The Apostrophe Protection Society
Making compulsive proofreaders’ lives a little easier since 2001.
Author: Richard Chonak
October 1, 1979
23 years ago today, on the feast of St. Therese of the Child Jesus, Pope John Paul landed in Boston for his first visit to the United States after his election. As a Cardinal Archbishop and professor of theology, he had already been across the river in Cambridge where he had lectured to the eminences of Harvard Divinity School, but now he was coming to his own. And his own received him in a big way, filling Boston Common with a hundred thousand souls, a big crowd for a city of 500,000. We college pals who arrived on foot at 7:30 am — making a little pilgrimage of it — were rewarded with a place close enough so that we saw the Pope — that is, if we had our glasses on — and that was enough for us. He told us as the rain poured down on us all, Catholics and catechumens alike, and even a few Evangelicals: “Do not be afraid to follow Christ!”
Well, I guess that makes
Well, I guess that makes up for it
OK, I admit it: I was holding Pop Greggy’s episode of ungentlemanly behavior (toward Miss Stimpson) against him, but after reading his new Rodgers and Hammerstein song, I’m willing to relent, grant him an indulgence, and say all is forgiven.
Do be do be do
Do be do be do
Fr. Bob Carr ruminates about why the slogan “What Would Jesus Do?”, a currently popular theme in Evangelical Protestant youth culture, never really sat quite right with him. He offers a story to illustrate why we need not just the question, but also the answer. He starts here and gives a followup.
For what it’s worth, here’s another angle: “WWJD?” by itself is a question about morality, and while moral guidance is good, it’s not everything. Sometimes we get the guidance and we still fail to live up to the way of Jesus. Another question comes to help us out: “What did Jesus do?” He became an inexhaustible fountain of forgiveness for us. We listen to the answers from Jesus the Preacher, but we also need Jesus the Priest.