In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

I found Frederick Kinsman's Reveries of a Hermit enormously stimulating, and as I said the other day, its title is misleading. His main argument is that the varieties of Protestantism are all actually versions of agnosticism: The aim of these lectures is to compare and relate three points of view from which the Christian religion is regarded. The first looks on it as something based on unreliable legends, and therefore negligible, except as myth expressive of picturesque fantasies. The second professes to hold its essentials but is ever ready to relegate component parts into the category of non-essentials, is eclectic; and the successive stages of its history are chracterized by rejections rather than by retentions. The third regards it as the one great fact in human history, to be retained intact and given dominant place in human life. Common names for these points of view are, the Agnostic, the Protestant, and the Catholic. . . . One main purpose of the investigation ...

I've had to defer my next post on Frederick Kinsman at least until tomorrow, as I received a lot of material for a post on my old blog on developments at Our Lady of the Atonement San Antonio . It seems to me that phenomena like the racket Fr Christopher Phillips was able to run for almost three decades at Our Lady of the Atonement, in which he indulged himself and selected underbosses at the expense of people who were allowed to fancy they were getting authentic Catholicism, is an extension of Kinsman's take on Anglicanism -- especially for high-church types, there has always been a key element of fantasy. I'll have more to say about this, but it's definitely a factor in the failure of Anglicanorum coetibus .

A visitor to my old blog brought a fascinating figure in Anglican and Catholic history to my attention, Frederick Kinsman, and he's very kindly sent me copies of Kinsman's books as he's located them. According to Wikipedia , Frederick Joseph Kinsman (September 27, 1868, Warren, Ohio - June 18, 1944, Lewiston, Maine) was an American Roman Catholic church historian who had formerly been a bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church. From 1908 to 1919 he was Episcopal Bishop of Delaware. However, On May 14, 1919, Kinsman announced his intention to resign as Episcopal Bishop of Delaware the following October. He subsequently became a Roman Catholic. He was appointed professor of modern church history at The Catholic University of America. The photo above is apparently his formal portrait as Episcopal Bishop of Delaware. I haven't been able to find any other photos of him, though they must certainly exist. If anyone can locate any others, I'd greatly appreciate l...

To clear our palates after The Godfather Part 2 , we watched Mel Brooks's Spaceballs , a sendup of the Star Wars franchise, last night. Although there are no upper-class women with The Look in it, my wife warned me that it would lower my IQ by 20 points for some period of days. A scene I'd ignored in previous viewings was the wedding. This is probably because I hadn't watched the film since Anglicanorum coetibus , and I'd either taken the denomination of the archbishop for granted, or I hadn't given it much thought. But he's clearly an Anglican. The Spaceballs Wiki says he's in the First Intergalactic Temple (Reformed) of the Druids, but he's vested as a bishop, and since he's conducting a royal wedding, he must be an archbishop. But also, according to the Wiki, in the second attempt at holding the wedding, The [Archbishop] decides not to risk their wedding becoming interrupted by giving, "the short, short version," in wh...

Last night we watched The Godfather Part II on TV. i reflected on it overnight and looked it up on Wikipedia this morning. Wikipedia says it's one of the greatest films of all time. Yeah, and Joe Biden's Abraham Lincoln. The film wasn't even into the final credits when I realized it was an allegoery of the Patriarchy, with various jabs thrown at the Catholic Church. Wikipedia's plot summary misses the point. The story arc involves the careers -- or more specifically, the inescapable, Patriarchical character flaws of Vito Corleone, the original Godfather of Part I, and his son Michael. Vito must leave Sicily as a boy of 14 when the local Mafia boss, Don Ciccio, kills his father and sets about to exterminate all the sons of the family from the justified fear that if they survive, they'll avenge their father and kill Don Ciccio. Vito, basically a good guy, rises in the New York Mafia and is gradually corrupted. By the 1920s, he's prosperous enough to return ...

When I was taking anthropology as an undergraduate, I learned that there was, at least at the time, a great deal of controversy over whether there was such a thing as a Neanderthal man. One point that was made was that the bone structure of such individuals was hard to distinguish from human bones of people with hyperthyroid conditions. More recently, I read, or hear on TV or something, that we all have Neanderthal DNA, except we all also have pumpkin DNA, so I'm not sure what any of this proves. White House Press Secretary Psaki did little to clarify this yesterday in defendng President Biden's remarks about two governors: MS. PSAKI: The behavior of a Neanderthal, just to be very clear. The behavior of. But wait a moment. All we know about Neanderthals has to do with some bones and stone tools and such. What on earth do we know about Neanderthal behavior? But then I thought about another N word. What if Biden called someone the other N word? Would...

One puzzling phenomenon in recent weeks has been that Gov Newsom, facing a likely recall election this fall, with vaccinations underway, and with pandemic statistics plummeting, has made little change in his, or the state's, COVID messaging. In fact, in a clear rebuke to Texas, Florida, Mississippi, and other states, he's now recommending that Californians wear two masks, not one. “We are encouraging people basically to double down on mask wearing, particularly in light of all of what I would argue is bad information coming from at least four states in this country,” Newsom said. “We will not be walking down their path. We’re mindful of your health and our future.” Newsom’s remarks come after Mississippi and Texas governors ended their mask mandates. But Newsom recently faced criticism after making a Tik Tok video from inside a Fresno restaurant , where indoor dining is not allowed. What's puzzling is that it might be appropriate to recommend two masks at ti...