A late Lent bibliography
I’m just now getting into the spiritual and intellectual work I associate with Lent. Barring some quick epiphanies, this work will stretch into the Easter season.Here are some of the things I’m...
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Scott Schaeffer-Duffy’s Catholic Worker murder mystery: Murder on Mott Street
Longtime Worcester Catholic Worker Scott Schaeffer-Duffy has written a historical-fiction mystery in which “teen detective” Tamar Batterham (aka Dorothy Day’s daughter) teams up with Catholic Worker...
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Lenten Gameplan, 2019
Fasting: At last, Facebook has become a miserable enough experience that it doesn’t feel like a sacrifice to give it up. So the likely candidates this year are the old classics: giving up (some) sugar,...
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Jubilate Agno
“For I bless the PRINCE of PEACE and pray that all the guns may be nailâ€d up, save such are for the rejoicing days.” –Christopher Smart, Jubilate Agno Wow! Here’s a reading of Christopher Smart’s...
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Theorists of Nonviolence: Ballou, Tolstoy, Gandhi, and Sharp
Adin Ballou is a truly revolutionary figure, deserving of serious public and scholarly attention. I want to focus on his achievement as a theorist of nonviolence: how his life and writings contributed...
View ArticleBook: Justice Seekers, Peace Makers
Another Michael True work posted online this week: PDFs from his book Justice Seekers, Peace Makers. Don’t be surprised if some of these chapters show up as future posts on Pie and Coffee. Martin...
View ArticleNonviolence, racism, and the state
You may recall my frustrated critique of the essay “Nonviolence as Racism.” One of many things I disliked about this essay is that it didn’t back up many of its assertions, and seemed more off-the-cuff...
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Two comments on two quotes from Nassim Nicholas Taleb
The first quote is from NNT’s book The Black Swan: These were the days when it was extremely common for traders to break phones when they lost money. Some resorted to destroying chairs, tables, or...
View ArticleDifferent kinds of non-resistance
From the first chapter of Christian Non-Resistance by Adin Ballou (1846). What is Christian Non-Resistance? It is that original peculiar kind of non-resistance, which was enjoined and exemplified by...
View Article508 #68: WPI and PILOT
508 is a show about Worcester. This week, I talk to Brendan Melican. Topics include inaccurate predictions, the Telegram & Gazette’s website troubles, and WPI making non-tax payments to the city....
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George der Naygeriker
Zack Berger’s Yiddish translation of Curious George is out! There is no better holiday gift, save perhaps his Yiddish translation of The Cat in the Hat. Update: Don’t miss our interview with Zack...
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An Interview with Zack Berger
A few years ago, Zack Berger and Celeste Sollod self-published Zack’s Yiddish translation of “The Cat in the Hat,” Di Kats der Piyatz. Following the success of that book, they’ve come out with Zack’s...
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Various Articles
The L.A. Times today is chock-full of articles relevant to P&C. The lead story is on the massive demonstrations against proposed draconian laws against illegal immigration. They say it’s the...
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Sign of Peace 5.2: Counter-recruitment and the Church
The latest issue of the Catholic Peace Fellowship‘s journal, The Sign of Peace, is excellent. You may wish to download the PDF. The CPF would also be delighted to mail you copies. There follow some...
View ArticleTwo comments on two quotes from Yochai Benkler
I’m starting a project on Yochai Benkler’s The Wealth of Networks, and already a couple quotes have caught my attention. Benkler spends most of the book describing how our information, as opposed to...
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God, violence, and what I watched growing up
Most young Americans don’t have a firsthand experience of war. Many grow up with no experience of intense violence at all. Their attitudes towards these things are shaped by art: books, TV shows, the...
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Discussing “A Good War Is Hard to Find”
This week we’re publishing some thoughts on David Griffith’s book A Good War Is Hard to Find: The Art of Violence in America. We’ll be featuring Dave’s response, too. The first reviews are from Mike...
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Nation of Lost Souls
In An Ethic for Christians, William Stringfellow wrote: “The unique aspect of biblical faith is that immediate, mundane history is beheld, affirmed, and lived as the true story of the redemption of...
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A comment on “Good War”
I’ve been e-mailing with my little brother Mark about David Griffith’s A Good War Is Hard to Find, and about Christopher Sorrentino’s review of the book in the New York Times. The New York Times review...
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“True Romance” and true compassion
When I was in college I watched the movie True Romance with some friends. Iâ€d never seen anything so painfully violent, and I told them how it bothered me. Their response was dismissive and they...
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Response: part 1 of 2
Shame. To shame someone. To put them to shame. Shame on you. Shame. Shame. Shame. Shame. Say a word often enough and it starts to lose its coherency. It becomes pure noise: a “shhh†sound, followed...
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New work from Mike True and Dan Berrigan
Last night I got to listen to some of Father Daniel Berrigan’s new poetry CD, The Trouble with Our State. Listening to the readings helped me make sense of the poems (there was one line about Graham...
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Response: part 2 of 3
Sorry itâ€s taken so long to come up with part 2 of my response. Many forces have conspired against me to ensure that I didnâ€t finish, among them the horrible tragedy at Virginia Tech. To pick up on...
View ArticleThe Wealth of Networks podcast
Here’s a recording of myself reading Yochai Benkler’s The Wealth of Networks. To listen, see the Internet Archive page, or download a zip of the mp3s (559MB). For a taste, listen to Chapter 12 (the...
View ArticleDavid Griffith and Wayne Kostenbaum podcast
David Griffith, author of A Good War Is Hard to Find, points to a recent podcast interview with him and Wayne Kostenbaum. He doesn’t point to the mp3, so I’ve linked to it here [mp3]. You can also...
View ArticleLearning to Read
I just discovered this article by Janine Schwab in PeaceWork Magazine. It’s about living in a foreign country, poetry and activism. It includes the author’s own translation of a poem by Viennese...
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