Tyler Hummel's piece in the North American Anglican is one of those things that surfaces from time to time in the Anglican/Episcopal World. It has the feel of the Palm Beach Old Guard's worst nightmare: the dread of tasteless nouveaux riches making a statement and getting away with it. As someone who started out in …
The World of Late Antiquity by Peter Brown (1971 2nd edition 1989)
Peter Brown
Peter Brown has been a pioneer of the study of the late Roman / Early Medieval world for 50 years.
His books in the 1960s and 70s are credited with bringing a new coherence to the study of the period, and a new attitude which saw it not as a story of inevitable decline and fall, but as a period of surprising vigour and innovation – as a much more complex, rich and fascinating period than had previously been thought.
Brown helped to bury the term ‘Dark Ages’ – which is now generally deprecated – and bring about the recategorising of the period as the ‘Early Middle Ages’, now generally defined as 500 to 1000 AD.
The World of Late Antiquity was published in 1971 as an extended essay or meditation on the earlier part of this period, from roughly 250 to 750 AD. It was published by…
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Looking at the “Whole Person”: Yesterday it was the Ivy League, Now It’s the State Department
Our Foreign Service is changing the rules: The Foreign Service – the US Department of State’s on-ramp for career diplomats – is watering down its application process with a change that critics say could have troubling implications for national security.“I worry that we’ll be sending good community activists over to Baghdad and Beirut who don’t …
Penitential Rite, from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer
It's needed now: One thing that always struck me about this and so many other penitential rites in the Anglican liturgy (like this one) is that God always is ready to forgive and have us back. That's missing in many of the moral systems that are being imposed on us these days.
Those Needy Pentecostals
One of the things I heard frequently as a NOM (Novus Ordo Missae, as opposed to a Trad or Rad Trad) Catholic was the phrase "your needy people." This was generally rolled out when same needy people were about to "come to the table" (which they really didn't.) And yet...somehow, the whole concept of "needy …
George Conger for Bishop?
That's what's on the street: Enter George Conger, the ambitious evangelical cleric from Central Florida. Is he qualified? Eminently so. He is by far away the most credentialed of all the candidates with a good track record in his own diocese. However, there is no love lost between Conger and his bishop, Greg Brewer, who …
Two Defeats, Two National Nervous Breakdowns
A few years back I did a review of Andreas Killen's 1973 Nervous Breakdown. It's hard to argue against the fact that what we went through in the late 1960's and early 1970's was in fact a national nervous breakdown. Two years later, of course, came the fall of Saigon and the real end of …
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Some Reflections on “The Ten Weeks” and Our Current Situation
Well, it's done: my novel The Ten Weeks is now blogged. I trust that those who have followed it have been blessed and entertained. For those who have not kept up, it's not a problem; this site's traffic has traditionally come from its long-term content. The novel was an ordeal for its participants; while blogging …
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The Ten Weeks, 20 February, Like a Twitter Thread, At The End It’s “Fin”
The weekend that came was decidedly strange. Lucian Gerland’s death and the fiasco of his funeral had made for a long week. There weren’t many on the Island alive and active who could remember a Verecunda not dominated by Lucian Gerland, and the anticipation of what life would be like without him depended upon what …
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The Ten Weeks, 18 February, The Rioters Even Show Up to Funerals
Terry stood nervously and alone outside of St. Sebastian’s, facing Aumonier Street. Behind her the stained glass windows of the church showed their images muted and in reverse. Her full length black dress and veil became her; her long hair was swallowed up in her dress. She stared blankly out into the street, so intently …
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Positive Infinity 