sisu

"They also wondered greatly at my piety"

Tuck says she's the new Kiri Te Kanawa. Where have we been? Spending too much time in the blogosphere worrying about the future of the shining city upon a hill, no doubt. American soprano Renée Fleming is the new light of our life. Click here to watch and listen to her breathtaking "Ave Maria" from a November 2005 concert of "the world’s best-loved sacred songs and arias in front of a packed audience in Mainz’s beautiful Romanesque Cathedral."

"My new songs from Scott's Lady of the Lake especially had much success. They also wondered greatly at my piety, which I expressed in a hymn to the Holy Virgin and which, it appears, grips every soul and turns it to devotion," Franz Schubert wrote to his father and stepmother re the Ave Maria composed in about 1825:

It was written for voice and piano and first Published in 1826 as Op 52 no 6. The words most commonly used with Schubert's music are not the words that the composer originally set to music. Franz Schubert actually wrote the music for an excerpt from the poem "The Lady of the Lake" by Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832), which was translated into German by Adam Storck. Schubert called his piece Ellens dritter Gesang (Ellen's third song) . . .

The original words by Sir Walter Scott . . . include many references to the Latin "Ave Maria" prayer. This, no doubt, inspired an unknown person to fit the Latin "Ave Maria" prayer text to Schubert's notes.

Big-time thanks to The Ugly American at SondraKiStan for the heads up re American diva Renée Fleming singing Schubert's transcendent "Ave Maria." A few notes from our imail correspondence this evening:

She: THANKS for the link!!!! Nice to hear the Ave Maria sung by a hottie!!!

We: Yes. Schubert sung by a hottie . . . It doesn't get any better.

She: How thrilling it must be to perform such a masterwork so beautifully. When we get tears in our eyes, we know they have hit a home run . . . As a woman, I can imagine the agony of sacrificing one's child . . . just as all the mothers of military personnel might potentially do . . . the greater good DOES matter . . . Again, thank you for the link. I am on my 5th replay.

We: I am on my eleventy-second.

Can't get enough. The best way to listen is with the Latin (left) and English translations side by side:

Ave Maria                  Hail Mary,
gratia plena                full of grace.
Dominus tecum          The Lord is with thee.
Benedicta tu              Blessed art thou,
Et benedictus            and blessed
Fructus ventris tui      is the fruit of thy womb.

Sancta Maria             Holy Mary,
Mater Dei                  Mother of God,
Ora pro nobis             pray for us
Peccatoribus             sinners
Nunc et in                 now and in
Hora mortis nostrae   the hour of our death.

Ora pro nobis peccatoribus says it all.

"I want another chiquita to go with me"

While human familiars focus on the evil that men do, Baby Cakes focusses on the noodle that Tuck dangles before him.

"Hey, let's go," emails sub rosa blogpal Miss Kelly, who, with Sol of Solomonia, lit a fire of late under the local media to go after some shady terrorist supporters in our midst here in the Greater Boston area. The Jewish Advocate explains:

Two Bostonians [that would be Miss Kelly and Sol] expanded the debate on immigration rights to the Web last week as they created an online petition in support of the recent arrests of local Muslim leaders. Imams Hafiz Muhammed Masood of the Islamic Center of New England in Sharon and Hafiz Abdul Hannan of the Islamic Society of Greater Lowell in Chelmsford, along with Masood’s 24-year-old son, Hassan, were released on bail from the Plymouth County House of Correction last Tuesday. The Pakistan natives were among 33 individuals taken into custody around the country as part of an ongoing investigation into a visa fraud scheme.

"The petition simply supports the ICE [Customs Enforcement] officials for doing their job and enforcing the law," notes Miss Kelly. "Naturally, we are accused of fostering Islamophobia."

This morning the Chelsea Grays were out on their tethers in the side yard before dawn. When we went out at one point to check on things, Tiny appeared to be eating something. As we drew close, we realized she had dispatched a tiny mouse and was about to wolf it down, tail first. It's nature's way, of course, but given our delicate sensibilities, we wrested the poor victim from the jaws and laid it to rest in the garbage container under the sink. Both Tiny and Baby rewarded us with Miss Moppet "where did the mouse go" looks.

Now the heroic Miss Kelly beckons us to leave our cozy nest and go forth tomorrow evening to bear witness at something called ". . . and Justice for All: New immigration laws and civil rights in America," brought to you by the Muslim American Society - Boston Chapter, who appear to have learned one thing big time about this great nation of ours: We are a litigious society. Would that they had learned a little more about the shining city upon a hill and a lot less about the suit-happy lawyer community down in the ditch. So it goes. Here's what we emailed Miss Kelly:

Oh, I couldn't. I'm the stay-at-home type. I will be with you in spirit . . . Is Sol going with you, I hope?

And her reply:

Maybe, but the men and women are separated, men upstairs and women and kids downstairs. So I want another chiquita to go with me.

Our reposte:

Wait a sec. Shouldn't the women and children be upstairs? What goes on here?

"Yes, at many mosques the women look down from a balcony, but not in Chelmsford," writes Miss K:

I went there once before.  It's actually very annoying downstairs, because the kids are running around, very loud, you can barely hear the speaker.

You just can't go anywhere these days.

"Now that the media's paying attention"

Up at the crack of dawn as usual, thanks to Tiny and Baby, who let us know with gallops across our chest, nose bites and hard-paw tactics that it was time to feed the kitties, even as Papa Ratzi was delivering a message of hope and love to a small flock of Turkish Catholics at Mary's House, "a small stone building among the woods above Ephesus. Tradition has it that this is where the Mother of Jesus spent her last years on earth." TV screen shot of the Holy Mass from the House of Mary via EWTN above.

Mid morning, Father Jonathan Morris, covering the Pope's visit to Turkey, tells the Fox News anchor that Papa Ratzi is saying that in order for us to be a civilized society, we have to reject violence in the name of religion, and we have to be tolerant of other religions:

If the Vatican had hired a high-profile Manhattan pr executive, it couldn't have done better. Now that the media's paying attention [thanks to Regensburg] his message of brotherhood and a bridge to peace is being heard.

A crazy-hour mad dash yesterday up the front stairs, across the hall and bedroom and then down the back stairs, ends with Baby pausing, wild eyed, atop the downstairs shower stall.

According to on-the-scene Fox News correspondent Jennifer Griffin, the Turkish headlines are gushing with admiration for Papa Ratzi's message of respect and outreach to the people of Turkey and the followers of Islam. "Turkish leaders appear to have been won over when the Prime Minister reported that the Pope is no longer opposed to Turkey's being admitted to the European Union," she reports. Didn't we just say?

His mission accomplished, Baby heads back down to floor level via the backside of the shower.

Why can't we all just get along, indeed. What if we get through this papal visit without a single deadly Muslim tantrum? Is this the miracle we have prayed for?

Turkey's moment to shine

The photography (above) at CNN was superb, but the coverage of the early hours of Pope Benedict's historic visit to Turkey at EWTN soared above CNNs facile on-air coverage in terms of both historical context and objective assessment (natch). That pure white, double-breasted, floor-length camel-hair (?) overcoat is to die for.

Behold, I tell you a mystery . . .

We're watching today's events in Turkey unfold on EWTN (Evengelical Eternal World Television Network -- thanks for the correction, Ruth Anne) early morning here in Chelsea-by-the-Sea. Before switching channels, we checked in with Fox News and CNN, who were covering the Pope's historic visit to the predominantly Muslim country sporadically. CNNs on-the-scene correspondent summed up the MSMs grasp -- or non grasp -- of the gravity of the situation when she observed that had Papa Ratzi not made that memorably misread statement about Islam and violence at Regensburg last fall, no one would have been paying much attention. Little does she realize the irony of her words. Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do. Meanwhile, from EWTN, a rumor that Papa Ratzi has reversed his stand on Turkey's entry into the EU . . . What if it were so? Would that be the miracle to totally disarm the enemy? A little background about what Turkey wants, from Hugh Hope at the WSJ:

Rudyard Kipling's old saying that "East is East and West is West" -- or its modern incarnation, "the clash of civilizations" -- is not the right paradigm for Turkey, which feels increasingly confident as part of both. The West is now all over the East and the East is firmly camped in the West. Indeed, Turkey's republican founder Kemal Atatürk believed that the "East is East" idea was fostered by Western powers to justify clinging to power over their former colonial subjects.

You'd have to be better informed than the average American or else subscribe to Google's list for news about Pope Benedict XVI to know what we just learned this morning about those flag-waving Pope-haters that have been all over the MSM of late. Ever heard of Turkey's "Happiness party"? We hadn't, either:

The Happiness Party has no representation in the Turkish national legislature even though it has become a stronger force in Turkish politics in recent years. To that extant the visit of Pope Benedict could be seen as a litmus test for the party. If planned protests are not as popular - as their weekend demonstration - as had originally been hyped, that could be a sign that the population at large is rejecting the Happiness Party's radical platform, which in turn could be a positive sign for EU observers.

Interestingly, "Prime Minister Erdogan was once a member of the Happiness Party, but broke with it to form the currently ruling Justice and Development party." Given Turkey's westophilic history in the last period of time -- if accurately portrayed in that WSJ essay -- we'd say without knowing much beyond this morning's reading and listening/viewing that this is Turkey's moment to shine. You go, whirl.

Update: According to Reuters, "Pope Benedict backed Ankara's EU entry bid and said Islam was a religion of peace on Tuesday, according to Turkey's prime minister, in a bid to soothe rows over his views in the mostly Muslim state."

We still don't get this "religion of peace" shtick, but the EU entry-bid thing sounds promising.

Update II: The Anchoress reads poetry into our screenshot of Benedict XVI in his awesome, full-length white coat descending to Turkish soil after touchdown Thursday morning (above):

I am in love with this picture of Benedict disembarking from his plane, which Sissy Willis captured. He looks like The Man in White (even White Hair!) Come to Dodge City! I like the fact that the picture is a little fuzzy and the face is indistinct. I like the way it emphasizes that the man, Joseph Ratzinger, is not the focus here and not recognizable . . . all that is recognizable is “The Vicar of Christ.” Sissy also points out that Benedict is now encouraging Turkey’s admission into the EU, which -- like Sissy -- I think is a good thing and long overdue.

Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini.

They "misunderestimate" Papa Ratzi at their own risk

Our sis says Father Jon, Fox News' cuddly Pope commentator (above) is "a little bit too cute to be a priest. I'm mighty suspicious." And she's the one who believes in Jesus.

We put ourselves on a Google news alert months ago for all things Papa Ratzi. Today, on the eve of Pope Benedict XVI's historic and fraughtful visit to Turkey, Father Jonathan Morris of Fox News tumbled into our emailbox with news that he will be "providing television and web commentary from Turkey throughout the week." His first dispatch, "Pope Benedict the Brave" made our spirits soar. Hoping to get him to lend us an ear, we emailed our thoughts:

Dear Father Jonathan,

I love your Fox News essay, "Pope Benedict the Brave." It's one of the few -- the only one? -- I've seen in that vast wasteland of religious ignorance we call the mainstream media that knows what it's talking about. They "misunderestimate" Papa Ratzi at their own risk. I've often blogged about this great student of history and human nature -- who was warning the West of the gathering Eurabian storm long before he became Benedict XVI -- most recently critiquing Time Magazine's "While Time Magazine Slept" clueless cover story.

'Am looking forward with great excitement -- and some trepidation -- to your coverage of coming events.

Doc Sanity has more of the same, not about Papa Ratzi per se but about the larger titanic struggle with the enemies of civilization:

The MSM have been actively undoing the Bush foreign policy activities as fast as they can. They have promoted terrorist propaganda and denigrated our own military in order to do it; they have emphasized anything which makes the current administration look bad and given evil a free pass, focusing instead on any instance of American ineptitude as evidence of unmitigated American evil. Meanwhile the unmitigated evil of the enemies of civilization continues unabated, sure in the knowledge that they, too, can count on the western media to support and enable their goals.

Then there's John Sentamu (above), "the Archbishop of Canterbury-in-waiting" according to the London Times:

The contrast between the charismatic Archbishop of York and Rowan Williams, the cerebral and prevaricating occupant of Lambeth Palace, sprang into sharp relief last week. As MPs and the public rallied to Sentamu’s withering attack on British Airways for banning an employee from openly wearing a cross at work, Williams chose to travel with BA for a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI in the Vatican.

Sentamu also took on the BBC, which he claimed was biased against the Church of England: “We get more knocks. They do to us what they dare not do to Muslims.”

In an impassioned critique of the “systematic erosion” of the majority faith by an “illiberal atheism”, he castigated the abandonment of traditional Christmas cards in favour of Season’s Greetings versions, the introduction of “Winterval” in the Christmas holiday period and the Royal Mail for not featuring Jesus on Christmas stamps.

With his trademark gap-toothed grin and staccato enunciation of quaint English, the Ugandan-born archbishop is credited with having an electrifying effect on faithless, post-Christian Britain.

If Papa Ratzi, Dr. Sanity and the Archbishop of York be for us, who can be against us? Listen here.

Update: Pajamas Media links.
 

The two faces of Tiny

On the alert this morning after running a feline intruder off her territory, Tiny is still all eyes and ears and olfactory alertness in the aftermath of her re-establishment of the status quo, ever "adaptive to newly acquired information about the world," as we blogged recently in our post "The head can be removed after cooking."

Back inside the inner sanctum, she pauses for a moment of reflection, assuming the role of the female subject of a Vermeer -- or perhaps a Sargent -- a prop in our ongoing study of the light fantastic, revealing beauty in unexpected places.

Update: More beauty in expected places at Modulator's Friday Ark #114.

Update II: All cats all the time at the 140th Carnival of the Cats with resident felines Kosmo, Mouse and Amber at Scribblings.

We await some explanation

Thank you, indeed. This from a window during Thanksgiving walkies yesterday in that anti-war Kennedy-Kerry stronghold, Newburyport, MA.

Update: Before reading this whiny rant, check our wise readers' comments for a much-needed course correction. As Laura Lee commented, "I read your piece and felt like you were feeling really emotional about the death of Litvinenko. It struck me hard too." It was the pictures of Litvinenko's proud, heartbroken father that got us, but now it's time to pick ourselves up and get back in the race.

Original post [washes paw]: Tony Snow, where are you? The horrendous murder of Litvinenko must be explained. The fact that you have said nothing for what -- 24 hours? -- is horrific, untenable. Maybe we missed something?

Sir, we await some explanation. Pootie-Poot with his Christian cross about his neck and his face-to-face confrontation with the man from Crawford who claims he "looked into his soul" no longer works for us, not to mention his sale of rockets to our "friends" down Iran. What does your boss have to say? We're starting to think his adversaries were on to something when they suggested he was "incurious." Not that they are not incurious themselves, but how long do you expect us to suspend our disbelief?

Another window display during walkies yestarday, the other side of the anti-war, anti-capitalist collectivism that is Taxachusetts. Let the Christmas sales begin, and may the best entrepreneur win!

George W. Bush has abandoned us, as far as we can tell. We put up with a lot of trashy, anti-science, pro-"Intelligent Design" fundamentalist stuff we didn't buy -- what with our being an atheistic Catholic -- for the greater good of homeland security, but this will not stand.

The Democrats have nothing to offer, and the closest we come to anything tenable is Joey Lieberman. Were we a Founding Father, we would be rolling over in our grave. As it stands, we are sick at heart. No one ever said it was going to be easy, but we put our faith in you, GW Bush and your spokesman, our beloved Tony Snow. Where do we turn now?

Scenes from a Thanksgiving

The younger generation lies down -- in the Peaceable Kingdom sense -- with the older in a civilized and highly entertaining gathering of the clan for Thanksgiving at our brother and sister-in-law's in River City yesterday. Above, Heather, Sarah, Tuck, Susan and Ellen ask the Lord's blessing.

"A wonderful time was had by all [as far as we could tell], but most of my pictures are out of focus and/or captured the moment when one or more of the guests was blinking," we imailed our sis this afternoon re our photographic attempts to capture some of the magic of brother and sister-in-law B & E's brilliant Thanksgiving celebration yesterday.

Goomp and Heather -- are you taking my picture? -- enjoy prosciutto-wrapped aparagus at yesterday's festivities, while Chris, Susan and Tuck assist and keep Ellen company in the kitchen (background) as our hostess prepares to mount the Mother of All Groaning Boards for our dining pleasure. The wonderfully theatrical separation of conversation nooks encouraged the mingling and regrouping of varying configurations of guests over the course of the afternoon prior to the Main Event. While conversation itself was lively, the camera caught a misleadingly everyone-talking-past-each-other, "lengthy sequences without dialogue" moment. It wasn't that way at all in person. Followers of Palestinian stringers take note.

B & E's addition (foreground in above photo) to their neatly appointed Queen Anne home in one of Boston's historically-rich North Shore bedroom communities makes a perfect entertaining space when combined with the counter-islanded kitchen (background). Behind us as we took the picture are French doors opening out onto a raised porch that steps down to their richly-planted back yard, with a city pocket park (see below) and the mighty river beyond, an appropriated landscape that lends their intimate garden an Olmstedian sense of something beckoning us beyond the immediate scene.

We feasted our eyes upon Ellen's cornucopia of table decorations, some new, some old, all blended with her expert eye in a tour de force of the decorator's art.

The table was full of turkeys -- a tureen, papier mache candleholders, placecards -- even before the food arrived.  Ellen is our own local -- scandal-free -- Martha Stewart of home decor. Her wreaths, centerpieces and Christmas trees always dazzle.

Sarah by candlelight. Everyone says our elder niece resembles Sissy herself in our salad days. Well, we were quite a looker back then. Sarah and her younger sis, Heather (below) -- both George Washington University grads who work and study inside the Beltway -- regaled us with tales of their recent insiders' visit to the West wing. Heather promises photos in the near future. Watch this space.

It's WHO you know, as Heather (above) reported, a friend of hers having provided access to the West Wing for herself and a few close associates.

Here's the park referenced above behind B & E's house, which is the grey building upper right. If you look closely, you'll see the French doors described above. That's our own man-of-many-hats Tuck in the photo, together with Sarah during a post-prandial walk about town. Behind us, again, as we took the picture, is the mighty Merrimack River.

Thank you, brother Ben & Company for a most memorable day of Thanksgiving.

"Wilder than wild, who will tame me?"

The untamable Tiny enjoys a wilder-than-wild moment early morning after plucking a superbowl from her collection and pursuing it about the dining room.

"Wilder than wild, who will tame me?" goes the Dutch folk song that was transformed -- in the wake of the Battle of Turnhout of 1597, in which Prince Maurice of Orange defeated the Spanish occupiers of a town in what is now the Netherlands -- into "We gather together," the familiar Thanksgiving hymn about overcoming religious oppression. So wrote Melanie Kirkpatrick in OpinionJournal last year. We missed her fascinating mini-history at the time, but thanks to the internet search function, it was right near the top when we typed in the first few words of the hymn:

It's tantalizing to think that the English Pilgrims -- in exile in Holland, the only place in Europe where they could worship freely--might have been familiar with "Wilt heden nu treden." There's no record that they were, but the circumstantial evidence is strong. Some of them spoke Dutch, attended Dutch churches and even became Dutch citizens. "It's possible, I'd even go so far as to say it's probable, that the Pilgrims knew the tune," says John Kemp of Plimouth Plantation, the living-history museum of 17th-century America.

But to the Pilgrim mindset, "We Gather Together" would have been a secular song. It wasn't the direct word of the Bible, which meant they would not have sung it at church. The Pilgrims, like the Dutch Calvinists, sang only Psalms in worship and then without musical accompaniment or even harmony, which they considered "man glorifying in man's art," says Mr. Kemp. They saw any song except a Psalm as a violation of the commandment against idolatry.

Pausing between parries and thrusts, Tiny keeps her eye on the ball.

We gather together to ask the Lord's blessing;
he chastens and hastens his will to make known;
the wicked oppressing now cease from distressing:
sing praise to his Name, he forgets not his own.

Beside us to guide us, our God with us joining,
ordaining, maintaining his kingdom divine;
so from the beginning the fight we were winning:
thou, Lord, wast at our side: all glory be thine!

We all do extol thee, thou leader triumphant,
and pray that thou still our defender wilt be.
Let thy congregation escape tribulation:
thy Name be ever praised! O Lord, make us free!

What would the Pilgrims think of the rampant glorification in man's art that pervades the hearts and minds of the people who occupy the land of their "shining city upon a hill" in our day? Would they still see a  glimmer of light in our commitment to human freedom?

A Chelsea morning

Tiny loves Tuck . . .

And Tuck loves Tiny.