Father Benedict's Rosary Book



I just finished reading Father Benedict Groeschel's Chain of Hope, his new book on the rosary that is published by Ignatius Press. As always Father has a slightly different take that makes reading about the most common devotion interesting and unique. He shares his experience of praying the rosary while entering the subteranean world of the New York subway system that he describes as richly apocalyptic (something that struck me as prophetic in light of last Thursday's black out and how it affected those depending upon that mode of transportation). He shares the experience of Mother Teresa's praying the rosary in times of darkness--in a word he presents the prayer of the rosary as a "chain of hope."



Somewhat strangely, the Luminous Mysteries are included in an appendix, I understand from my sources that the publisher doesn't quite buy their addition to the traditional mysteries and wanted them treated as something "extra." The meditations and the focus on the mysteries of light as a source of renewal within the church is both insightful and right on. Also included in the appendix is the Apostolic Letter on the rosary written by the Holy Father.



This book is different then the one that Amy and I have put together, ours is more of a "prayer book", this is more of a book about the rosary and a "meditation" book. But I highly recommend it to both the long time rosary pray-er and the novice.

Most Popular Person in France?



A saintly priest!



Alan Moss: A brief essay on Abbé Pierre's personal memoir (Mémoire d'un croyant)

A Book for Your Back to School Student



I first include an Amazon.com review:



A fond introduction by the editor (a former student of the Archabbot's) leads you into pithy latin expressions which are then translated and followed by a light (very light but still insightful) meditation, and Reilly writes with a humble yet amusing style.



This is an extremely useful for those of us who practice lectio divina and who might be having some difficulty with it, as sometime happens with a discipline...a gentle way to get back to it. I highly recommend it.



The fond introduction is written by moi, who indeed was a former student, albeit a terrified one at the feet of this Latin master:

Private Revelations and the "Grid"



Here is a taste from Spirit Daily - Daily spiritual news from around the world:



"But this is serious business. After last week, with the great blackout, we have a glimpse of what can happen on a much wider, longer scale. At this point no one knows what triggered the outage, but they are pointing to relatively minor mishaps that may have pulled down the energy supply for parts of eight states and Canada. We were granted a glimpse of just how reliant we are on a system that can vanish in a flash. Many are now pointing to the source of the blackout as Ohio, where Storm himself lives and where, that the very same week, a statue of the Virgin Mary was reported to be mysteriously glowing.



As the eyes and heart of the statue allegedly lit -- even in the night -- the rest of the state and much of the North were in darkness."



Go to the link for the rest of the column.

Cleveland in the Dark or A Light Shines in the Darkness



As Amy has detailed, we on a whim, decided to spend a few vacation days in Cleveland, Ohio before Katie had to start school today. It turned out to be quite an adventure.



On the way there, just west of Toledo we saw a van towing a U-haul that looked like it had been blown up. It was on fire, raging with dark black smoke billowing into the sky. I mused at the time that it might have been some terrorist who had his bomb go off before reaching his target. I don't know what it actually was, since the Cleveland Plain Dealer carried almost no news in their Friday's edition due to the blackout.



We stopped for lunch at one of the Ohio Turnpike rest areas. Amazingly hardly any brochures, etc of what to do while you are in Ohio. Does Ohio not promote tourism? I also noticed that there are hardly any billboards on the turnpike. The gas prices and food are reasonable on the Turnpike which is laudable though.



We arrived at Berea, a suburb of Cleveland around in the early afternoon and everyone went for a quick swim. Then it was off to the "The Feast" in Little Italy for some Italian for dinner. But on the way the traffic lights went out and the Little Italy trip turned out to be a quick tour of what wasn't going on because of the power outage and after we picked up a schedule we sought out St. Andrews Benedictine monastery, that turned out to be not that far away from where we were. Traffic was a challenge. No one was obeying the standard rules for driving when the traffic lights were out, and instead of stopping and taking turns, it was more like once one car went forward they were followed by a bunch as though an imaginary green light had come on, and they stopped only when someone bravely started inching out in another direction and was followed by a similar bunch of cars. Amazingly though I didn't see any accidents, perhaps these Ohioans have this down to a science?



The power was out in the monastery but candles were lit and we chanted vespers with the monks with a piano accompanying us. It was a pleasant interlude from the chaos on the roads outside. It also called to mind the real principle of life that all the noise, hustle and bustle of life can crowd out. It was the first "light" in the darkness of that day.



After Vespers and a brief look at the reliquary that contained some very big bones pieces of St. Boniface and others, it was back on to the streets. By this time it was time for dinner and there of course was nothing open, until thankfully we found one convenience store where the clerk was adding items up on a scratch pad (without sales tax--I might add). We bought some crackers and such and were thankful for the clerk who was the second "light" of the day.



Next it was off to the a Byzantine Catholic Church. There were a few cars and Amy worried that I had gotten the wrong time down for the vigil Mass of Our Lady's Dormition. But it turned out that I hadn't but only a few people were in attendance. Even though the prayers were a little unfamiliar to me, I enjoyed the simplicity and constant focus on God, (except for one humorous incident that Amy relates where the female cantor stopped the priest and loudly instructed another congregant on what page we were on). Begging God to have mercy on you, thanking God for all that he has done, and even receiving a blessing as you receive communion gave me a great sense of what the Eucharist is all about...food for the journey, God's presence going with you. A third "light" shining in the darkness.



When we got to the Residence Inn, everyone was outside. Hotels clearly aren't built with power outages in mind. One window in our room, opened but had no screen, so there was little air flow in a room suddenly bereft of air conditioning. The staff was a great help though, cooking extra food (albeit burning it) and providing a keg of beer that the guests had already drained by the time we arrived back (we could have used a miracle at Cana here). Darkness fell, and an alarm went off in our room. This turned out to be a good thing. The Russian maintenance man (almost everyone who worked spoke at the hotel spoke with a Russian accent), fixed the alarm and then turned on the fireplace providing some much needed light to the room (that none of us had thought of in our bemoaning our not having bought a flashlight at the convenience store). The staff at the hotel, then was the fourth "light" that shone in the darkness.



That night, I stood at the open window observing city lights off in the distance, while our skyline remained dark. I stood there receiving a gentle breeze and marveling at the night sky often hidden by the glow of the artificial lights below. Every now and then there was an unusual flash of light (almost like an explosion) that would go off. I couldn't figure out what that was, but it might have been some low class fireworks--since I did see a few of those go off too. Later a nearly full moon lit the sky, the fifth "light", a light of hope reflecting the Sun that soon would rise--like all of the other lights that reflected the Son of God in the darkness that fell on Cleveland last Thursday.

Was it an Act of Terrorism?



From this week's NewsweekWhat Went Wrong:



" In fact, federal investigators ruled terrorism out within the first 45 minutes—perhaps prematurely. True, there was no detectable physical intrusion; nor had terrorist hackers left the usual cyber footprints. But despite the initial reassuring signals to the public, during an emergency conference call with senior officials at 5:30 p.m., the CIA “put on the radar” the possibility that there might have been some terrorist tampering. Informants and interrogations of terror suspects have led the CIA to believe that Al Qaeda is seeking to target power grids to produce just the widespread chaos witnessed Thursday afternoon, a senior administration official told NEWSWEEK. Last year the FBI concluded that terrorists are eagerly surveying weaknesses in power grids through Internet connections in Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and Pakistan. Even if they had no role in this episode, many worry that the Blackout of 2003 provided them with a perfect case study."

Again



Back from Cleveland, where on Thursday afternoon we were driving along a road when suddenly I noticed that the traffic lights had died. It was 3 o'clock, in another hour the lights would dim around Lake Erie.



At the time we didn't know that. Turning on the radio we found out that the power outage was spreading. It wasn't terrorism though, we were also told. Of course they also said they didn't know what was causing it. Which begs the question of how do you not know that it isn't something if you don't know what it is?



Today, in case you missed it an air traffic control center lost power. Just for thirty seconds, half a minute. But a lot can happen in thirty seconds. Makes you wonder if someone is trying out a new computer set they just got to see how much havoc they can raise.



Here's the L.I. Traffic Control Center story, from Yahoo! News - L.I. Air Traffic Control Suffers Delay:



"NEW YORK - A 30-second power failure at an air traffic control center disrupted flights at major New York-area airports for about 30 minutes Sunday afternoon, authorities said.



The cause of the failure was under investigation but was not believed to be related to Thursday's blackout, Federal Aviation Administration (news - web sites) spokeswoman Arlene Salac said.



At 3:08 p.m., computers at the New York Terminal Approach Control Center on Long Island lost power when the power conditioning system broke down, Salac said.

Air traffic controllers who monitor flights in and out of the region's three major airports temporarily lost radar contact but not voice communication with aircraft, she said. "