Explaining And Gilding

History is always written by victors, and the defeated create a new set of myths to explain the past and gild the future.
―    Morris L. West
From his novel:  “The Devil’s Advocate“
.
On This Day In:
2019	Lead To Action
2018	Listen And See
2017	The Big Illusion
2016	What Are You Thinking About?
2015	What The Framers Chose
2014	Lost Anything Lately?
	A Life Of Science
2013	Serve The World
2012	Acquaintance, n.
2011	On Why His Father Was A Great Teacher
	A Baker’s Dozen

Read Full Post »

I Am Doubtful

I believe in saints as I believe in sanctity.  I believe in miracles as I believe in God, who can suspend the laws of His own making.  But I believe, too, that the hand of God writes plainly and simply, for all men of good will to read.  I am doubtful of His presence in confusion and conflicting voices.
―  Morris L. West
From his book:  “The Devil’s Advocate“
.
On This Day In:
2018	True Measures
2017	Hoping For Tapes
	In It Now
2016	On Viewing This Mudball
2015	It Takes A Village
2014	In God’s Eyes
2013	We Root For Ourselves
2012	Like A Shark
2011	Discernible Virtue

Read Full Post »

Nothing To Build On

I was lost a long time, without knowing it.  Without the Faith, one is free, and that is a pleasant feeling at first.  There are no questions of conscience, no constraints, except the constraints of custom, convention and the law, and these are flexible enough for most purposes.  It is only later that terror comes.  One is free – but free in chaos, in an unexplained and unexplainable world.  One is free in a desert, from which there is no retreat but inward, toward the hollow core of oneself.  There is nothing to build on but the small rock of one’s own pride, and this is a nothing, based on nothing…  I think, therefore I am.  But what am I?  An accident of disorder, going no place.
―   Morris L. West
From his novel:  “The Devil’s Advocate“
[For a number of reasons (particularly “the hollow core of oneself”), this quote just reminded me of our current President (#IncompetentDonald).  I’m not sure if that says more about me or more about him.  —  KMAB]
.
On This Day In:
2017	This One Is…
2016	Happy Is…
2015	Dare Yourself To
2014	Damned If You Do…
2013	On A Rainy Sunday
2012	Not Sure Anymore
2011	But What Does It Cost?
2009	Another Day, Another Diet…

Read Full Post »

A Gift

My brothers, if this is the last sound made by the last living man, it must be shouted loud and clear.  Life is a gift of God.
—    Kiril Lakota (Pope Kiril I)
The main character in the novel: “Shoes of the Fisherman“
Written by:  Morris L. West
.
On This Day In:
2017	Unless You Genuinely Are Small
2016	B1
2015	Five Things
2014	Have Faith
2013	Found In A Mine
2012	Two-Sided Coin
2011	Passionately Scorned Rules

Read Full Post »

A Moment Of Union

Even in sin, the act of love  – done with love –  is shadowed with divinity.  Its conformity may be at fault, but its nature is not altered, and its nature is creative, communicative, splendid in surrender.  It was in the splendor of my surrender to Nina and she to me, that I first understood how a man might surrender himself to God  – if a God existed.  The moment of love is a moment of union  – of body and spirit –  and the act of faith is mutual and implicit.
―    Morris L. West
From his novel: “The Devil’s Advocate“
.
On This Day In:
2016	Symptoms
2016	Tossers
2015	Hunger
2014	Outside Dependence
2013	Doing Right
2012	A Short Course In Human Relations
	If Death Be My Future
	Strive
	Such A Fool
2011	I’m Working For A Living

Read Full Post »

You Have Just Begun To Climb

Kiril Lakota:  [the shadow of the cross is on the Pope’s empty chair during this exchange of dialog]  Leone, how does a man ever know if his actions are for himself or for God?
Cardinal Leone:  You don’t know.  You have a duty to act.  But you have no right to expect approval, or even a successful outcome.
Kiril Lakota:  So, in the end, my friend, we are alone?
Cardinal Leone:  Yes.  I have seen three men sit in this room.  You are the last I shall see.  Each of them, in his turn, came to where you stand now, the moment of solitude.  I have to tell you there is no remedy for it.  You are here until the day you die.  And the longer you live, the lonelier you will become.  You will use this man and that for the work of the church.  But when the work is done, or the man has proved unequal to it, you will let him go and find another.  You want love.  You need it, as I do.  Even though I am old.  You may have it for a little while, but you will lose it again.  Like it or not, you are condemned to a solitary pilgrimage, from the day of your election until the day of your death.  This is a Calvary, Holiness.  And you have just begun to climb.
—    Morris West
The above conversation is from the movie adaptation of his novel: “In The Shoes Of The Fishermen“
.
On This Day In:
2017	Equal Protection Under Law
2016	A Stubbornly Persistent Illusion
2015	Or You Don’t
2014	If You Ever Fall…
2013	Glory Days (part 2)
2012	They Follow A Pattern – If You Know What I Mean
	What I Live For (Precis)
2011	Giving

Read Full Post »

Are You Waiting?

If you spend your whole life waiting for the storm, you’ll never enjoy the sunshine.
―  Morris L. West
.
On This Day In:
2015	The Future Myth
2014	Hands
2013	Because You Have Lived
2012	47%
2011	Conservative Values: Low And Lax
2010	A Non-Zero Sum Game
	What If “c” Isn’t A Constant?
2009	Pictures from UCLA trip…

Read Full Post »

Otherwise Obscured

I am convinced, moreover, that honest error is a step toward a greater illumination of the truth since it exposes to debate and to clearer definition those matters which might otherwise remain obscure and undefined in the teaching of the Church.
—  Morris L. West
From his novel:  “The Shoes Of The Fisherman“
.
On This Day In:
2014	Fundamentals
2013	Proof – ing
2012	Deluge, n.
2011	Hail, Caesar!
	Why Were You Sent?

Read Full Post »

Embrace The World Like A Lover

It cost so much to be a full human being that there are very few who have the enlightenment, or the courage, to pay the price….  One has to abandon altogether the search for security, and reach out to the risk of living with both arms.  One has to embrace the world like a lover, and yet demand no easy return of love.  One has to accept pain as a condition of existence.  One has to court doubt and darkness as the cost of knowing.  One needs a will stubborn in conflict, but apt always to the total acceptance of every consequence of living and dying.
—    Morris L. West
From his novel: “The Shoes of the Fisherman“
.
On This Day In:
2014	Democratic Beliefs (for the next President)
2013	And Go Now!
2012	A World Safe For Diversity
2011	What If I Don’t Want To?
2009	Restful Sunday and a Movie About Boys’ Dolls (Action Figures)

Read Full Post »

Still Learning

…I am still lonely often, as you are.  But to be lonely is not to be unloved, but only to learn the value of love  –  and that it takes many forms and is sometimes hard to recognize.
—  Morris L. West
From his book:  “The Shoes of the Fisherman“
.
On This Day In:
2014	Dark Processes
2013	To The Last Link
2012	Slept In Again
2011	Home Again, Naturally
2009	Thoughts after a long day of OT…

Read Full Post »