provinces (Immaculate Conception and St. Anthony). The theme of the retreat was that God was making all things new. This retreat and four others I will be preaching this year were part of a spiritual preparation for the joining of the provinces in 2014. The main purpose of the retreat was to make sure that the union was not simply a superficial joining of two groups of friars, but was rather an opportunity to take a look at our lives and see what needs to be changed. I compared it to moving to a new friary. One has two choices: one can simply pack everything in a moving van (thus needing a bigger one each time someone moves) or one can get rid of what wasn’t really necessary and pack light.

The talks were based on transitional moments in Sacred Scripture: Abraham; Moses; The exile in Babylon; After the Exile; the call to be disciples; the early Church; and the New Jerusalem of the Book of Revelation.

It is never easy to preach to the friars of one’s own community. They know you a little too well. But the friars could not have been more gracious. They entered into the spirit of the retreat wonderfully, and we had some really good conversations.


On a hunch, I also spent ten minutes or so before each of the conferences to talk about things that are going on in the order. Being the Assistant General, I get to see the order at a much wider level than most of the friars, and it is part of my job to let them know what is happening. A number of friars told me how much they appreciated that.

On Friday I flew back to Ellicott City, and then on Saturday night I headed out to Dublin. I will be participating in a series of assemblies (here, in Liverpool, and in London) over this next week. Then I will be heading back to Rome.

I finished a few books.

A Prisoner of Birth by Jeffrey Archer

This book tells of a young working man from London who is falsely accused and convicted of killing his best friend when a band of four rich professionals (one of whom committed the murder) testify against him. He is befriended by a man in prison who belongs to the Scottish nobility who becomes his tutor in school and also in how to comport himself in the world. When the noble is murdered in prison, the young man takes the identity of the noble (for he looks remarkably like him – e.g. The Pauper and the Prince) in order to be released so that he might prove his innocence. This particular detail is a bit unlikely, but the book is quite good overall. I wouldn’t mind reading some more of Archer’s writing.

Typhoon by Joseph Conrad

In this novella, Conrad tells of a captain transporting a group of Chinese coolies to their home city. His ship runs into a terrible typhoon, and they just barely survive. The great thing in the story is that the captain is remarkable dull witted. He never seems to be able to understand the nuances of anything that is said or done. Yet, it is his very slowness that ends up saving the ship from destruction both from the storm and from a rebellion of the Chinese. Once again, Conrad is a great author, and I could easily read anything that he has written. I just cannot believe that English was not his mother tongue. French was, and Polish was his second language. English was his third language, and yet his writing is remarkably good.

Imperium by Robert Harris

This is a historic novel about the rise of the famous orator Cicero to the imperium, the office of Council in the Roman Republic in the early days of Julius Caesar. It is written from the point of view of his private secretary, a slave. (Remember, in Roman times, many of the slaves were educated and quite respected for their expertise.) We hear about the plots and counterplots, the corruption of the later republican era of Rome, etc. Harris has done an incredibly good job in this book. I listened to the abridged version of it, and some day I would love to listen to the longer version of it, something that I could only rarely say for the books that I listen to on my MP3.

Have a good week.

Shalom
fr. Jude

Ellicott City, MD - Jonesboro, GA

February 5, 2012

Peace and Good,

This has not been all that busy a week. I came down here to Jonesboro this past Sunday for a series of meetings with the provincials of the United States, Canada, and Great Britain/Ireland. We have a rather large parish in Jonesboro, and we were hosted by the friars living and working there. The parish has an interesting mix of Hispanic, Anglo, African American and African.

We met Monday and Tuesday and discussed a number of important issues, including our assistance in Assisi.

In Assisi, our friars take care of the Basilica of St. Francis where St. Francis is buried and also the Sacro Convento, the very large friary for the friars working in the Basilica. We try to have friars from all over the world stationed there to host the pilgrims and tourists who come to Assisi. It is easy to help them enter into the spirit of Assisi because of the beautiful artwork in the Basilica, including a series of frescoes on the walls of the upper basilica which recount the life of St. Francis by Giotto. These frescoes are really the beginning of western art as we know it. Before that, most art, even in the west, was a Byzantine style in which the figures are represented without any movement or emotion. The basilica marks the beginning of landscape in the paintings and emotion and what is called plasticity (movement). The reason for this is obvious - St. Francis saw this world as a revelation of God's love, so it was a fitting subject for the artist.

Wednesday we took a field trip to the Martin Luther King Jr. center and to the Jimmy Carter Center. I had previously seen the former, but this was the first time that I saw the Jimmy Carter Center. It has the presidential library, a presentation center, and a center for dialogue and negotiation. He has worked hard for free and fair elections and for peace negotiations in trouble spots of the world. Rosylyn, his wife, has worked hard for treatment for the mentally ill. They are both exemplary in the way they have dedicated their time to service of their fellow human beings.

Tomorrow I head out to Jacksonville to preach a retreat to members of two provinces. This is the first of five retreats that I will preach for them this year as they prepare to unite in the year 2014.

I have finished a few books:

The Reign of Henry the Eighth by James Anthony Froude

This is the story of Henry the Eighth from the beginning to the end of his decision to divorce Catherine of Aragon and to marry Anne Boleyn. It goes into some of the economic and social realities of the era. Froude is a bigoted Protestant apologist for what Henry the Eighth did. Anything that destroyed the Catholic Church is seen as positive. While he at times admits that Henry had his faults, his greatest attacks are aimed at the Pope and the venality of the English Church (which did deserve some condemnation in those days). I would not recommend this book to anyone other than to exemplify how history should not be written.

King Alfred of England by Jacob Abbott

You might remember that I have been reading a series of biographies of historic figures that were written by Jacob Abbott for young Englishmen around the turn of the 19th to the 20th centuries. This is not one of his better books. He has so little information for this early Anglo Saxon king that he must pad his book with tons of apologia for the Anglo Saxon race. The book really has a racist overtone, which is to be expected given when it was written (during the reign of Queen Victoria).

Auschwitz by Miklos Nyiszli

This is an eyewitness account of some of the horrors of Auschwitz. Nyiszli is a Jewish doctor who was recruited by Mengele when he arrived at Auschwitz to do autopsies on those killed in the camp (either to find out of some disease had killed them or for some twisted motive on the part of Mengele). It is the kind of book that anyone who might deny the horrors of the extermination camps should read.

Rome - Ellicott City

January 29, 2012

Peace and Good,

This has been a somewhat restful week. I flew to Baltimore last Sunday after the completion of our General Definitory meeting.

This past week I have been taking care of medical and dental check ups. Being on the road so much, this can be a chore. I went to the dermatologist and had my routine colonoscopy. All looks good inside and out. I went to the center for tropical diseases to update my inoculations and get a refill of anti-malarial medicine for my next trip to Africa. I also went to the dentist.

Friday I took the train up to New York for a meeting with fr. Michael Lasky, the director of the New York office of Franciscans International, the Franciscan lobbying organization at the United Nations. Since I am now on the Board of Directors, I wanted to talk with him to get a sense of what is going on.

Today I head down to Atlanta for a meeting of the provincials of the United States, Canada, Great Britain and Ireland.

I have finished some books.

A History of Russia: From Peter the Great to Gorbachev by Mark Steinberg

This is a long (36 lectures) and well written description of the history of Russia from the time of its opening to the West under Peter the Great (1672-1725) until the days of Gorbachev. Steinberg gives a number of lectures for cultural and societal background. Each of the major rulers is described. One gets a very good sense of seeing where thing were coming from and where they were headed. I found this series very informative.

The Tavernier Stones by Stephen Parrish

This is the story of a treasure hunt (with murders and thefts thrown in). The topic involves trying to find a cache of gems that were stolen during the days of King Louis XIV (the Sun King) of France and hidden somewhere in Germany. There are cartographers, cryptographers, gemologists, detectives, etc. all looking for the treasure. The hero is an Amish young man who has left his way of life to work making maps. The story turns out to be a purifying journey through the muck for him. The book is well written, although once in a while it gets a bit bogged down in trying to explain the codes found on the treasure map.

The Torment of Others by Val McDermid

This is the story of a serial killer who was institutionalized and is still in a prison hospital, and the fact that his murders has recommenced. It takes place in England, and the hero is a woman detective who heads a task group establish to study the difficult cases. A sub plot is looking for the murderer and bodies of two young boys. It is a very good who done it. The tension of the stories is palpable. Certainly, a topic like this has quite a bit of violence (especially because the serial crimes are sexual in nature). But the book is quite good.

I hope you have a good week.

Shalom
fr. Jude

Rome - Ellicott City

January 23, 2012

Peace and Good,

I have been in Rome all of this week for our monthly definitory (gathering of the minister general and his council). As usual, we discussed the situation of friars and friaries all throughout the world.

During the week, we also took a field trip to a community called the Community of St. Egidio (Giles). This community was founded by Catholic young lay people as a reaction to the upheavals of 1968 (which tended to be very violent in Europe - remember, they brought down the presidency of Charles de Galle). These young people decided that there had to be a way that they could live their lives in a more authentic manner, but remaining lay people. This community had long been dedicated to the service of the poor and emarginated in society. They have spread all throughout the world. There are now around 70,000 to 80,000 of them. They have even been involved in diplomacy. Their most famous intervention was in Mozambique, Africa, when they helped to broker a cease fire and peace treaty to end a civil war raging there.

Since 1986, they have been committed to inter-religious dialog under the title of the Spirit of Assisi. This was the name given to a gathering sponsored by Pope John Paul II of religious figures all throughout the world in Assisi. This community has continued this initiative with gatherings of various religious figures each year to commemorate and continue the work.

We met with them to see where we could work together, and what we could learn from each other.

I continued my visitation of Korea in Italy, meeting with a number of Korean friars who are in Rome for their studies. I will be able to finish up the visitation when I get back to Rome in February.

I flew to the States yesterday and will be here for the next three weeks. These week I am getting caught up on medical tests (the normal ones). Next week I have a meeting with the American provincials, and then the week after I will be giving a retreat to our friars at a retreat house in Jacksonville, FL.

These are some books that I have finished.

Lectures on Russian Literature by Ivan Panin

I have really taken a liking to Russian literature, and this is a long lecture on four different authors who represent various tendencies in authorship: Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenef and Tolstoy. Pushkin is seen as someone who can only sing the glories of what he sees. Gogol can see and describe the negative. Turgenef attack that which he understands to be unjust. Tolstoy sees the good and bad and transcends them. The lecture certainly shows certain prejudices on how Panin reads these authors, but his evaluation is a good read.

The Mountains of California by John Muir

John Muir is largely responsible for the movement to protect the beauties of nature in the US. I have already read a couple of his books describing the Grand Canon and the glaciers of Alaska. This book covers the mountain ranges in California. His writing is pure poetry, but this one gets a bit too bogged down in description. Sometimes one feels as if one is ready a botany textbook. It is still worth reading, but it is not Muir’s best attempt.

Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky

Nemirovsky was a Catholic French author (of Russian Jewish heritage) who wrote just before and during World War II. She was eventually arrested and died in Auschwitz. This book was written at the begging of the war (up to the first anniversary of the conquest of Paris by the Nazi’s, which coincided with the German invasion of the Soviet Union). It describes first the panicked response of people as the Nazi’s were arriving, and then their attempt to live under the control of the Nazi’s. There is also a good amount of polemic about the attitude of the various factions in French politics that had torn the country apart before the war and how those divisions continued well into the occupation. There are not a lot of heroes in the story, even as that period was terribly messy in actuality.