The Arrow's Path

Today is the Feast Day of St. Michael and All Angels, commonly called Michaelmas . In some places Michaelmas is a big to do, especially in towns where St Michael was the patron. One of the prayers I often use at the four corners of a house, when I do a full house blessing is the Prayer of St. Michael: Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle, be our protection against the malice and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him we humbly pray; and do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly host, by the power of God, thrust into hell Satan and all evil sp irits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls. Amen.

" The folks who think and lust a whole lot about reunion tend to be clergy, whose friendships with the "other side" tend to be clerical friendships, which as we know are not always the same thing as actual human friendships, and also the ecclesiocrats and ecclesiophiles and the spirituality junkies/groupies, for whom having an "Orthodox friend" or a "Catholic friend" usually has that same feel to it that one feels when you see your white, bourgeois, male Prof who teaches the class on multiculturalism or liberation theology hanging out with his lesbian Chicano friend - that pride taken in having token friendships, etc." The Ochlophobist Blog

I remember a time when we used real wood for playground equipment and played in the dirt. Read this article and tell me what you think. Granted it's England, but this is just crazy. Hat tip: Father Ed

So, to make a long story short, I have been trying to track down a functional automobile for an acquaintance who just got laid off from his job and whose car died the next week. I thought being a priest I might be able to pull a few strings. After finagling some people who know some people in the ministerial association and various social work organizations, I got word that someone was willing to donate an automobile. I was dubious, but perhaps there was some goodnatured, philanthropist soul who had a functional, short term automobile. " "Oh, I assure you, Father...the car runs well and has a clear title." Riiiight. So I arranged to look at the automobile and pick it up if that assertion was correct. (You so know where this is going to end.) I went down to the dept. of labor and talked to someone who knew the social worker in the next building. They handed me the keys and the title and told me the car was "in the back lot." Riiiight. So I started looking in th...

"When you are completely detached from all earthly things and when, your conscience clear, you are at any moment ready in heart to leave this present life and to dwell with the Lord, then you may recognize that you have acquired true virtue. If you want to be known to God, do all that you can to remain unknown to men." -St. Theognostos On the Practice of the Virtues, Contemplation, and the Priesthood. (3rd Century)

This is cool... Click here to see the online 3-D walk through of St. Paul's Cathedral in London. ( Flash 9 required.)

This is a video put out by an Orthodox monastery in Guatemala. If you are interested in icongraphy, there are some interesting clips in the middle of the video that show application of iconographic art into the new church. It is short by really interesting.

Week 3 of the NCAA College Football season yielded surprises, though probably not patently obvious when looked at from the sheer angle of wins and losses. True, USC lost, but that wasn't totally unexpected. Pete Carroll finds ways of losing to underdogs early in the season. Usually it is to the likes of an Oregon/Oregon State, but this time it was to the Washington Huskies. The Huskies were on my preseason Team to Watch list for this very reason. I thought Steve Sarkisian was going to have a rather quick turnaround of the Huskies. I did not think they would upend the likes of USC this soon, but I think Washington might be an up and coming team in the next few years when Sarkisian gets some recruiting going, and with a win against USC, that will start happening. BYU got blown out by Florida State. Again, not a huge shocker there. BYU was in the top ten, but that was after beating Oklahoma when their top QB went down. I knew BYU was overrated, and it was simply a matter of time until...

Uh...yeah...what he said .

Rejoice O Virgin-A Blessed Feast.

(click to enlarge) Hat tip: Southern Orthodoxy blog .

We've been doing a lot of canning this summer. If you make jellies and apple butter and whatnot, you need a lot of sugar. So, we've been buying the 10 pound bags of sugar, pictured here: Looks innocuous enough, does it not? We were in the midst of canning some stuff, and my wife says, "Will you look at this?" I looked at the bag, and sure enough, the fine print right above red section with the Net Weight reads, "15 calories per serving." "Well, that's not too bad...wait...IT'S PURE SUGAR!" Upon further review, the nutrition label on the side looked like this: Servings per container: 1134! 1134 x 15 =17010 calories per bag! Now that's what I call spin!

We are past Labor Day, and we will hit the Horror/Scary movie season in the theaters (one or two are already out). As a fan of classic scary movies, I am usually dismayed at the rot that passes for Horror films these days. Blood and guts everywhere and special effects that simply put most Horror films over the top, and thereby render them more absurd than scary. If you are a devotee and critic of Horror films, I recommend watching the following two Youtube clips. Its a very well done BBC two part interview from 1964 with the master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock. His thoughts on film making in this genre are really thought provoking. After watching this, see if you can stand Jason v. Freddy flicks or other such bad horror films anymore without feeling a loss in the overall quality of film making in the genre. A good suspenseful, scary movie comes along every so often still, but they are few and far between.

The following is a excerpt from an article written by a friend of mine, David Vryhof, a brother in the Society of Saint John the Evangelist religious order, in the latest edition of the Society's quarterly magazine after he spent some time in Africa: "The courage and faith Margaret and her husband have shown in the face of opposition and difficulties is not uncommon among the students at St. Philip's Theological College in Maseno, Kenya. It is not unusual for students to have paid a heavy price to train for the ministry. Many have left their families to the care of relatives and neighbors so that they could be away for long periods of time. Finding the money to pay school fees for themselves and for their children at home is a challenge almost every seminarian faces. They worry about how their families are getting along without them, and often find themselves wondering whether their children have had enough to eat that day. Nor can they anticipate a day when they will rece...

click here to view. (I highly recommend clicking on the full screen option to view them.) Hat tip: Kendall at t19.

you have a parade of skimpily clad assimilated Borg clones passing by your office window. IPods, Blackberries, Cell phones, GPS systems, portable computers, Facebook, twitter...It's truly amazing how connected (and addicted) everyone is these days to the "hive mind" as the Borg refer to their collective consciousness in Star Trek (and I am talking original Next Generation series Borg, not the subsequent Borg Queen absolute monarchy that the concept devolved into in the movies and Voyager. I really thought that twist detracted from the concept.) I am also always amazed at the certain level of hypocrisy in the under 30 crowd. As a group, they seem to be all about "being Green," recycling, and saving the environment, which is cool. Don't get me wrong on that. But I would like to see a read out of how much power/energy is being ate up because they can't walk down the street without their various electronic gadgets which are absolute power suckers. And if you...

At 9:09, this blog wishes you at Happy 09/09/09 Day! For what that's worth...which may not be much.

There were a few surprises in the first week of college football that I didn't see coming but largely the first few games of the regular season for most teams are pretty much what I call "stupid games." Here are my week one thoughts: I did not see Oklahoma looking so completely lackluster. Granted, their QB got badly hurt and taken out of the game in the 2nd quarter, which was concerning on a number of levels. The Oklahoma offensive line was not up to snuff against a BYU team not known for defense. If an offense is so completely dependent on one player, its a long season if one player gets hurt. The good news is that a BYU loss doesn't really mean much, as it was non-conference. If Oklahoma can win out the rest of the season (doubtful though it looks now) I think they still play for the national championship in January. If you have to lose, lose early, and work your way back up. I was not surprised Virginia Tech lost to Alabama. They looked good the first half, but r...

In honor of college football season kickoff, I post the first of the new line of Baby Archer sports shots. Since we are multicultural, there will like be ones from South Dakota State and Nebraska coming.

Read about it here . Good job, Chuck!

I was remiss yesterday due to general business from posting something on the saint for September 1st. The Saint yesterday was a deacon in the Episcopal Church in the later 1800's. You have probably never heard of him, but his name was David Pendleton Oakerhater. Oakerhater (from the Cheyenne word for Sun Dance) was a warrior and later Christian convert who became a deacon and served his people with distinction until his death in 1931. I could write much more about him, but for more on his life there is an excellent essay here that is worth reading. After being ordained (a rarity for any "mainstream" Protestant denomination at that time and for some decades thereafter) and returning to his people in 1881, his first sermon done at a Sun Dance Powwow had this quote: "When he first returned to Oklahoma in 1881, he said: You all know me. You remember when I led you out to war I went first, and what I told you was true. Now I have been away to the East ...