Montreal

May 17, 2015 Peace and Good, It is so good to be able to write just one city in the title of this blog. I have been here in Montreal for the past week for the custodial chapter of the friars up here. So far it has gone quite well. A custody is a type of baby province, and the provincial, fr. Jan from Gdansk in Poland, is the one who is actually running the chapter. I get to sit back and listen to the translations (for most of the business is in Polish) and make a comment every once in a while. This time here has helped me to catch up on daily reflections. My next chore will be to write a few articles for the Messenger magazine from Padua. Then I will be pretty much caught up. I have finished some books: Halloween Party by Agatha Christie A young girl is murdered at a Halloween party, drowned in the apple dunk basin. The story follows the investigation by Hercule Poirot as he tries to discover who could possibly have sneaked into the house where the party was being held and killed the girl. He also has to try to discover the why of the murder, although there is a major clue right from the start: that the girl bragged in front of a mystery author at the party that she, too, had seen a murder. A Temple of the Holy Spirit by Flannery O’Connor This is the story of a young girl whose two slightly older cousins visit their home from religious boarding school. The young girl thinks of herself as a genious and of the cousins as nitwits, and she cannot stand the fact that they get to go on a date with two boys to the carnival. Typical of Flannery O’Connor’s stories, there is a moment when she has to decide to be a better person or not, and she seems to fail in her commitment. Young J. Edgar Hoover and the Red Scare by Kenneth Ackerman Following World War I and the Communist revolution, there was an outbreak of violence in the States instigated by anarchists and communist radicals. This book outlines how J. Edgar Hoover worked to stop these dangers, but in a way that trashed the value of the constitution (illegal arrests and detainments, cruel imprisonment conditions, deportation without due process). His boss, the Attorney General was blamed for most of went on and J. Edgar Hoover got away with it, being named the head of the newly founded FBI shortly afterward. When one studies his career, though, and how he kept secret files and conducted illegal searches and wiretapings, one can see how the pattern began early. The Last Cato by Matilda Asensi Even since the DeVinci Code, there have been a series of conspiratorial books involving the Vatican. This one is about a society that dates to the Middle Ages which has sworn to defend the true cross from all dangers. They have made their task into a religion in itself. Supposedly, they set up a secret perfect society in the middle of a mountain in Ethiopia. The action concerns a nun who works in the secret archives of the Vatican, a ruthless Vatican Swiss Guard and an Egyptian Coptic scholar who go through a series of rigorous tests so that they might infiltrate the secret society and find out why they are stealing relics of the cross from all over the world. The Ghosts of Cannae: Hannibal and the Darkest Hour of the Roman Republic by Robert O’Connell This is the story of how Hannibal invaded Italy during the Second Punic War. He won almost all of the battles, and nevertheless lost the war. One of his victories became synonymous with tremendous crushing victory: Cannae. Yet, the Romans dogedly held on. Those soldiers who survived Cannae were treated as if they were ghosts, sent to Sicily and not even allowed to live in town. Yet, they were the core of the force that eventually defeated the Catheginians definitively. This book is well reasoned and well written. Hope you have a good week. Shalom fr. Jude

Rome - Chicago - Lexington - Rockford - Algonquin - Montreal

May 10, 2015 Peace and Good, I finished off my first week of definitory on May 2. The next day I flew out to Chicago, arriving the evening of Sunday. Monday I and a couple of other friars drove to Lexington, Kentucky, for the episcopal ordination of fr. John Stowe, one of the friars of Our Lady of Consolation Province, who was being ordained as a bishop for the diocese of Lexington. John is the third bishop of this relatively new diocese. The ceremony was incredibly well planned and beautiful. Wednesday we headed back to Chicago (a six and a half hour drive). Thursday and Friday I visited two friaries in the Rockford diocese that are run by the friars from Poland, the Cracow diocese. They are a good group of friars. They run three different parishes, one Polish, one Mexican and one American. Saturday I flew up to Montreal for the custodial chapter that will be held here the next couple of weeks. The friars here are of Polish origin, and they serve Polish immigrants here in Canada and in three parishes in the United States. I will be here until the 23rd. This is an easy week for me for the chapter is run in Polish and I only have to listen to the translation as much as I can. I finished a few books this week: Indignation by Philip Roth This is the story of a young Jewish man who is the son of a Kosher butcher. He, himself, is a non-believer. When the son goes off the college, the father becomes unreasonable protective, driving the son to seek a college in Ohio. There a series of unfortunate incidents lead him to be thrown out of college, and he is drafted into the Korean War where he is killed, fulfilling the worst fears of the father and leading to his own death. St. Francis of Assisi by Wyatt North North write short biographies of various saintly people and then tells about their importance for our modern days. This is that type of presentation. It is not especially deep, but it is good to reread the story every once in a while to remind oneself of what is really important. Third Degree by Greg Iles A doctor finds out his wife is cheating on her husband and he holds first her and then their children hostage. In the meantime, the doctor has been doing illegal things for profit with his partner. The authorities are getting ready to raid their clinic. The police show up and try to end the hostage situation which is complicated when they find out that the doctor is actually suffering from an inoperable tumor. A lot of action and good characterization, but some unlikely situation nevertheless. Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes This is a long and frustrating account of the battle that marines faced during the Vietnam War. They were often used for political purposes and to foster the promotion of their superiors. They were told to do one thing one day, and then the opposite the next. They built up fortifications only to have to leave them to the enemy, and then have to retake them later on. Matterhorn, is in fact, a mountain fortress that was controlling the infiltration of the North Vietnamese into that part of the highlands of Vietnam, and it is the center of the story. Eenie Meenie by Willow Rose This is another of those horror stories written by a Danish author. She tells of a prison for young male offenders. Someone, and one doesn’t come to know who until the end of the story, is angry because the offenders get off so easily. He takes it into his mind to make sure that they are punished severely for their crimes, castrating one, blinding another, etc. This author doesn’t hesitate to use gruesome scenes to make the point. I hope you have a good week. Shalom fr. Jude

Mesilla Park (New Mexico) - Rome

May 1, 2015 The Feast of St. Joseph, the Worker Peace and Good, I have been back in Rome this week for one of our General Definitory meetings. We have met from Monday til yesterday. The other definitors will be back in session next week, but I am taking off this coming Sunday to head to Chicago for the episcopal ordination of one of our friars, John Stowe, who has been named the bishop of Lexington, Kentucky. The trip back to Rome from El Paso (the nearest airport to Mesilla Park) was eventful. The first flight had some mechanical difficulties and we had to deplane. After about an hour, we took off and actually made up a bit of the time because of a strong tail wind. Nevertheless, when we got to Chicago, we had to sit on the tarmac for a good amount of time because our gate was not ready. Fortunately, I had a good amount of time between flights. The next flight from Chicago to Rome was even worse. We had a delay of three hours because of a number of mechanical difficulties. We did finally take off and the flight was fine. This was my third delay (or in one case cancellation) due to mechanical difficulties in ten days. This week, one of our older friars in our house, fr. Luigi Costantini, passed away. He has worked for the General level of the Order for fifty years. He was the recording secretary at every General Chapter since the 1970's. He was 91 years old, and was in fairly good health until a couple of weeks ago. We will miss his presence here. I finished some books and stories this week: Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind by Ellen Brown and John Wiley This is not the book Gone with the Wind, but rather the book that explains who Gone with the Wind was written and sold. Margaret Mitchell wrote the book in sections over the years. She never felt it was ready for people to see, but a friend mentioned it to someone who then requested permission to see whether their publishing house would be interested. She put it together as much as she could and sent it off. The publishing house was very interested, and she worked like the devil to make it ready in time for publishing. She and her husband were shocked at its success, and the rest of her life she fought a double battle: to preserve her privacy, and to fight for what she considered her just rights against her publisher, the movie people, foreign publishers, etc. She died when hit by a car while crossing a road to go to a film with her husband. Binary by Michael Crichton A multi-millionaire who is disgusted with politics as it is being exercised decides he is going to do something about it. He steals the components for nerve gas and plans to kill a massive number of people during one of the political conventions in San Diego. The agent investigating the plot must not only figure out what this perpetrator is doing, but also how he is playing off against his own personality (for the millionaire had stolen the agent’s file and knows his psychological assessment and is using it against him). The River by Flannery O’Connor This is the story of a young boy who spends the day with a sitter who takes him first to her home, and then to the river where a famous preacher is performing healings that day. These experiences are all new to the boy, and he eventually wanders away from his family to return to the river. There seems to be a choice between believing in the power of the Spirit and living one’s life the way one always had (which involved partying and drinking, things that the boy’s parents seem to know well). Avanti: Mussolini and the Wars of Italy 1919-1945 by J. Lee Ready This is an account of Italy’s war effort during World War II. At times, the author is objective, giving the positive and negative side of the battle. At other times, the author is very, very prejudiced against anything which would hint of cowardice or lack of organization on the part of the Italians. He openly attacks the British, Americans, Germans, etc. The book is interesting, but one has to wonder how much the account has been colored by the conclusions that the author is trying to push. Odd Thomas: You are Destined to Be Together Forever by Dean Koontz This is a novella in the Odd Thomas series. Odd can see ghosts, and they lead him to various adventures. This is sort of a prequel in which he and his beloved girlfriend Stormy receive a card from a mechanical fortune teller which predicts that they will be together forever. This is sort of tragic, for Stormy is killed at the end of the first Odd Thomas full book, but it might be a foretelling of an everlasting future that, like most of what happens to Odd, cannot be measured according to our earthly standards. Have a good week. Shalom fr. Jude

Sydney - Rome - Geneva - Mesilla PArk (El Paso)

April 22, 2015 Peace and Good, I hope you are well. This blog starts out in Australia. I recovered from my food poisoning in plenty of time to fly back to Rome The trip to Rome was a bit eventful. I flew out Sunday afternoon to go from Sydney to Melbourne to catch my flight to Rome. The flight from Sydney to Melbourne was cancelled because of mechanical difficulties and they could not book me in time to get the connection to Rome. I slept in a hotel they provided, and then at 10 the next morning headed out to the airport. In the meantime, I tried to change the date of my ticket to Rome, but could not because it was made by my travel agent. I had to e mail the agent in Rome and wait until 5 PM (all the time in the airport) before I knew for sure I could fly out that evening. I made it back to Rome on Tuesday. On Wednesday, we had a special Mass for fr. Lanfranco Serini, an ex minister general, who passed away a month ago. Then on Thursday I flew to Geneva for a meeting of Franciscans International, a lobbying group at the UN for peace and justice issues. I am on their board of directors. Sunday I flew from Geneva to Frankfort to Denver and on to El Paso. All of the connections worked out fine, but my bag never arrived in Denver. I think it travelled in another direction. I arrived in the retreat center in Mesilla Park, New Mexico (not far from El Paso) for a meeting of the provincials of the US. My bag should arrive this morning (Wednesday). Thank God there is a dollar general just down the street where I could pick up some necessities to hold me over until now. The meeting of the provincials is going very well. They are a fine group of men to work with. We finish today, and I will fly out on Friday morning going back to Rome for a definitory meeting. I finished some books: Jewish Outlaws by Alan Furst This is the first volume of the story of the Millen-Faber gang, a group of young Jewish men who followed the pattern of Bonny and Clyde. They lived in the Boston area, and were not really from impoverished families. They nevertheless raided armories for weapons, robbed banks and movie theaters, and murdered a number of people. This all occurred during the great Depression. Rock a Bye Baby by Willow Rose A woman becomes a bit paranoid in caring for her family and especially for her new born baby. She sees threats everywhere and begins to kill all of those whom she considers to be a danger. At the end of the story, one finds out why this happened: her baby had died in its crib a couple of weeks ago. The only problem is that it would appear that her hallucinations were not just that. It seems as if she has been killed people left and right, even grinding some of them up to make her homemade sausage. The Life You Save May Be Your Own by Flannery O’Connor This is another of those strange stories from Flannery O’Connor. A man missing a hand shows up at the home of a widow and her handicapped daughter. He serves as their handyman for a time, and eventually marries the daughter (but only to get a bit of money and their car). He leaves her at a roadside diner and passes on. Whenever I read her stories, it leave me wondering what she was trying to say. The Insiders by Craig Hickman This is a conspiratorial book in which a group of businessmen have developed a system to control economics. They manipulate the system both legally and illegally in order to win, even at the cost of destroying goods and people who are only trying to survive. A man whose father seems to have tried to commit suicide must uncover the plot and find a way to destroy the powerful forces that want to continue the evil that they have been doing. While overall the book is good, once in a while it does get too involved in detail that can make one lose track of the point the author is trying to make. The Vanished Man by Jeffrey Deever Lincoln Rhyme must investigate a series of murders being performed by an illusionist. The basic principle of illusionists is that nothing is as it seems to be. That makes the investigation all the more difficult. Rymes comes to depend upon Kara, a budding illusionist, to help him see through the false messages that are being communicated in order to stop the murders and find the murderer. The Crushing of Eastern Europe by Anne Applebaum This is a very long and very thorough outline of what happened in Eastern Europe after the defeat of the Nazi’s and during the ascent of the communist regimes in that part of the world. Applebaum shows conclusively that the development of the Iron Curtain was not a reaction to anything done by the Western powers, but rather was a plot developed during the war by Stalin and his cohorts. We see how every vestige of freedom is wiped out, every possible rival to communism is systematically imprisoned or murdered. This is a depressing account, but it is all true. Having worked in Romania after the fall of communism, this story brings back so many of the stories the friars shared with me about what it was like under communism. Have a good week. Shalom fr. Jude

Rome - Melbourne - Sydney

April 12, 2015 Peace and Good, I hope you are all well. I spend Holy Week at home in Rome. Holy Monday we had a quick meeting of our definitory to take care of pending business. Then the rest of the week I spent participating in the services in the Basilica and also working on some taping and writing projects. I headed out on Easter Sunday afternoon to fly to Australia to visit our friars there. This was not an official trip, simply a visit to see how things are going. There has been an influx of new blood of friars from the US (which has taken forever because their visa applications dragged on and on). They will be meeting in assembly in June to talk about the present and the future. I, unfortunately, will not be able to be there, so this was a good time to stop and see and listen. I started out in Melbourne where we have two friaries. Then I moved on to Sydney. Unfortunately, I came down with food poisoning (most probably from a restaurant where we had lunch before I left Melbourne). Fortunately, I carry a supply of antibiotics with me because I end up with food poisoning at least once a year with all the travel that I do. This time it really laid me low for a couple of days, but today I feel well enough to continue on my journey back to Rome. I finished some books: The Lady in Gold by Anne-Marie O’Connor This is the title for a painting that was produced by Gustav Klimt and which became the symbol for the cosmopolitan, avant guarde culture of pre-war Vienna. The woman painted, Adele Bloch Bauer, was a Jewish society woman with very liberal attitudes. The book covers first the society in which she and Kilmt lived. I then deals with what happened to Adele Bloch Bauer’s family and friends after the takeover by the Nazi’s. Finally, it deals with the attempt of the family of Bloch Bauer to recover the painting from a museum in Vienna, an attempt that dragged on for years. I Claudius by Robert Graves This is a fictional account of the emperor Claudius, the successor of the mad emperor Caligula, and the predecessor of the equally mad emperor Nero. Claudius was considered to be a nobody in the family of the Caesars. He had a speech impediment and was somewhat crippled. Caligula used him as a court fool, which probably saved his life for many of the other royal family members were killed when Caligula thought of them as rivals. We hear of how Claudius’ own mother hated him, and we hear of the machinations of the widow of Augustus Caesar, Livia. The book is well written, and was the source of a PBS series a number of years ago. Straight into Darkness by Faye Kellerman This is the story of a series of murders in Munich, Germany right before Hitler takes power in Germany The police officer who must investigate the murders is caught up in the craziness of the times. Jewish people are murdered without any compunction, and Jewish people are blamed even when it is clear that they had nothing to do with it. The officer tries to keep out of this, but it is impossible and he has to make choices that leave him and his entire family in danger. It is a well written account of a very confusing time. Ghost Map: The Story of London’s Most Terrifying Epidemic by Steven Berlin Johnson This tells the story of an outbreak of cholera in one part of the city of London during the 19th century. Many people supposed that it was vapors coming from burial grounds so some other airborne contagion that was causing the disease. A doctor and a clergyman were able to disprove this theory and show that it was actually contaminated water that caused the disease, tracing this particular outbreak to the water in one well (which, ironically, was considered to be one of the best water wells in the city). Johnson then speaks of how this discovery allowed for the continued growth of cities, and he deals with the dangers that face large cities today from disease, terrorism, etc. The Rise of Rome by Anthony Everitt This is the masterful treatment of how the city of Rome, a small insignificant hill town in the 8th century BC, went on to become the greatest empire that the world has ever seen. One sees the growth of the republic, which was really an oligarchy. One sees how Rome conquered its enemies first near and then far. One also sees how the organization of the republic eventually led to its downfall in civil war due to the outsized personalities of a number of its politicians. I hope you have a good week. Shalom fr. Jude

Chicago - Rome

March 20, 2015 Peace and Good, This past week I was at two of the houses of the Chicago Province. One of them is on Kenmore Avenue which is a few blocks away from Loyola University on the north side of the city, and the other is called Marytown and it is adjacent to Mundelein School of Theology. The latter is a retreat house and shrine. The friars are doing great work there, and I was talking with the administration there of how we can support their activities. I know most of the friars there quite well. The weather in Chicago was terrible. It snowed a couple of times in the past week, and it was very, very cold (especially along the lake). That didn't stop me from doing my daily walks, but I had to bundle up quite a bit to keep close to warm. (No, no socks with my sandals - one of the friars, when he saw this, said that my toes would fall off). I came back on Saturday. The flight was a bit more complicated than normal because there had been a change in plans. Instead of flying back directly from Chicago to Rome, I had to go from Chicago to Raleigh, Raleigh to London and London to Rome. Fortunately, the connections were great (we had a tail-wind across the Atlantic that got us into London an hour early). My luggage was not lost. All in all, not a bad trip. I will be here in Rome for Holy Week, and then head out to Australia on Easter Sunday. I finished some books and stories: Martin Cruz Smith Tatiana This is another of the Inspector Renko books. This one takes place in Moscow and the small and incredibly corrupt Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. Renko is trying to discover the murderer of a Moscow newspaper reporter. He travels to her sister’s house in Kaliningrad and tries to sort out which plutocrat (if not all of them) had her killed. This story takes place in the present era, after the fall of communism. Smith’s books are incredibly well written and provide a true insight to the mess that now rules Russia. A Covert Affair: Julia Child and Paul Child in the OSS by Jennet Conant Julia Child as an OSS agent. Can that be real. Yet, this is exactly what she did during World War II. She helped set up OSS offices (which was the predecessor of the CIA) in Sri Lanka and then in China. This is where she met her husband. The book is about her, but even more about one of her friends Jane who was accused of being a communist during the McCarthy era. It turns out that even though she denied it, she probably was at least a collaborator with the communists. This book chronicles the period from the beginning of the war until Julia became a sensation for her cooking books and her cooking shows. In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin by Erik Larson This is the story of the American ambassador who Franklin D. Roosevelt sent to Nazi Germany during the beginning of the Hitler Regime, William Dodd. It is also the story of the idealistic and somewhat flighty daughter who first fell in love with the Nazi movement, and then switched her loyalties to the communists. Dodd tried to deal with the German government in a normal way, but that was largely unsuccessful. He was also undercut by many of the career diplomats who resented his populist ways. The title of the book comes from the address at which he lived which was across from the Tiergarten, which literally means the garden of beasts (which was used as a symbol for the beastly behavior of the Nazis. Double Cross by James Patterson This is an Alex Cross story about a widowed black police man/psychologist who pursues both a crafty murderer who escapes from prison (who had been a FBI profiler) and some of his fans who have gone on a murder spree. This search is very personal, for both of these pursued criminals intend to hurt the people whom Cross loves. As with all of Patterson’s stories, it is well written. There is a romance sub-plot between Alex and a female police officer with whom he works on the case. A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O’Connor This is a very odd story from the southern Catholic author Flannery O’Connor. A family travelling down to Florida run off the road. The men who stop to help them turn out to be murderers who then kill the family members one by one. The grandmother, who is the last killed, is given a chance to change her life in a moment of clarity. O’Connor speaks about grace as coming into our lives as a violent force that makes us make life decisions. The imagery is troubling and challenging. Have a good Holy Week. Shalom fr. Jude

Rome - Frascati - Rome - Chicago - Algonquin - Libertyville

March 22, 2015 Peace and Good, This blog is for the past two weeks. In the first week, I spent time at Frascati, a town just outside of Rome (not too far from Castel Gondolfo where the Pope spends his summer). I was giving a retreat to a group of Capuchin Franciscans. There were 30 of them. Capuchins are a reform of the Franciscans dating to the 16th century. They are very similar to Conventual Franciscans in a lot of ways. Padre Pio was a Capuchin. The retreat went from Monday morning until Friday lunch. I had a really good time with the friars and was very pleased with how the retreat went. On Saturday of that week I flew out to Chicago. For the first week I was staying at our house on Kenmore Avenue, not far from the campus of Loyola University (on the north side of Chicago). I was there for a series of informal meetings with a series of friars. I had spent a lot of time in Chicago last year addressing some problems, and I was there to see how things were going. On Friday I visited a parish about an hour outside of Chicago that is run by a group of our Polish friars. It is a big parish, and the friars are doing a great job there. Yesterday I attended a workshop on one of the writings of St. Bonaventure. I don't get to go to many of these types of talks, and it was well done. I learned some key ideas about the thought of Bonaventure which will help me understand a lot of his philosophy. Then, after the talks, I moved up to our friary and shrine in Libertyville called Marytown. I will be here until Thursday to meet with any of the friars who want to talk with me. I finished some books: Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food by Paul Greenberg The author of this book speak about four fish that serve as food for many people in the world: salmon, cod, sea bass, and tuna. He speaks about the over fishing which has caused their wild populations to plummet. He also speaks about the attempts to raise these fish in fish farms and what affect this has on the wild population. He offers suggestions on how to make sure that there will be wild fish in the future. Poisoned Land by Elie Batuman This is a story of a young man and his father, who is a doctor, who visits the ex countries of Yugoslavia to investigate a strange series of kidney disease. He goes through various possibilities: is it caused by poisoning caused by plants there, or by the silt left in a flood, or by genetics, or by coal seams running under the land. It turns out people who live along the river which frequently floods suffer from a much worse disease rate than those who live on the hillsides. This is true both for those born in the area and those who entered the area in recent years. It is a good story both from the travel and from the medical investigation level. Humpty Dumpty by Willow Rose This is one of four stories by a Danish author who writes in the horror literature genre. It is about a young girl who is very obese, thus receiving the name Humpty Dumpty. She comes from a family that is not all that nice. Her father abused her and her older sister. The mother knows this and does nothing, and she hates that her daughter is so not perfect. A gang of young men from a prep school plan a Freddy Krueger spree of murder and mayhem. They plan to kill her whole family. The young girl uses her telekenetic powers to protect herself and her young brother. It is sort of a cross between a possession story, Carrie and Freddie Krueger. Everything is Broken by Emma Larkin This is a story based in Myanmar, Burma. This country has been ruled by a military junta for many years. It speaks of the crackdown exercised by the government when the Buddhist monks staged opposition marches, even when this was considered to be a blasphemous action. Then, months after this, the country was hit by a horrible cyclone named Nargis. No one knows how many people were killed, but it is well over 100,000. The government refused to accept foreign assistance to help the people suffering in the delta, possibly because they were afraid of losing power. The author traces the efforts to bend the will of the military and how the people suffered throughout these months. The Age of Pericles by Jeremy McInerney This is a Teaching Company presentation on life in Athens during the Fifth century BC. This was known as the golden age of that society. The presenter is very good in his description, and he tells of the glories but also of the shortcomings of that society. On the positive side, one has the building of the temples on the Acropolis, the sculptors and poets and playwrites, the military heroes and the fight for some basic rights. On the negative side, the rights did not involve slaves, women or foreigners. As always with teaching company presentations, this series gives one a to think about. Have a good week. Shalom fr. Jude