For I was ill and you cared for me

With the death last night of Sen Edward Kennedy, fellow Catholic and longtime proponent of universal health care, it might be a good time to check out a fine article about the Catholic response to the current debate in Congress over at Busted Halo, a Catholic young adult site sponsored by the Paulists.

Stump the priest

A suggestion from some of the students at UofL is that I open the floor for questions. Always a great idea. When I teach a class I always tell people to interrupt me with questions or I'll just go on and on and on. So feel free to leave questions or topics to explore in the comments section below.

Nothing greater can be conceived

well. School's back in and I figured it's probably time to start writing again. Looking around for a topic I was surprised to find that one of the most emailed articles in yesterday's New York Times was a meditation on St Anselm of Canterbury's ontological proof for the existence of God. In tracking down the author, Nathan Schneider, (gots to love the google) I found out he's a 20-something who (among other things) edits an online magazine called "Killing the Buddha," which is for "people embarrassed to be caught in the 'spirituality' section of a bookstore." There I found an earlier article he'd written about his own proof of God, his search for meaning in life, his baptism as a Catholic when he was a senior in high school, and his continued search for faith in college. They are both worth reading. And "Killing the Buddha" has some interesting things as well. One quote from Schneider's "Proof Enough for Me":

The proofs people make for their gods, whether those of great philosophers or of the unwashed internet, arise in eminently social ways-argument, love, politics, or even boredom and loneliness. They are not objects of some pure logic, as philosophers often treat them, but come mingled in flesh, desire, and experience.

A very Catholic way of looking at it I think.