Interesting time getting to Mass -- finally found out that it was in the Lady Chapel, and managed to get through the security for the patrocina grand event. This is a complicated city; I've recorded many of the complications in this blog. But the church manages to still provide a window, a windowed monad, perhaps, on the reality of the faith. The difficulty is that almost everyone is caught up in rhythms of habituation, imitation. and competition -- the thing itself is obscured, and it would take some doing to point out that there is grail there to be uncovered, let alone the disposition and work involved in bringing the inner truth of the event to light in the present time. Never let the world teach you about unworldly things. At most, it provides a window.
The church is a ladder supply warehouse, not a ladder machine. I prefer this metaphor to the analogy of a hospital (apparently one with a peculiarly ineffective psych ward).
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Standard daily paean to southern Europe -- the desire to return to a minimally sufficient existence, interesting cultures and art, and the dignity of civilizational context. I'm remaining calm and carrying on, but this departure and return really does need to happen rather soon.
Was doing some private devotions on the walk from the gym to the cathedral, and encountered a father talking to his very young son in what I suppose he thought to be a normal voice, but one which any sufficiently well-grounded observer could tell was primarily an instrument used to attack a hostile world.
Contrary to the received view in the New World (Prospero: "Tis new to thee...") civilization can also preserve innocence.