Posts

Memorandum from Below - Toward a Successful Apostolate

By
Image
  Submitted to Happy Jack anonymously by a person in deep-cover. Memorandum from Below [CONFIDENTIAL: This memorandum is for operational use only. To avoid it falling into the Enemy's hands, destroy it immediately once read. The strategies herein depend entirely upon remaining unrecognised.] Notes Toward a Successful Apostolate by Slubgob, Junior Tempter I am permitted (with some hesitation from my uncle Screwtape) to outline the broad contours of our present strategy for the modern age, now that brute unbelief is unnecessary and, in many places, inefficient. Outright atheism and diffuse spirituality serve us well enough among the masses. But for those still tethered to institutional religion, a more subtle approach is needed. The central aim is no longer to persuade humans that God does not exist. Much better to persuade them that the Enemy exists, but does not speak clearly, and certainly not through any institution capable of making binding claims. Our primary achi...
5 comments
Read more

A Happy New Year to One and All

By
Image
May our eternal God, who transcends our understanding of time, be with you in this New Year and always  
24 comments
Read more

Learning to See Christmas and Holy Saturday: How Stories Form Us

By
Image
  Prologue I was setting up the Christmas crib with my five-year-old grandson. As we placed the figures, he stopped and looked at the scene for a moment. Then he said, quietly, "This really isn't very joyful for baby Jesus." He was not confused. He was attentive. Taken on its own, the crib is not a joyful image. A child lies in a feeding trough. It becomes joyful when one knows what has gone before and what is to come; as one understands the full pattern of Eden, the Cross, and the Resurrection; the promise, cost, and vindication. The Nativity is joyful. The angels announce "good news of great joy," the shepherds rejoice, and the Magi worship. But it is a paradoxical joy, a joy in anticipation, precisely because it's joy despite poverty, vulnerability, and impending persecution. Joy is not deferred until Easter. It is joy under the shadow of the cross. It is the Father's love breaking into the world, the Word made flesh, already Emmanuel. God ha...
19 comments
Read more

This Is My Body: The Choice Between Gift and Grasp

By
Image
  Introduction: The First Choice A Catholic senator defends marriage and votes against labour rights on Monday. A Catholic activist champions the poor while dismissing chastity as repression. An environmental warrior fights pollution while treating sexuality as a private choice. We have fractured what should not be divided. We speak of sexual morality as one thing and social justice as another. We build entire Catholic identities around these divisions. Left versus right, private morality versus systemic sin, bedroom versus boardroom. This division obscures a deeper unity. The Second Vatican Council said it plainly: "Man cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of self." From Eden to the present, human love unfolds as a single fundamental orientation: gift or grasp, communion or consumption, an open hand or a closed fist. In the modern West, we’ve built a civilisation of grasping. Radical autonomy, sexual utilitarianism, and economic acquisitiveness....
17 comments
Read more

A Quick Hello After Going Quie

By
Image
  Hi everyone, I just wanted to pop back and say a quick sorry for going so quiet these past few months. A few of you have checked in and asked if I was alright. Thank you. I am. I just seemed to disappear without meaning to. After the last post, which was so inward-looking, I found it hard to write anything else. And honestly, the summer here in the UK has been so full of news, changes, and general chaos that every time I tried to get a few thoughts down, something else happened. Before I knew it, weeks had gone by, and I was still staring at a blank page. So this is me easing myself back in; nothing profound, just a hello and an apology for the silence. I’d really love to hear from you: How are you finding things in the UK under Labour so far? What’s stood out to you these past months - good or bad? Any moments or stories that have stuck with you? I’ve missed the conversation here, and hope to get back into the rhythm of writing again. Thanks for sticking around. Peter...
8 comments
Read more

A Pilgrim in the Desert: Lessons from a Long Road

By
Image
  O God, you are my God, I seek you, my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. (Psalm 63:1) Prologue: The Landscape Within I’ve walked a long road, and the older I grow, the more I see that the desert isn’t just somewhere you visit, it also slowly unfolds inside. As a child, I imagined the spiritual life as a mountain to climb, milestones and clear vistas. But after decades in mental health and social work, in cramped offices with flickering fluorescent lights, it feels more like wandering through a vast terrain. The ‘desert’ I speak of isn’t sand and wind. It’s the state of the human heart in our restless times: the ache for meaning amid abundance, the hunger for love amid noise, the search for meaning in comfort. The Church knows this desert. She walks through changing landscapes, her voice shifting as the world changes. When I was young, she spoke with warning and clarity, guarding truths, though sometimes sh...
23 comments
Read more