I just like this a lot

This is going to Bee bad...

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.bd2664988112b33ebe7091069cfec28e.8b1&show_article=1

To All SGA Alumni

To all alumni of Saint Gregory's Academy and to friends of the Academy,

There has been a lot of talk recently, and I don't know if you've heard anything, but I recently got an e-mail from Sebastian Jansen reaching out to the alumni to keep them updated.

Here is the link to the SGA Alumni Website: http://sgaalumni.com/

SGA needs prayers, lads.

Yours,

Peter

The Essential Belloc: A Prophet for Our Times

Ladies and Gentlemen!  

Here it is at last the book that my father wrote along with Fr. John McCloskey and Brian Robertson, and which I helped to edit and research for.  Pre-order your copy today!

Cheers,

Peter Hilaire Bloch

Dear Friends of Belloc:

On behalf of my fellow editors, Fr. C. John McCloskey, Brian Robertson, and the Faith and Reason Institute under the leadership of Robert Royal – we would like to invite you to pre-order your copy of the collection of Hilaire Belloc’s best writings. 

We thank you for considering purchasing it on preorder.  Perhaps it would also be suitable for gifts for others, and to circulate this notice to friends and relatives and others who may be interested.  The timing is good for a reordering of our minds to culture and Christian civilization.  Belloc is the paladin of that effort, and a kindly guide through life’s measureless wonder and warfare.  

Here is the link to Saint Benedict/Tan Press for pre-order of The Essential Belloc: a Prophet for Our Times.

http://www.saintbenedictpress.com/Catholic-Classics/The-Essential-Belloc.cfm?ID=15520

It’s also on Amazon.com - http://www.wholesalecatholicgoods.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=7996

Below is the book jacket copy.   I will be doing a book signing at the Catholic Information Center on April 21, 2010 at 6:30 p.m. followed by wine and cheese reception.  Fr. James Schall who wrote the Preface to this book, will be in attendance and will introduce a short talk.

Your scrivenous scribe, 

Scott  Bloch, Secretary of Belloc Society of Washington, DC

“More than any other man, Hilaire Belloc made the English-speaking Catholic world in which we all live”
-Frank Sheed

He was a poet, a polemicist, and a prose stylist without peer, but Hilaire Belloc (1870-1954) was first and above all a mighty champion of the Catholic faith. With his brave (and sometimes brash) defenses of Catholic civilization, he taught an entire generation of Catholics never to stand for being treated as second-class citizens in the predominantly Protestant Anglosphere.

Today, with the Faith once again suffering scorn and contempt from all sides, it is time to re-discover this Catholic champion.

The Essential Belloc draws upon the prolific writer's works (he authored more than 140 books, plus countless articles, pamphlets, and letters) to provide a comprehensive overview of his ideas, style, and personality. More than just a collection of quotes, these pages offer rich samplings from Belloc's writings, affording you a solid introduction to his thoughts on:

• The foundational link between European culture and the Catholic faith
• The anti-Catholic historical myths that the English-speaking world has come to accept as fact
• The limits—and dangers—of science that has abandoned faith in God
• The latent power and future menace of militant Islam
• The characteristic faults of political and economic systems that deviate from Catholic principles
• The particular charms of places throughout the world: their towns and roads, their churches and inns
• The love of good food, wine, and ale, and the songs of camaraderie that go with them

And more—plus delightful examples of Belloc's poetry and wit.

Belloc himself once remarked that “genius is the ability to think in a very large number of categories.” In The Essential Belloc you will marvel at how well he fits that very definition, and be edified by the breadth of his brilliance—and its continuing relevance for the modern world.

SOME BLURBS:

“Hilaire Belloc’s superb portrait of England’s ill-starred cardinal, Wolsey, would crown any normal writer’s career.  But with Belloc, this is just the tip of an iceberg; his range and brilliance as a writer have been matched by very few moderns.  Father McCloskey has done a marvelous service by collecting many of Belloc’s most insightful passages into one volume.  The Essential Belloc is an invaluable resource and hugely enjoyable reading.”

 

+Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap.

Archbishop of Denver

 

At a time when Catholicism is again vilified, Fr.C John McCloskey, Scott Bloch, and Brian Robertson have done a timely service to us all by bringing forth this affectoinate and appreciative study of Hilaire Belloc, that spendlid writer, modern prophet, and morally courageous defender of the Faith.
                                                                                                    --- Pat Buchanan

 “From graceful depths to bumptious joy, Belloc’s prose deserves an audience literate, allergic to cant, and wise. Nevertheless, it will have to make do with us.”

                --David Whalen, Associate Provost, Hillsdale College

 

Hilaire Belloc should be essential reading for any serious Catholic wishing to get to grips with the modern world and the evils it promotes and fosters. And if Belloc is essential reading what better than a book that brings together the "essential Belloc" into one power-punching volume?

                    -- Joseph Pearce, author of Old Thunder: a Life of Hilaire Belloc

 

Belloc believed that party and the state are not all powerful, that the Church and Family have primacy of place.  He married an American and was fond of saying that our Declaration of Independence was a master work of freedom in the world’s history.   As such, we need him more than ever to reestablish our religious liberties, the rights of the family, of marriage, and the sacred right of property.  

                --Senator Rick Santorum, author of It Takes a Family

 

Economics and competition never happen in a moral-free zone.  Hilaire Belloc offers us a roadmap for a healthy economy and a healthy culture.  Read this book and you will see how Belloc was among the few in the last hundred years who advocated for better business principles that are not predatory but just, not given over to big government but ordered to free people in a free economy.

     -- Dr. Andrew Abela,  Chair of Department of Business and Economics, Catholic University of America

"They called Hilaire Belloc "Old Thunder." After Bellocian Thunder will come first the rain and then the fruit of truth for those able readers of The Essential Belloc who dare to wrestle with the master's muscular prose."

 

     -- Robert K. Carlson, Academic Dean, Wyoming Catholic College

"In the pantheon of English literature the bust of Hilaire Belloc has been relegated to a dusty corner, frequented only by the convivial cognoscenti who gather to drink claret beneath its shade.  The great man deserves to be better known, the conviviality should be spread, and I hope The Essential Belloc finds the wide readership it deserves."

-- H. W.Crocker III, author of Triumph: The Power and the Glory of the Catholic Church, A 2,000-Year History

There is no one like Hilaire Belloc, no one who could describe a battlefield or a heresy with such penetrating insight, no one who saw the future as clearly (eg, Islam’s rise; Calvinism’s vitality among the Protestants); no one who could conjure so invitingly and vividly the pleasures of hearth and home and friendship and walking and roaring.  I thank Father Schall for pressing me to read him, and I thank Scott Bloch, Brian Robertson and Father McCloskey for taking the (no doubt bracing and wonderful) time to draw his insights and his splendid writing together for us and future generations to read, to savor, and to exhult in, and I hope it leads us all to give thanks to the good God who gave us Hilaire Belloc.

         --William Saunders, Senior Vice President and Senior Counsel, Americans United for Life

From Dallas [Braniff Graduate Center]

We played TGIT last night, I cannot speak today, and the show was off the hook.

Does anyone have video, pictures, etc. of the show?  I amn't on facebook.

Also, Happy St. Joseph's feastday.  I'll eat cookies and taco salad bowl: mmmmm.

Here comes a tour of prospies.  Gotta shine.

Kill,

Peter

We Need Orthokardia

I got this in an e-mail today from my father, and it really spoke to me.  The e-mail stresses the necessity of poetry; and more specifically how poetry is infused and intertwined in the books of the Bible.  I have been speaking to one of my colleagues at Glendale quite a bit about poetry.  He and I believe that poetry is so necessary, but that very few people read poetry.  Within the category of poetry readers only a handful, we think, actually read and drink up the poems--and probably merely peruse or glance at them.  Poetry makes us human, it is the highest expression of language--logos.  Philosophy sits in awe of the word, of Poetry.

-PB

Sydney Anglican Network
You need to read poetry
by Michael Jensen
December 29th, 2009

I would lay money on the fact that poetry is not one of your great
interests. For most people, reading poetry is about as fun as going to
the dentist.

Yet I have been thinking about some great words from my good friend
Justin Moffatt recently, in a blog post entitled ‘We Need the Poets’:


The Bible is not just facts, and it’s not just history. It’s not all
argument, and it’s not all logic. It’s not a manifesto, and it’s
certainly not a tract. It is full of wisdom, poetry and songs. If we
desire to be true to the Bible, then we need to re-find the poets, the
wisdom writers, and the prophets.

It is one thing to say: ‘Be faithful to your wife’. But it is another
to muse with the writer of Proverbs: ‘Let your fountain be blessed,
and rejoice in the wife of your youth, a lovely deer, a graceful doe.’

So we need a few things: We need wonder, not just exegesis. We need
awe of God, not just exposition. We need insight, not just
information. We need wisdom, not just your points. We need to wrestle
with the Psalmists, and not just proclaim their certainty. We don’t
just need to ‘think Christianly’, we need to feel it too. We need
Orthokardia.


Justin’s point is that poetry is trying to do something very similar
to what preachers are trying to do. Poetry overlaps hugely with
theology. Reading great poetry sensitizes us – and makes us better
readers of the Word of God, no doubt.

Two books I have been reading have reminded me of the power and the
blessing and the necessity of poetry – especially for people who would
be good readers of Scripture.

First, "The Anthologist by Nicholson Baker." It is a terrific novel about a mediocre poet and
collector of poems. As he narrates his own story, he also gives us a
terrific lesson in reading and appreciating poetry – and introduces us
to some amazing poets. I had never heard of Louise Bogan before, for
example.

Second, E.D. Hirsh’s book How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry might be just what you need to get going with poetry. It’s a
magnificent introduction to poetry, but it is so much more than a
‘dummie's guide’. He introduces the reader to the whole world of poetry
– perhaps you’ll start a life-long love affair with a poet’s work, at
Hirsch’s invitation?

http://www.sydneyanglicans.net/life/culture/you_need_to_read_poetry/

Climb that mountain no matter how high

...and my blood approves
while spring is in the world
-ee cummings

Well, I'm returning to the Lone Star State.  I'm going to embark on a 16-18 hour car ride tomorrow morning at 4:00am.  I am going to try to take some of this great weather with me.  Mary Tetzlaf and Joe Prever are coming with me.

If you haven't already heard, I will be playing the St. Patrick's Day TGIT on March 18th, and I hope that you can make it out.

This is amazing

Words cannot express...

http://trololololololololololo.com/

Dr. Rosemann's on Wikipedia

Don't trash Wikipedia as a pseudo-academic forum until you read Dr. Rosemann's delightful wikipedia article on a neighborhood not too far away from my office.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wynnewood_(Dallas,_Texas)

"Better go down on your marrow bones"

I did some car repairs today.


I love to be connected to the machine that I drive.  I have a 97 Toyota Camry, and it's got about 160K miles on it.  His name is Benjy by the way.  Benjy has been serving me pretty well out here in the desert.  I gave him some real nice tinted windows last week.  He likes it a lot.  The tinted windows keep me nice and cool; on top of all that, everybody thinks that I'm some kind of tough guy and so they don't mess with me or Benjy.  Today I went out and bought a drill gun.  It was pretty sweet purchasing a tool and then using it.  The job was to fix the passenger side speaker on the front door.  It has been going in and out for a while now, and I finally had enough.  The hardest part wasn't getting the door off, but putting it back on.  There are some really tricky things on these Asian cars...
After all the repairs were done, I scrubbed Benjy down and got all the bugs off of the front.  If Benjy had to have an epithet it would be Benjy Bug-Bane.
The final touch was restoring the wind-burnt headlights.  With all the travelling that we've done together the headlights have become wind-burnt, which is where they appear yellow and scratched up.  I bought a restoration kit, basically you just buff away the scratches and it shines like new!  
I feel manly today.  Benjy is damn proud of his new look.  He still needs some flushes and a good vacuuming, but that will have to wait for a while.  


I might get Benjy a spoiler for his birthday (it's in July I decided).


Now I'm off to a dinner with Mr. Jakubcyzick; it's Arizona Right To Life.  Then a birthday party and hanging out with various UD people.


Enjoy your weekends dearest ones!


I am yours,


Lord Bloch

Peter Bloch.

Seeing as how you are rather close to Surpise, Arizona, where the Ranger's spring training camp is located, and the first spring training game is today, you should go and bring me something cool. Please. Pretty please with a cherry on top.

How UD is UD?

Glendale Preparatory Academy

Dear All,

Glendale Preparatory Academy is Now Hiring for the 2010-2011 school year.

Please Download this informational flyer if you are interested in applying, or if you are interested in viewing our curriculum and reading list.

We are growing as a school and thus are hiring across the board.  The positions that I know for a fact are open for next year are:

• College Counselor
• Modern Languages Teacher (Spanish)
• History Teacher
• Math Teacher
• Science Teacher
• Philosophy/Literature/History Teacher

I remain truly yours,

Peter Bloch