Category Archives: Fun!

I have been accepted for admission to Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology, where I intend, if I am deemed worthy, to enter the seminary program.

Following the lead of Nick Norelli, I present what my iPod kicked up at me for the first fifteen songs in shuffle mode. Not too embarassing, as it turns out, and a representative cross-section of what’s stored on the thing….

1.) Gustav Holst: Double Concerto for Two Violins III. Variations on a Ground

2.) Get Back (Rehearsal) — The Beatles: Thirty Days

3.) The Christmas Song — Vince Guaraldi Trio: A Charlie Brown Christmas

4.) Prima Virtus Viri Sancti — Ensemble Organum: Chant Cistercien

5.) Once in a Lifetime — Talking Heads: Sand in the Vaseline 1

6.) Responsorium In die resurrectionis: Versus congregabo gentes — Ensemble Organum: Vêpres du jour de Pâques

7.) I’ll Get You — The Beatles: Past Masters 1

8.) George Frideric Handel, Chandos Anthem No. 11 – Sonata — performed by Harry Christophers: The Sixteen Choir & Orchestra

9.) Maquam “Sultani Iraq” – Samir Tahar: Dreams

10.) Psallit in Aure Dei — Lisa Gerrad and Patrick Cassidy: Immortal Memory

11.) Graduel: Recordatus est Domine — Ensemble Organum: Plain-Chant Parisien

12.) Filigree & Shadow — This Mortal Coil: Filigree and Shadow

13.) Till the Next Goodbye — The Rolling Stones: It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll

14.) Where the Streets Have No Name — U2: The Joshua Tree

15.) Manuel Cardoso: Kyrie from Requiem Mass, performed by Schola Cantorum of Oxford — Magnum Mysterium I

Here are some pictures I took just a few minutes ago from my desk at home. We had a surprisingly stunning sunset today. The city lights in the distance are those of San Francisco. Enjoy!

My correspondent the generous liturgist Byron Stuhlman writes to share his own list of particularly influential fifteen authors. These lists are so interesting! Enjoy Byron’s selection:

1. The Bible, the basic witness to God.
2. The Book of Common Prayer, especially 1549 and 1979.
3. Louis Bouyer, Liturgical Piety, which introduced me to the paschal mystery as the basis of baptism, the eucharist, and the Christian Year when I was in college.
4. Gregory of Nyssa, who put me in touch with Eastern traditions in my college years (in Danielou’s selections) and later provided an alternative to Augustine’s version of the Christian story with his catechetical homily.
5. Alexander Schmemann, whose For the Life of the World and Introduction to Liturgical Theology made me familiar with Byzantine Liturgy.
6. Juan Mateos, whose articles and books first made sense of the daily office for me and introduced me to East Syrian worship.
7. Robert Taft, whose work on the liturgy of St. John Chrysostom made sense of the Byzantine eucharist for me.
8. Miguel Arranz, whose articles laid out the development of the Byzantine rites of initiation for me.
9. Abraham Heschel, for his masterpiece on the Sabbath.
10. Raymond Brown, for his work on John’s gospel and the trajectory of the New Testament.
11. John Macquarrie, for his masterful overview of Christian theology in his many books.
12. Jeremy Taylor, for his marvelous assimilation of Eastern theology and liturgy in the Anglican tradition (and for his courage to argue against Augustine.
13. Gregory Dix, whose Shape of the Liturgy first made sense of the eucharist for me.
14. Gordon Lathrop, for His Holy Things, a masterful liturgical theology.
15. Gregory Nazianzus, for his theological orations and his festal homilies.

Macrina Walker has tagged me in a meme called “Fifteen Authors.” One lists fifteen authors within fifteen minutes, authors who’ll “always stick with you.” Here is my list, in roughly the chronological order of my encountering them:

1.) God the Holy Spirit “who spoke through the Prophets” as author of the Bible, the single most important book in my life and on my shelves and in my heart.

2.) Rabbis of the past: I was trained in classical Hebrew, and gained a deep appreciation for their methods of interpretation, which methods were reflected in Jesus’s sayings in the Gospels, and here and there in later Christian tradition. I thus came to understand my own tradition better only through the help of Rabbinic Judaism’s legacy.

3.) Soeur Marie Keyrouz — a musician, of course, but her “Ya Sakbin” on her CD Cantiques de l’Orient had two important effects on me: 1.) I was amazed to hear the faith in her voice, and, through the gentle nudging of the Holy Spirit, considered that if someone could have such faith, so could I; 2.) led me to think of the East as a possible home, away from what was for me a desert in the West.

4.) St Basil the Great: Particularly his”On the Holy Spirit” is responsible for my looking to the Greek Fathers, and Eastern Orthodoxy as my soul’s home.

5.) Metropolitan Kallistos: in the middle of reading The Orthodox Church, I called to speak to a priest about converting.

6.) Metropolitan John Zizioulas: an Archimandrite friend, one of the first Orthodox priests I got to know in my area, shared with me an article by Zizioulas that he’d translated.

7.) St John of the Ladder: The Ladder of Divine Ascent was my introduction to Orthodox monastic literature.

8.) St Nikodemos the Hagiorite: although The Philokalia was my introduction to, among others, St Maximus the Confessor, I recall an instruction from the Archimandrite I mentioned above: “Well, stop reading about prayer and pray!” That’s something we all need to keep in mind and in heart and in practice!

9.) St Dionysius the Areopagite: Easier to feel than to describe, and that’s the point, isn’t it?

10.) St Ephrem the Syrian: my training in Hebrew led me to a great love of St Ephrem’s form of expression, which is so resonant of the Hebrew psalms.

11.) Fr John Romanides: provided helpful training on understanding the history of the Church, a subject much of which I had to unlearn.

12.) Fr Andrew Louth: someone recommended Discerning the Mystery, and it is an astounding book. I now keep an extra copy of it to give away as the need arises.

13.) Fr Georges Florovsky: the clear-sighted Father of modern times, whose instruction is like refined gold. What skill as a teacher in such difficult times!

14.) St Isaac the Syrian: such a treasury of Orthodoxy and purity of vision toward application in our lives (monastic and not) that I wish I’d run across him much earlier.

15.) Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos: he describes living Orthodoxy in the modern world, right this minute.

I will decline to tag others, as even the appearance of such a chain letter mentality rubs me the wrong way. But that was fun!

This is a not very good picture of the view from my desk at home. I was leaning back in my chair, so there was a little shaking going on. Still, it’s the best of the lot.

The city lights out there are San Francisco, the dark swatch through the middle are the waters of the Bay. The nearer lights are those of Berkeley leading down to the water.

I was trying to catch the magnificent sunset. You can see something of the colors involved, and the brilliant planet Venus.

That’s where I get much of my work done. Being able to stare out at a view like that is remarkably conducive to actually getting things done, though that might seem counterintuitive. I’m grateful and thankful for such blessings as simple things like quiet, a view, a working computer, and such.

Tonight I was the recipient of two thoughtful and very much appreciated gifts:

The Penguin Classics edition of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales in the original Middle English. This will pair excellently with the unabridged translation by Burton Raffel that I picked up last year. [The latter book is now apparently out of print, though still available new from booksellers. Search by the ISBN to find a copy: 9780679643555. It’s a beautiful hardcover edition.]

And…

The Baronius Press edition of the Catena Aurea by St Thomas Aquinas. This is a beautiful (and hefty!) four volume set of hardcovers, leather bound. Each volume has two registers (ribbon markers) and gilt pages. (The set is much more handsome than in the publisher’s picture.) If you’re not familiar with the Catena Aurea, it is a collection of excerpts from numerous patristic writers commenting on passages in the four Gospels. The excerpts are in order of the Gospel text, so no matter what liturgical tradition you belong to, you can find a short commentary on your lectionary’s reading of the day, or, simply read through for the fun of it. The Catena Aurea was compiled by St Thomas Aquinas, and is a true wonder.

Both of these were on my list of books to buy. I am very happy to have both!

Thank you very much, my generous friend!

Howdy!

It is 80˚F at this very moment, at 10:07 pm, and I am loving it.