Animation Movie Meme

From here; I've linked to references I've made to some. (Why are they out of order anyway? ;-))

X what you’ve seen
O what you saw some but not all of
Bold what you particularly liked
Strike-through what you hated

CLASSIC DISNEY
——————————-
[ X ] 101 Dalmatians (1961)
[ X ] Alice in Wonderland (1951)
[ X ] Bambi (1942)
[ X ] Cinderella (1950)
[ X ] Dumbo (1941)
[ X ] Fantasia (1940)
[ X ] Lady and the Tramp (1955)
[ X ] Mary Poppins (1964)
[ X ] Peter Pan (1953)
[ X ] Pinocchio (1940)
[ X ] Sleeping Beauty (1959)
[ X ] Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
[ O ] Song of the South (1946)

DISNEY’S DARK AGE
——————————-
[X] The Aristocats (1970)
[ ] The Black Cauldron (1985)
[ ] The Fox and the Hound (1981)
[ ] The Great Mouse Detective (1986)
[ ] The Jungle Book (1967)
[ ] The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977)
[ ] Oliver and Company (1986)
[ ] Pete’s Dragon (1977)
[X] The Rescuers (1977)
[O] Robin Hood (1973)
[?] The Sword In The Stone (1963)

THE DISNEY RENAISSANCE
——————————-
[X] Aladdin (1992)
[X] Beauty and the Beast (1991)
[ ] A Goofy Movie (1995)
[ ] Hercules (1997)
[X] The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
[X] The Lion King (1994)
[X] The Little Mermaid (1989)
[X] Mulan (1998)
[ ] Pocahontas (1995)
[ ] The Rescuers Down Under (1990)
[X] Tarzan (1999)

DISNEY’S NEW DARK MODERN AGE
——————————-
[X] Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)
[X] Bolt (2008)
[ ] Brother Bear (2003)
[ ] Chicken Little (2005)
[ ] Dinosaur (2000)
[ ] The Emperor’s New Groove (2000)
[X] Fantasia 2000 (2000)
[ ] Home on the Range (2004)
[ ] Lilo & Stitch (2002)
[ ] Meet the Robinsons (2007)
[O] Treasure Planet (2002)

PIXAR
——————————-
[X] A Bug’s Life (1998)
[X] Cars (2006)
[X] Finding Nemo (2003)
[X] The Incredibles (2004)
[X] Monsters Inc. (2001)
[X] Ratatouille (2007)
[X] Toy Story (1995)
[X] Toy Story 2 (1999)
[X] Wall-E (2008)
[X] Up (2009)

DON BLUTH
——————————-
[ ] All Dogs Go to Heaven (1989)
[X] An American Tail (1986)
[X] An American Tail: Fievel Goes West (1991)
[X] Anastasia (1997)
[ ] The Land Before Time (1988)
[ ] The Pebble and the Penguin (1995)
[ ] Rock-a-Doodle (1991)
[X] The Secret of NIMH (1982)
[ ] Thumbelina (1994)
[X] Titan AE (2000)
[ ] A Troll in Central Park (1994)

CLAYMATION
——————————-
[ ] The Adventures of Mark Twain (1986)
[X] Chicken Run (2000)
[X] Coraline (2009)
[ ] Corpse Bride (2005)
[ ] James and the Giant Peach (1996)
[X] The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)
[ ] The Puppetoon Movie (1987)
[X] Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)

CGI GLUT
——————————-
[X] Antz (1998)
[ ] Happy Feet (2006)
[X] Kung Fu Panda (2008)
[X] Madagascar (2005)
[ ] Monster House (2006)
[X] Over the Hedge (2006)
[O] The Polar Express (2004)
[X] Shrek (2001)
[X] Shrek 2 (2004)
[O] Shrek The Third (2007)
[X] Monsters vs. Aliens (2009)
[X] How to Train Your Dragon (2010)

IMPORTS
——————————-
[ ] Arabian Knight
[ ] Back to Gaya
[ ] The Last Unicorn (1982)
[X] Light Years (1988)
[X] The Triplets of Belleville (2003)
[X] Persepolis (2007)
[ ] Planet 51 (2009)
[ ] Waltz With Bashir (2008)
[O] Watership Down (1978)
[ ] When the Wind Blows (1988)
[X] Yellow Submarine (1968)

STUDIO GHIBLI/MIYAZAKI
——————————-
[ ] The Cat Returns (2002)
[ ] Grave of the Fireflies (1988)
[X] Howl’s Moving Castle (2004)
[ ] Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989)
[ ] Laputa: Castle in the Sky (1986)
[ ] Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro (1979)
[ ] My Neighbors The Yamadas (1999)
[ ] My Neighbor Totoro (1993)
[X] Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984)
[ ] Only Yesterday (1991)
[ ] Pom Poko (Tanuki War) (1994)
[ ] Porco Rosso (1992)
[X] Princess Mononoke (1999)
[X] Spirited Away (2002)
[ ] Whisper of the Heart (1995)
[ ] Ponyo on a Cliff by the Sea (2009)
[ ] Panda! Go Panda!
[ ] Tales from Earthsea
[ ] Horus, Prince of the Sun

SATOSHI KON
——————————-
[ ] Millennium Actress (2001)
[ ] Paprika (2006)
[ ] Perfect Blue (1999)
[ ] Tokyo Godfathers (2003)

SHINKAI MAKOTO
——————————-
[ ] She and Her Cat (1999)
[X] Voices of a Distant Star (2001)
[ ] The Place Promised in Our Early Days (2004)
[ ] 5 Centimeters per Second (2007)

OTHER ANIME FILMS
——————————-
[X] Akira (1989)
[ ] Appleseed (2004)
[ ] Appleseed: Ex Machina (2007) -
[X] Arcadia of My Youth (U.S. Title – Vengeance of the Space Pirate) (1982)
[X] Cowboy Bebop: The Movie (2003)
[X] The Dagger of Kamui (U.S. Title – Revenge of the Ninja Warrior) (1985)
[ ] Dirty Pair: Project Eden (1987)
[ ] End of Evangelion (1997)
[ ] Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz (1998)
[X] Fist of the North Star (1986)
[ ] Galaxy Express 999 (1979)
[X] Ghost in the Shell (1996)
[ ] The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2006)
[X] Lensman (1984)
[X] Macross: Do You Remember Love (U.S. Title – Clash of the Bionoids) (1984)
[ ] Metropolis (2001)
[ ] Neo-Tokyo (1986)
[X] Ninja Scroll (1993)
[ ] Origin: Spirits Of The Past
[X] Patlabor the Movie (1989)
[ ] The Professional: Golgo 13 (1983)
[ ] Project A-ko (1986)
[ ] Robot Carnival (1987)
[X] Robotech: The Shadow Chronicle (2006)
[ ] Silent Möbius (1991)
[ ] Space Adventure Cobra (1982)
[ ] Steamboy (2004)
[ ] Sword of the Stranger (2007)
[ ] Unico and the Island of Magic (1983)
[ ] Urotsukidoji: The Movie (1987) I have no intention of watching this.
[X] Vampire Hunter D (1985)
[ ] Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust (2000)
[X] Wings of Honneamise: Royal Space Force (1987)

CARTOONS FOR GROWN-UPS
——————————-
[ ] American Pop (1981)
[ ] The Animatrix (2003)
[ ] Beavis & Butthead Do America (1996)
[ ] Cool World (1992)
[ ] Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001)
[ ] Final Fantasy: Advent Children (2005)
[ ] Fire & Ice (1983)
[ ] Fritz the Cat (1972)
[ ] Heavy Metal (1981)
[ ] Heavy Metal 2000 (2000)
[ ] Hey Good Lookin’ (1982)
[ ] Lady Death (2004)
[ ] A Scanner Darkly (2006)
[ ] South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999)
[ ] Street Fight (Coonskin) (1975)
[ ] Waking Life (2001)

OTHER ANIMATED MOVIES
——————————-
[X] Animal Farm (1954)
[ ] Animalympics (1980)
[ ] Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon The Movie (2007)
[ ] Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker
[ ] The Brave Little Toaster (1988)
[ ] Bravestarr: The Movie (1988)
[ ] Cats Don’t Dance (1997)
[ ] Care Bears: The Movie (1985)
[X] Charlotte’s Web (1973)
[ ] Fern Gully (1992)
[ ] G.I. Joe: The Movie (1987)
[ ] Gobots: Battle of the Rock Lords (1986)
[ ] He-Man & She-Ra: The Secret of the Sword (1985)
[X] The Hobbit (1977)
[X] The Iron Giant (1999)
[ ] Justice League: The New Frontier (2008)
[X] Lord of the Rings (1978)
[X] Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland (1992)
[ ] My Little Pony: The Movie (1986)
[X] Pink Floyd’s The Wall (1982)
[X] The Prince of Egypt (1998)
[ ] Powerpuff Girls: The Movie (2002)
[ ] Quest For Camelot (1999)
[ ] Ringing Bell (1978)
[ ] The Road to El Dorado (2000)
[ ] Rock & Rule (1983)
[X] Space Jam (1996)
[ ] Starchaser: The Legend of Orin (1985)
[ ] Superman: Doomsday (2007)
[ ] The Swan Princess (1994)
[X] Transformers: The Movie (1986)
[X] Wizards (1977)
[X] Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
[ ] Wonder Woman (2009)
[ ] Balto (1995)
[ ] Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002)

ADDENDUM
[X] 9 (2009)
[ ] The Ant Bully (2006)
[ ] Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
[O] Bee Movie (2007)
[O] Beowulf (2007)
[ ] The Chipmunk Adventure (1987)
[X] Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (2009)
[ ] Felix the Cat: The Movie (1988)
[X] Flushed Away (2006)
[ ] Happily N’Ever After (2007)
[ ] Hoodwinked (2005)
[ ] Horton Hears a Who (2008)
[X] Ice Age (2002)
[ ] Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006)
[X] Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009)
[ ] Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius (2001)
[X] Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa (2008)
[ ] Open Season (2006)
[ ] Pokemon: The First Movie (1999)
[ ] The Princess and the Frog (2009)
[X] Robots
[ ] The Rugrats Movie (1998)
[ ] Shark Tale (2004)
[ ] Shrek Forever After (2010)
[ ] The Simpsons Movie (2007)
[ ] Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas (2003)
[ ] Space Chimps (2008)
[ ] The Spongebob Squarepants Movie (2004)
[ ] The Tale of Despereaux (2008)
[O] Valiant (2005)
[ ] We’re Back! A Dinosaur’s Story (1993)

ADDENDUM II
[ ] Mind Game
[ ] The Secret of Kells
[ ] Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke (U.S. title “Magic Boy”)
[ ] Princess Arete
[ ] Urusai Yatsura: Beautiful Dreamer
[ ] Cat Soup
[ ] Summer Wars

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The Bible in 66 verses

Sarah Wilson at Lutheran Forum had an idea whose greatness cannot be summarized in a few words: pick one verse from each book of the Bible as its representative. (h/t)

I don't agree with all the representatives, but that's to be expected, I think: any such list is inherently subjective. As at least one commenter points out, we Catholics will naturally pick the correct verse will sometimes choose a verse with a different emphasis. In fact, different Lutherans, different Catholics, different Episcopalians, etc. will likely choose different verses, although most would have to turn to those books for the first time in their lives. Who knows, if you tried enough people you'd likely get nearly the entire Bible before long.

I think I'll take a stab at it over the next few weeks, but in a slightly different way.

1. Due to time constraints, I'll do it piecemeal: choices from each of a few books here one day, choices from each of a few other books on other days.
2. In many cases, I might cheat, and break her rule about only one verse. But I'll try not to do so.
3. Since I pray the Psalms on occasion (not as often as I'd like) I am very uncomfortable with picking only one verse from the entire collection of Psalms. There are certain natural groups in the Psalms, and I'll try to limit myself to one verse from each group.

As a follow up, I'd suggest picking one sentence (or short passage) from each of the Doctors of the Church that adequately represents his or her insight. Alas, I haven't read all the Doctors of the Church, and probably never will, although that was once a goal of mine. So such a list would have to be partial, of necessity.

Update: Due to a CSS error, a joke I put in might have seemed like a serious remark, and offensive to non-Catholics. That should be corrected now—sorry; I really didn't mean any offense.

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Tournament of Novels at First Thoughts

If, like me, you think the annual college basketball championship is less interesting than a good novel, then you might want to take a gander at First Thoughts' Tournament of Novels. There's only one word for it: AllKindsOfAwesome.

First Thoughts, by the way, is the weblog of First Things, a journal founded by the late Fr. John Neuhaus, and now maintained by Christians of a more traditional persuasion. This tournament was set up by Joe Carter, an evangelical writer for FT. So people given to certain cultural fashions of the moment may be surprised to find that Left Behind and Father Elijah are not on the list. No, they have genuine, classic novels—and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is on the list—but it faces off against Dune in its first round, which probably isn't fair at all. Paul Muad'Dib FTW!

(Honestly though, the choice in sci-fi should have been between Dune and A Canticle for Leibowitz. Maybe next time.)

Speaking of the uncultured ignorance of traditional Christians, some readers are complaining that Daniel Deronda was chosen for George Eliot instead of Middlemarch. I haven't read either myself, but I have read Silas Marner, which hopefully mitigates my sin.

I hope The Brothers Karamazov wins. In the first round it's paired up against Anna Karenina. Sorry, Clemens, but this time I hope Tolstoy loses, and badly. ;-)

Update: Okay, I was wrong: the voters are clearly misinformed clods. How do I know? Dune lost to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Look, I've read both of them, multiple times, and I love the Hitchhiker's Guide series, but the dinner scene in Dune is by itself higher quality writing than anything Douglas Adams put together in his entire life.

On the other hand, the Hitchhiker's Guide series was dismissive of religion, whereas Dune is the story of a galactic messiah.

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Creation and Generation

This entry at Brandon's weblog Siris has a lot to think about. I went to write a reply just now, but I fortunately read the comments first, so I had to pause to think more. Now I've gone & made a fool of myself for sure with my comment.

Don't wade into philosophical waters when there are philosophers about. ;-)

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First things discusses best films of the decade

See here.

I was somehow the first to comment (thank you, Google Reader) and my contribution is heavy on foreign and foreign-themed films. So much for my nationalist sentiments. ;-) In fact, I took my list from last year's list, so if I were to think hard about it I would add more films.

I may try something similar here in a few weeks.

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Nationalism

I would like very much to emphasize one of the tags below: this is a

Largely uninformed rant.

With that out of the way, I want to think aloud about this post by Ilya Somin at the Volokh Conspiracy.

After reading Somin's post, I have to say that I agree with all of it except two things.

(1) The assertion,

[N]ationalism is second only to communism as the greatest evil of modern politics.

In my opinion, tribalism is the greatest evil of modern politics, greater even than nationalism. I think it explains a lot of the problems we have: hyperpartisanship (if that's a word), interest groups that hate each other so much that they work even against their own interests, so as to destroy the other, etc. Of course, that's only an opinion.

(2) The definition of nationalism,

loyalty to one’s own nation-state based on ties of language, culture, or ethnicity.

This requires a much longer explanation.

I have never thought much about what nationalism is, except that in general I have thought that nationalist movements in lands where nations did not have states of their own were generally Good Things (Poland, East Timor, Greece, Armenia, etc.) even if tainted with bad aspects (are there any human phenomena untainted by bad aspects?), whereas nationalist movements in nation-states tend to be bad things. So I'll think aloud about it for a moment, and invite people to tell me what a moron I'm being. Or, if you prefer, what an insightful genius I'm being. But that never happens. :-)

Contrast Somin's definition of nationalism with the definition of patriotism,

loyalty to one’s government and/or its ideals regardless of ethnic or racial identity.

This is helpful because my definition of nationalism would remove one word from the one given:

loyalty to one’s own nation-state based on ties of language, culture, or ethnicity.

That is to say, one can be nationalist without being very loyal at all to one's nation-state. Indeed, I think Somin's distinction in the definitions is a distinction without a difference; for me any nation-state is more or less identifiable with the government. This may be wrong, but it explains why, to me, one can be quite disloyal to the nation-state precisely because one is loyal to one's nation. Nationalism can favor the nation-state, for example, when none exists; on the other hand it can oppose the nation-state, for example, when it feels that the "state" part of the nation has turned against the nation or been co-opted by another nation. I have in mind things like Operation Valkyrie in Germany. As one leader of the latter put it,

It is almost certain that we will fail. But how will future history judge the German people, if not even a handful of men had the courage to put an end to that criminal?

To me, this is a far closer expression of nationalism than those who worked to maintain Hitler in the name of the nation-state, or to subjugate other nations in service of one's own.

Somin was replying to a weblog entry of Jonah Goldberg at National Review's Corner. To be honest, I didn't entirely understande Goldberg's argument that Thanksgiving is a nationalist holiday as opposed to a patriotic holiday—I kind of get it, but I kind of don't—but it does look to me as if Goldberg is working from the definition I give here of nationalism, rather than Somin's. He writes,

The Fourth of July, President’s Day, and even Veterans’ and Memorial Day are celebrations of the nation-state created by the American founding. In short, our other holidays are about patriotism, not nationalism. …[O]ne reason for [this country's] greatness, too often forgotten, is that it is ours. [emphasis added]

Goldberg explicitly identifies patriotism with the nation-state, and implies that nationalism refers to the people and culture who make up that nation-state, regardless of whether they actually had a state.

To follow through, I don't think a nation can be healthy without a healthy nationalism, as opposed to the unhealthy nationalisms described by Somin. By contrast, there is a very unhealthy anti-nationalism that poisons a nation's institutions, so that its history, culture, and genuine achievements of a nation are forgotten, ignored, or discounted so much that the institutions inculcate disdain of the nation and its traditions rather than love for it. And I think both of these can, and probably must, exist at the same time, but that healthy nationalism must be nurtured in order to stave off unhealthy nationalism.

This though comes from my observations and interactions of the inhabitants of several nations: Italy, Russia, and the United States:

1. Fascism so poisoned the Italian notion of nationalism that (in my experience) Italians usually display flags only when the national soccer team wins a game. In Italy, the flag is a national symbol more than a patriotic symbol: the combination of green-white-red has existed in some form as an Italian flag since the Risorgimento, and the tricolor was the de facto symbol of the Italian nation since shortly after Napoleon. Admittedly, Italians never had a very strong sense of an Italian nation, with reason (Cavour's famous remark comes to mind), but I think this would only strengthen my argument.
   
   Italians do value many aspects of their culture (religion, cuisine, fashion), so by my reckoning Italians maintain a half-hearted nationalism. But even "Italian" cuisine varies greatly by region, and my experience with Italians is that they value their nation too lightly, especially when thinking of how they can solve their problems. Italians tend to have a can't-do attitude, that their problems will always plague them and their nation will not be great.
2. Russians, on the other hand, take the assertions of anti-Russian bigots far too seriously, even while rejecting them far too thoroughly. Serious achievements in the sciences and the exploration of space are so thoroughly forgotten that Russian films portray older Russians asking younger ones, Do you know the name Gagarin? Of course not, why would you? That is a serious lack of nationalism that leads to the unhealthy militarism and bigotry that people wrongly confuse with nationalism.
   
   Thus Russia allows me to try and distinguish what Somin has, I think, confused: nationalism and militarism are not the same thing. Nationalism in general relates to a nation, which can be independent of a state. The Polish nation, for example, existed even when the Polish state had been dismembered in the Partitions of Poland. The militaristic bigotry that manifests itself in many ways, such as the nostalgia for Stalin, is not nationalism if for no other reasons than (a) Stalin was not Russian, and (b) a major animus of the Soviet Union (indeed, of Communist ideology) was to subsume and eliminate nationalistic divisions. I would characterize this as nostalgia for the old patriotism, not as nationalism.
3. In the United States, it is far too common to hear and read remarks along the lines of,

   There is no greater cause of evil in the world than the United States.

   Never mind the blatant untruth of the statement, the attitude expressed by these words completely and utterly discounts, even disdains, the genuine good accomplished by the United States in the world—not so much in military matters (that's an argument I simply do not wish to take up) but in science, culture, the promotion of freedom merely by example, and so forth.

I'm having a hard time expressing my thoughts in those examples, but I hope I'm getting the idea across. Anyway, at this point I'd be very interested in readers' opinions: are my definitions correct, or are Somin's closer to the matter?

Update: Goldberg replies to Somin here. He touches on some of my points, even mentioning tribalism, but seems to contradict my understanding of his notion of nationalism. This is why definitions are, in any discussion, essential.

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European Union manages to offend Italy (again)

The European Union's Court of Human Rights recently ruled that the Italian government must pay damages to a family whose daughter had to endure the sight of a crucifix in every classroom. The National Catholic Registrar's daily blog offers disdainful commentary here; the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera editorializes here. Silvio Berlusconi, Prime Minister of Italy, has said that crucifixes will not be removed from the classrooms, adding with some interesting insight:

Non è rispettosa della realtà: l’Europa tutta e in particolare l’Italia non può non dirsi cristiana. …Se c’è una cosa su cui anche un ateo può convenire è che questa è la nostra storia. Ci sono 8 paesi d’Europa che hanno la croce nella loro bandiera… Cosa dovrebbero fare cambiare la loro bandiera?

([The decision] does not respect reality: no part of Europe, let alone Italy, can declare itself non-Christian. …Even an atheist can agree that this is our history. There are eight European nations that have the cross in their flag… What should they do, change their flags?

I think Berlusconi is undercounting here: European countries with the cross in their flag include Denmark, Finland, Greece, Norway, Portugal (implied in design), Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. Maybe he's excluding countries that are not (yet) part of the European Union, but at this point we're picking nits. His overall point is appropriate.

To get an idea of the strong reaction throughout Italy, consider these observations that open the Italian editorial:

Il giovane Sami Albertin — la cui madre ha chiesto la rimozione del crocifisso dalle scuole statali approvata dalla Corte europea dei diritti dell’uomo, ricevendo per questo su forum e blog volgari insulti da chi, per il solo fatto di proferirli, non ha diritto di dirsi cristiano — dev’essere molto sensibile e delicato come una mimosa, se, com’egli dice, «si sentiva osservato» dagli occhi dei crocifissi appesi nella sua classe.

The mother of Sami Albertin requested the removal of the crucifix from state schools. The European Court of Human Rights has agreed. For this, they have received vulgar insults on forums and weblogs. Now, the mere fact of proffering such insults strips one of the right to call oneself Christian; nevertheless, this must be a very sensitive child, as delicate as a mimosa, if, as he says, he felt himself "watched" by the eyes on the crucifixes hung on his classroom wall.

This is not, let me point out, an opinion that happens to disagree with the long-term goal of a secular Europe; to the contrary, the author argues,

La difesa della laicità esige ben altre e più urgenti misure: ad esempio — uno fra i tanti — il rifiuto di finanziare le scuole private, cattoliche o no, e di parificarle a quella pubblica, come esortava il cattolicissimo e laicissimo Arturo Carlo Jemolo.

The defense of the secular state requires other, more urgent measures: as one example among many, the refusal to finance private schools, Catholic or otherwise, and to bring them up to par with public schools, as exhorted by the very Catholic and very secular Arturo Carlo Jemolo.

Nevertheless, he disagrees with the notion that the crucifix must be removed.

I myself believe strongly in the symbol of the Crucifix, and I pay money so that my son will attend a school where crucifixes are free to hang from the walls. I don't see it as the symbol of any institution, but as a dual acknowledgment of God's universal and infinite love for fallen creation, and of the wretched depths of that fall, that we would crucify our own God. Yet hanging it in the state schools symbolically runs the risk of making God an instrument of the (fallen) state, rather than the other way around. And I think the arguments made prove my point; since they are along the lines of, "This is our culture and our past and we will keep it."

A better argument, I say, is the following: "We want to direct our youths' minds to the necessity of self-giving, a human value that even state schools should foster. Even if you do not believe in the story behind the Crucifix, there is no symbol of self-giving, universal love that is more effective or pedagogical than this one. Indeed, it transcends our culture."

Update: Grahnlaw corrects a bit of confusion on my part (the EU and the Council of Europe are not the same) and on his website offers some thoughtful analysis. In particular,

The Catholic Church would hardly have reacted as clearly, if the crucifix was only a state symbol (in Italy). …Generally, I prefer the state and the public sector more broadly to be secular and non-discriminatory, but I think that tolerance is sometimes more valuable than a stubborn application of principle. [and in the comments, he adds:] Protection for a 'right' not to be offended cannot go very far (cf. blasphemy).

I'm also reminded some time ago of the EU Parliament's debate (I'm pretty sure it was EU here) on eradicating Nazi symbols from public places. This went on fine until some Eastern Europeans proposed banning Communist symbols from public places. Since Communists Parties so-named are still abundant in Western Europe, this created difficulties. I don't remember how it turned out.

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Chaput's irony

The pronouncements of certain members of the Vatican hierarchy are starting to rub Archbishop Charles Chaput the wrong way, primarily due to what he perceives as their ignorance of American Catholic culture. By way of reply, he addressed them through an op-ed in a Roman newspaper, writes:

Habitual doubt adapts itself too easily into a sort of "baptismal skepticism": a Christianity limited to a vague tribal loyalty and a spiritual vocabulary of convenience. In recent American experience, pluralism and doubt have all too often become an excuse for inertia as well as moral and political lethargy among Catholics.

[La consuetudine del dubbio si adatta fin troppo facilmente a una sorta di “scetticismo battezzato”: un cristianesimo limitato a una vaga lealtà tribale e a un conveniente vocabolario spirituale. Troppo spesso, nelle più recenti vicende americane, il pluralismo e il dubbio sono diventati un alibi per l’inerzia e il letargo politico e morale dei cattolici.]

His next sentence says a great deal more than its length implies:

Perhaps Europe is different.

[Forse l’Europa è diversa.]

Calling this "irony" strikes me as understatement. There is no question that Europe is not different; indeed one might argue that Europe has led America to the state it's in.

Never mind European intellectuals, theologians, etc. and their influence here; examine the ground level. My direct experience of European Catholicism has generally given me the impression that the European Catholic attitude to morality is, "We'll pay for the show, but we won't participate until it's time to attack someone we don't like. We'll especially deride those who take the moral implications of Catholic faith seriously." This deep impression of my youth, which my adult experience has done little to dispel, delayed my conversion to Catholicism for years: I thought, effectively, that it was merely a religion for apathetic hypocrites. Similar things occur here in the States, but (in my experience) not on so wide a scale. Again, I could be wrong, but that was my distinct experience.

Chaput goes on,

But it seems to me that the current historical moment (that both American and European Catholics have in common) bears no resemblance to the social circumstances that the ancient Christian legislators had to face… These men had both faith and the necessary zeal, tempered by patience and intelligence, to incarnate the moral content of their faith in the culture. In other words, they built a civilization that was shaped by Christian belief. What we are witnessing today is quite different.

[Ma mi sembra che l’attuale momento storico (che accomuna cattolici americani e europei) non abbia alcuna rassomiglianza con le circostanze sociali che dovettero affrontare gli antichi legislatori cristiani citati dal cardinale. Questi uomini avevano fede e avevano anche lo zelo necessario (temperato dalla pazienza e dall’intelligenza) per incarnare nella cultura il contenuto morale della loro fede. In altre parole, hanno costruito una civiltà plasmata dalla credenza cristiana. Quello che sta accadendo oggi è una cosa completamente diversa.]

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A 10% foul-to-noise ratio

I just looked up the lyrics to a rap song that I saw referenced on a weblog somewhere. Why? Просто так.

Thanks to me, four hundred sixty-one words of raw commercialism posing as gritty, urban realism wound their way across the world, or at least across a few telephone lines, along with a bunch of ads that I ignored.*

I'm not sure what surprises me more:

• that I understood immediately the meaning of im'a;
• that the ratio of profanities to non-profanities is only about 10%;
• that someone took the time to transcribe all 461 words on the website, paying careful attention to which words should be capitalized;
• that, according to the acknowledgments, four different people submitted corrections to the original lyrics;
• that their emails are listed as plaintext (spammers take note!); or
• that I looked up the lyrics, read them, noticed all this, and am not ashamed to write it down.

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*I am no longer human; I am a statistic. Somewhere, someone is going to claim me as another "unique visitor"** to the website, and try to finagle advertising dollars on account of me. The government will count this transfer of money as economy activity. So if enough idle people would use the internet more, economic activity would increase and, yes, idle folk would pull us out of the recession.

Yet more proof that work doesn't pay. Let alone hard work.

**I wonder if I can count as two or three unique visitors by visiting the site again using different browsers, or by deleting the revelant cookies. Imagine: a small, committed army of idle folk could use such a strategy to generate an economic boom that would rival the best bull markets.

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"The God who doesn't make slaves, but becomes one"

One of my favorite seminary professors was Fr. Robert Barron. I had him for only one class, Modern Philosophy I believe, and it was a great class. Although to be honest I thought all my classes at Mundelein were great classes, philosophy and theology alike (with one exception which I won't describe). It was the pastoral aspect that challenged me.

Anyway, Fr. Barron has a website, Word on Fire. They've been posting videos on YouTube. Here is a nice one that ties together the film District 9 and the ethical philosopher Emmanuel Levinas:

In Jesus, God identifies as dramatically as possible with the underside of history: not with the Masters, but with the Slaves; not with the Insiders, but with the Outsiders. God looks out from the suffering face of Christ and compels us to the right ethical stance.

It's worth listening to the entire thing, and hearing for yourself what future priests hear.

Having said that, I think I will visit that website more often.

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People who twitter are...?

An opinion writer recently wrote,

I'm still not sure if I'm a fool for Twittering or a Twittering fool.

Never one to shy away from making a fool of myself, I emailed the obvious answer,

You're a twit.

No reply, of course.

For what it's worth, I like reading that particular writer, so I hope I didn't end up on his Nasty List as a result.

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Church and Marriage in the Middle Ages

A while back, someone claimed that the medieval Church really didn't care much about the rules of marriage one way or the other, since marriage was a matter for this world and the Church was concerned with the next world. I got involved in a little argument over this, inasmuch as (if I recall correctly) the argument being advanced was that the prohibition against homosexual marriage was at best a late medieval invention.

I may remember the argument wrong, and I regret the error if so, but it has stuck in my head a long while., because it came to mind immediately today while reading Humphrey's latest entry at James Hannam's Quodlibeta. Humphrey is writing a series of articles on the family in the Middle Ages, and whaddaya know, even the early medieval Church was deeply interested in the rules surrounding marriage.

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11 Undocumented Features of Google's Chrome OS

Not sure if I can copy it into the weblog, so click here to read it.

My favorite is number 5,

Integrated tax preparation software includes "I'm Feeling Lucky" deductible button.

But they're all good.

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"Rome has spoken, but the matter is unfinished."

You may have heard some time ago of José Cardoso Sobrinho, a Brazilian bishop who declared that the doctors who performed an abortion on a young girl who had been impregnated by her father were excommunicated. Her mother was also declared excommunicate. You may have heard also that the bishop declared the girl excommunicate as well, but this appears to be false.

On 15 March, L'Osservatore Romano, a Vatican newspaper, published an article by Archbishop Rino Fisichella that gave a harsh assessment of Sobrinho's actions. Fisichella is not easily dismissed as a mush on the matter of abortion, euthanasia, or other aspects of human life; he is the director of the Pontifical Academy for Life, and his article affirms several times the Church's teaching on the intrinsic evil of abortion. He writes, (my translation)

In the first place, Carmen should have been defended, embraced, caressed with sweetness so that she would feel that we all stood by her; all of us, without any distinction. Before thinking of an excommunication, it was necessary and urgent to save her innocent life and to bring her back to a level of humanity of which we men of the Church ought to be experts at announcing and teaching. Unfortunately, it has not been like this, and it affects the credibility of our teaching that appears in the eyes of many to be insensitive, incomprehensible, and without mercy. It is true that Carmen carried within herself other innocent lives like her own, even if they were the fruit of violence, and these lives have been suppressed. Nevertheless, this is not enough to pass a judgment that weighs like a axe.

This pronouncement of the importance of humanity, coupled with a public denunciation of a bishop, may sound wonderful to many, especially coming from a Vatican newspaper.

However, there are two problems with the article. One is its tone, florid in reference to the girl and furious in reference to the Archbishop. It sounds more like the passionate rantings of a teenager than the carefully weighed thoughts of a senior cleric.

A more serious problem is that the premises of its argument are false. The archdiocese of Olinda and Recife published on its webpage a refutation of several details. Some excerpts (again, my translation):

1. The rape did not occur in Recife, as the article claims, but in the city of Alagoinha, in the diocese of Pesquiera. Rather, the abortion took place in Recife.

2. All of us—starting with the parish priest of Alagoinha, who is among the signatories—remained close to the pregnant girl and to her family with great love and affection. (The word used is actually carità, which is not quite the same as "love", but more like charity, although not that either.) When the news [of her pregnancy] reached the parish priest at his house, he acted according to his pastoral calling, and went immediately to the family's house, where he met the girl to give her support and company, given the grave and difficult situation in which she found herself. This attention continued for each of the following days, both at Alagoinha and in Recife, where the sad conclusion of the abortion of the two innocents transpired. In the meantime, it was evident and undeniable that no one thought in the first place of "excommunication". …In every initiative taken on behalf of the girl and her children, the parish priest went in person to the city's protective Council [? "Consiglio tutelare"]. Both at the hospital and in his daily visits he gave evidence of an affection and attention that made both the girl and her mother understand that they were not alone, but that the Church, represented there by the parish priest, assured them any necessary assistance and the certainty that everything would have been done for the girl's good and to save the two children.

3. …The parish priest visited the hospital every day, leaving his city that lies 230 kilometers from Recife, without sparing any effort, so that both the girl and her mother would feel the presence of Jesus, the Good Shepherd who goes to find the sheep who most need his help.

…and so forth.

The archdiocese of Olinda and Recife has tried, without success, to have L'Osservatore Romano publish their reply. There has been no attempt to correct the original article, and the archdiocese is now threatening canonical proceedings against Archbishop Fisichella.

One half-imagines that someone described the situation badly to Archbishop Fisichella, got him to agree that, based on this false information, the Archdiocese had acted badly, then asked him to write a quick article based on this bad information. Rather than dig down to find the truth, L'Osservatore Romano is content with appearances only.

I say this not only because of this story, but some others I have read lately. L'Osservatore Romano does seem to be following a pattern of ignorance of many important facts that contradict the story they'd like to publish, at least on stories related to modern controversies on unborn human life. One need only think of some recent articles on the leaders of certain nations, who have acted as if a human life that is either microscopic or within the womb does not count as a human life at all and deserves no legal protection whatsoever, so they encourage and subsidize its elimination.

Read the story at Sandro Magister's www.chiesa. English version here.

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The Monty (Python) Hall program

Brendan at Siris has highlighted and discussed an interesting fallacy, and his discussion of it reminded me of the Monty Hall problem, which has always gotten my goat. (Pardon the pun.)

I left a comment, and while thinking about it a few minutes later, it occurred to me to try the problem out in a computer program. This way, I could simulate several hundred or thousand games in less time than it takes to blink an eye. Ain't computers grand?

For this I turned to Sage, a computer algebra system that uses the programming language Python as its interface with the user. It would be very, very easy to write a Sage program that would run the Monty Hall problem many, many times, building a sufficiently large sample space that the correct answer would be obvious. Moreover, Sage is free software that can be run from a web interface found at the website linked above, so anyone can try it, mess with the code, and see it in action. Thus was born the Monty (Python) Hall program. (Pardon the pun.)

While writing the code and thinking about how to implement the problem, I (finally) saw something that I had never really grasped before. (To see the code, click on "Read more".)

def monty_python_hall_program(n=6000):
  switch_wins = 0
  stay_wins = 0
  doors = Set([1,2,3])
  for each in range(n):
    winning_pick = randint(1,3)
    initial_pick = randint(1,3)
    if winning_pick == initial_pick:
      stay_wins += 1
    else:
      switch_wins += 1
  print "Probability that switching wins:" , round(switch_wins*100/n,1)
  print "Probability that staying wins:", round(stay_wins*100/n,1)

What I I realized is that the information given by the host is essentially useless. It doesn't affect the end result at all, because to decide whether the player wins by switching, one simply tests whether his initial choice was the winning door! You see this in the following if statement:

if winning_pick == initial_pick:

This line does not depend on the host's action at all.

The probability of the initial choice being the winning choice is 1/3, period, full stop. The probability of switching to the correct door is 2/3. The host's revelation of a wrong door doesn't change anything.

Here are the results of the program:

sage: monty_python_hall_program()
Probability that switching wins: 66.0
Probability that staying wins: 33.0
sage: monty_python_hall_program()
Probability that switching wins: 66.0
Probability that staying wins: 33.0
sage: monty_python_hall_program()
Probability that switching wins: 67.0
Probability that staying wins: 32.0

That may look convincing, but it shouldn't because I designed the program to produce those numbers. The real question is whether the program is designed correctly, which depends on whether my "insight" is correct.

Wikipedia does a pretty good job of explaining it, and I had read it a couple of times before. I "understood" it, but was too thick to grasp the explanation. I think (perhaps wrongly) that now I understand it.

I could be wrong, though! Perhaps the host's additional information does need to be implemented in a way that I didn't see. It's late at night, and I'm not a probabilist, so I beg your forbearance in that case. In any case, the code is here (again, click on "Read more"); feel free to leave a comment indicating any error. If you want to suggest a way to implement the host's information, first think carefully about whether it can be optimized out, especially since the player wins by staying if and only if the following boolean expression line evaluates to true:

if winning_pick == initial_pick:

…and that expression does not depend in any way on which door is opened by the host!

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Statistics, you two-faced lying sumb----!

Remember that story I cited on why people leave churches? Here are two different comments I found on it today.

From the Pew center's talking points, quoted at getreligion.org:

Catholicism has suffered the greatest net loss in the process of religious change.

From the bishops' website:

A Pew Forum poll on Americans and their religious affiliation finds Catholics have one of the highest retention rates, 68 percent, among Christian churches when it comes to carrying the Catholic faith into adulthood.

I refuse to make sense of this apparent contradiction. I just don't have the time.

---

Okay, I lied. I visited the Pew Center's website and took a gander at what they had to say. The fuller quote is interesting:

While the ranks of the unaffiliated have grown the most due to changes in religious affiliation, the Catholic Church has lost the most members in the same process; this is the case even though Catholicism's retention rate of childhood members (68%) is far greater than the retention rate of the unaffiliated and is comparable with or better than the retention rates of other religious groups. Those who have left Catholicism outnumber those who have joined the Catholic Church by nearly a four-to-one margin. Overall, one-in-ten American adults (10.1%) have left the Catholic Church after having been raised Catholic, while only 2.6% of adults have become Catholic after having been raised something other than Catholic.

The apparent disparity in the word choice is, if I understand correctly, due to the statistic that although Catholics do tend to remain Catholic, more adults abandon Catholicism than embrace it.

Small logical disparities like this are what make computer programming and mathematics hard.

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More of the same at Siris

It's unfortunate that, too often, we associate "maturity" with holding a certain viewpoint, or belonging to a certain clique. Brandon makes, as usual, an insightful observation:

There is, indeed, only one path to maturity, and that is to set one's sights on higher things than oneself, whatever you happen to be wearing. Maturity is nothing other than gracious prudence, practical wisdom laced with good will toward others. It can be found in jeans and ballcaps. It can be lacking in slacks and a tie. And these days few indeed can be said to have it, not because of what they wear or how they play, but because they have sterile hearts that shirk the burdens that come with loving one's neighbor.

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My unfortunate 15μs of fame

A few days ago, David Frum's* NewMajority.com solicited ideas from readers on how to reform the tax code. Frum wrote,

Please email your ideas to Editor@NewMajority.com, and we'll post a sampling of the most compelling in this space over the coming days.

I took a few moments to write an email containing a few ideas, none of which I've discussed with anyone in particular detail (maybe an allusion or two at Clemens' website), but two of which I do care somewhat about: indexing deductions to the local cost of living, and a means-tested, non-refundable tax credit for sending one's children to private school.**

I've done this sort of thing before with other political websites, and sometimes I'm able that way to contribute to the discussion. Generally I've been quoted as "a reader", and that anonymity is exactly how I like it.

Not in a million years did I imagine that Frum would reproduce the body of my letter verbatim on the website, along with my name, position, and place of employment.

If I'd known that, I never would have sent it in.—Well, maybe I would have, but I would have tried to make it more presentable, and I would have requested anonymity. They wrote merely that I'm a professor, which makes me feel not a little pretentious. Had they said that I'm a professor of mathematics, then readers could at least know that I don't really know what I'm talking about! It would at least excuse any economic ignorance in my proposals.

On the bright side, it does imply that someone respectable, with some influence, considers these ideas compelling. Too bad I never see the bright side through my obsidian-colored glasses.

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*David Frum and Jonah Goldberg have been much maligned by talk radio, which I find ironic inasmuch as I've generally found their arguments to be well-considered, even when demonstrably wrong. You can't say that about most pundits and expers, who as Clemens recently reported (twice, no less) are usually wrong without the merit of having thought very well about what they said. (You didn't hear that in the mainstream news, did you? ;-)) As for talk radio, I explained my distaste for those clowns a while back.

**In case anyone's wondering: neither of these would actually benefit me, so I'm not shilling for my own good. As things stand right now, I don't pay income taxes, and amazingly enough it's all legal, thanks to the child tax credit. If the credit for private schools were refundable, I would stand to benefit, and poor parents would benefit more, so I don't object to that if anyone wants to go there, but that's not what I proposed.

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Was Jesus' Resurrection an Urban Legend?

Jim S. is on the case at the (now) team blog, Quodlibeta (formerly James Hannam's Bede's Journal).

My personal favorite is the "evil twin" theory. Don't forget to read the comments, one of which elaborates on this somewhat!

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No good Catholics on this weblog

I didn't receive the Sacrament of Penance this Lent. I didn't receive it last Lent, either, and I suspect that I didn't receive it the Lent before. I do receive the Sacrament of Penance several times a year, and I wish I could receive it more often—if I had my druthers, I'd receive Penance every day, right before assistant at and receiving the Eucharist—but between the long lines of Lent and the "joyous celebrations"—er, "communal penance services", although the local parishes describe them as "joyous celebrations"—I wait until Easter, unless it's a dire need. Sadly, the "dire need" crops up more often throughout the year than I'd like. You should have guessed this already, but in case you haven't: you won't find any good Catholics on this weblog.

(As an aside: a "joyous" celebration, eh? That sounds too much like that remark from Jules Fieffer,

Jesus died to forgive our sins. Dare we make his martyrdom meaningless by not committing them?

I understand that my sins are forgiven, of course, and I'm grateful for God's mercy, but I draw the line at a "joyful celebration" of penance. If we can no longer be somber about somber matters, then we can no longer be serious about serious matters.)

So I don't always make a confession during Lent. That didn't bother me one whit—I do receive the sacrament of Penance relatively frequently, being in dire need of it frequently, what with my not being a good Catholic and all—until I heard an announcement at Church that strongly implied that I had an obligation to make a confession during Lent. That was news. I shrugged it off, considering myself fairly familiar with the minimal requirements of my faith, and went about my business until someone in a weblog that I respect referred to the practice as "canon law". Wonderful. Now I'm caught between parishes that want me to celebrate my sinfulness, and some obscure passage from canon law. So obscure, in fact, that I can't for the life of me find it.

Of course if you're going to confess once a year, you should probably do it in Lent. If, however, you are not so saintly, and out of sheer need confess reasonably more than once a year, I'd say that confession during Lent is a healthy spiritual practice—one that, yes, I probably should have taken advantage of during Lent—but not an obligation.

Anyway, I pointed out that there is no actual obligation in Canon Law to receive Penance during Lent, and was thanked for my efforts by a scolding:

I have checked this with several priests, in fact, and all agree that any serious Catholic should go to confession several times a year and that confession during Lent is required, although there have been statements by bishops that seem to confuse this point.

Honestly: A year without pride? Lying?

And here I thought I was, for all my faults, a "serious" Catholic. At the very least, I've been somber about somber things, and I was looking forward to being joyous about joyous things, and I at least try to be serious about serious things. So much for that! I can't catch a break no matter which way I turn.

So can someone point me to the precise canon in the 1983 Code that requires confession during Lent? I'd be grateful, and in the future I'd adhere to it.

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