From the archives: What violence kills

From a post in November 2015

I read an interesting blog post recently: Simone Weil and Homer, by David Beardsley, on the Circe Institute blog. This is the part that struck me:

"By not making the clear connection to the one war, however, she made a clear connection to all War; to the eternal process that is inevitable when one country, one sect, one person, seeks domination.

"She also describes those moments of love that do break through the 'monotonous desolation:' hospitable, filial, brotherly, conjugal, even the friendship that can occur between mortal enemies such as Achilles and Priam.  'These moments of grace,' she says, 'are rare in the Iliad, but they are enough to make us feel with sharp regret what it is that violence has killed and will kill again.'”

Something to read today (it could change your Decembers forever)

In Defense of Advent, by Greg Wilbur, on the CIRCE blog.

2022 Updated link

A sample:

"Imagine the difference this type of celebration makes. Instead of endless gatherings, fighting traffic at the mall, retrieving the daily stacks of catalogs from the mail, and the family pressures and stress, these four Sundays and the weeks in between are intended as a quiet and reflective time to examine your heart, make peace with God and your neighbor, seek reconciliation and repentance for sin, and make room for Christ."

From the recent archives: All Creation Waits (Book Review)

First posted November 2016. Check out this week's Mason Jar podcast for an interview with Gayle Boss and Megan Hoyt!

"Every single creature is full of God and is a book about God. Every creature is a word of God. If I spend enough time with the tiniest creature, even a caterpillar, I would never have to prepare a sermon. So full of God is every creature." ~~ Meister Eckhart, quoted as a preface to All Creation Waits

In his review of All Creation Waits, writer Brian Doyle refers to it as a "sidelong" book, which I take to mean indirect, something like a parable. In twenty-five short readings, accompanied with woodcut illustrations, Gayle Boss takes you on an early-winter walk around Lake Michigan, with stop-offs to visit skunks, foxes, porcupines, and other local inhabitants. What are they doing at this time of year? As "all creation waits" for the Advent of the Saviour, animal activities are lyrically described, but without much added-on interpretation. This is not a book of prayers or Scriptures; the animals are not analogies; they do not think of much beyond shelter and food, and they have no imagined sense that Christmas is coming. It reminds me more of Prayers from the Ark, or some of the Christmas readings that take the viewpoint of the cow and the spider; or the muskrat scene at the beginning of The Long Winter.

A sample from the chapter "Whitetail Deer":

"Gliding through the woods in groups of two, three, or four, their coats the color of brush and bark render them nearly invisible to us. So when, in October, we see herds of them out in the open, it seems a curtain has been pulled back on a secret society. They know the cold is coming. Banding together against predators, they forage widely in the fields before their food freezes, or vanishes under snow.

"But then, a drive deeper than feeding seizes them. By November both bucks and does, restless, verge on reckless. Trumping food and wariness, the primal urge to reproduce one’s self and one’s kind surges with the winds of the coming, killing cold."

This book would be most suitable for families with children, who perhaps are looking for something non-commercial but also not directly Bible-related for Advent reading times. [One possible note of caution: there are occasional references to mating which might or might not be appropriate for some families.] It could be useful for homeschoolers, or for those who need a set of readings for less-usual, out-of-church situations. It is a good reminder that the animals are (still, thankfully) all around us. Their stories are a (sidelong) glimpse of the way God creates and sustains them--and us.

Statement of disclosure: I received a complimentary e-copy of this book for purposes of review, but I was not otherwise compensated for this review. All opinions are my own.

Christmas Countdown with Charlotte Mason, Week 8 of 12: Every lesson goes somewhere

5 weeks till Christmas!

Here is this week's passage from Charlotte Mason's book Parents and Children.

"The Self-regarding Child no longer Humble––But these are the least of the reasons why a child should be trained to put up with little discomforts and take no notice. The child who has been allowed to become self-regardful in the matter of sensations, as of appetites, has lost his child's estate, he is no longer humble; he is in the condition of thinking about himself; instead of that infinitely blessed condition of not being aware of himself at all...though a child may cry with sudden distress, he does not really think about his aches and pains unless his thoughts be turned to his ailments by those about him.  

"No Spartan Regimen––I am not advising any Spartan regimen. It is not permitted to us to inflict hardness in order that the children may learn to endure. Our care is simply to direct their consciousness from their own sensations...At the same time, though the child himself be taught to disregard them, his sensations should be carefully watched by his elders, for they must consider and act upon the danger signals which the child himself must be taught to disregard. But it is usually possible to attend to a child's sensations without letting him know they have been observed."

In the spirit of Charlotte Mason:

This is the last bit in the chapter about protecting children's natural disinclination to self-obsession, and reflecting on what adults can learn from being around them. We are assured here that what may sound harsh (don't be too quick to fuss over every bump) is actually a reminder that parents need to keep their eyes open for their children's needs, without noticeably interfering. In one sense it requires an impossible amount of wisdom and discernment; but it can also be a simple outgrowth of our own will to live without self-obsession and self-importance. It is a form of "masterly inactivity," that also teaches children to quietly, respectfully, and non-intrusively care in the same way for the needs of others. 

And why? Why are we doing this? And what does it have to do with the themes of Advent?

Consider this passage posted by Danny Breed at the Circe blog:

"As we sat around a table during staff training, listening to a talk, three of my teachers and I heard a familiar refrain that begged to be pondered: 'The glory of God must be the aim in our teaching...'

"We began talking about the purpose and end of a lesson. Every lesson is going to go somewhere and it is going to make much of something, if there is any weight and wonder to it. To glorify God is to make much of God and to glorify anything else is to make much of that something else. When Moses asked to see God’s glory, God showed Moses Himself by walking in front of him. Thus glory and glorifying is tied to some aspect of showing off how great God is."

Danny Breed may have been talking about school lessons, but...quietly, respectfully, non-obtrusively...our everyday lives are also lessons. What's it about, that idea of being able to get over a small hurt quickly?--not just learning courage and taking steps toward maturity, but being able to take our eyes off ourselves altogether and glorify God. The point of not complaining?--to allow us to see God's glory, and how can we do that if we're focused on our own circumstances?. "Every lesson is going to go somewhere, and it is going to make much of something." That something, in Charlotte Mason's words, is meant to be something, or Someone, outside of ourselves. It is not just how we live, but why we live.

"Yea, Lord, we greet Thee, born this happy morning;
Jesus, to Thee be all glory given..."

This will be hanging on our apartment door soon

Things to Do This Week:

My fourth-grade Christmas play was Judith Martin's "The Runaway Presents." (I got to wear a large, very uncomfortable cardboard box.) The main character, Mrs. Hurry-up, sings this song: "Wrap and tie, wrap and tie, I should have started in July." December 25th will come before we know it and be gone again, even if the presents run away on us. 

So what's to do this week without rushing things too much? And how do our preparations glorify God?

If we cook or bake for a celebration (like Thanksgiving), maybe the glorifying is not in the sugar or the flour or the cranberries, but in the gift of those who work together to prepare it, and those will share it together. Even those who clean up afterwards.

The glorifying in a decoration, or in playing uplifting music, might be in a prayer that those who see it or hear it will sense our joy.

"Mamy, who lived in a small house next to Lord's Chapel, couldn't imagine why people would want to go to church in the middle of the night. She did confess however, that as she became increasingly wakeful in her old age, the midnight service was something to look forward to, as, however faint it might be, she could hear the singing." ~~ Jan Karon, Shepherds Abiding

On the quiet side, how about staying warm with a good book (again)? Brenda at Coffee, Tea, Books, and Me just posted a lovely holiday reading list for grownups which includes Shepherds Abiding. Consider also Father Tim's vacation reading list from To Be Where You Are: "Travels with Charley, The Book of Common Prayer...The Oxford Book of English Verse, Allen and Greenough's New Latin Grammar, several novels by dead authors, plenty of Billy Collins, Mary Oliver, and Wendell Berry...and a volume of Wordsworth for old times' sake." To which I might add, To Be Where You Are.

Fresh from the thrift store

Finally, here's some online inspiration: The Prudent Homemaker shares Ten Ways to Add Joy to Your Life When You Don't Have a Penny to Spare.

Quote for the day: It's mediocre (Joshua Gibbs on Circe)

"Good things are hard to like, and mediocre things easy. Mediocre things are tailored to our most ready, most easily accessible desires. All men desire beauty and goodness, but those desires lay buried deep within our souls and we are only willing to hoist them out on rare occasions. Liking good things requires effort, but we are accidentally seduced by the mediocre. The man who succumbs early to the temptations of mediocrity knows that, whatever else, he at very least has a great volume of something in store for himself. There is far more money to be made in the mediocre than in the beautiful and good." ~~ "The Dangers of Mediocrity in a Consumerist Society," by Joshua Gibbs on the Circe Blog

Quote for the day: Not born free?

"When God Himself gave His ten commandments to the children of Israel, He did not impose an arbitrary rule. Drawing on the principle of propriety, He expressed ten laws that, if they followed them, would lead them to treat things as they ought to be treated (Worship the Lord, honor your parents, leave the neighbors stuff alone, etc.) and, since that is how reality is structured, they could be free. Not just free from Egypt, but free to be His people who knew them and what led to their flourishing." ~~ Andrew Kern, "Writing as a Liberating Art," Circe Institute blog

Best thing to read today

At the Circe Institute blog: Great Books Give Us Something to be Human With.

Something to read today, and a quote on malaise and discord

Joshua Gibbs just posted an interesting article on the Circe Institute blog, about whether one classical teacher in a school is more classical than another. He makes the point that the point is effectiveness.

But towards the end, he says something that echoes Charlotte Mason's words on teachers who wield undue influence over students, and also her beliefs on loyalty:

"So, too, the Catholic teacher who incites Presbyterian students to doubt the Presbytery is not making his students into Catholics, but atheists. Once malaise emerges, it is hard to direct. Malaise is like ink in water and becomes diffuse. In and of itself, discord does not kill morale, because man is born into trouble as the sparks rise. A little discord is unavoidable. However, the knowledge that discord is intentionally being stirred up breaks the spirit."

Worth reading and thinking about.

Great stuff to read this weekend

The Common Room shares a number of insights on reading by Isaac Watts. One thought:

"And remember that one book read over in this manner, with all this laborious meditation, will tend more to enrich your understanding, than the skimming over the surface of twenty authors."

Joshua Butcher, at the Circe blog, talks about the problems of translating classical authors, and quotes Alan Bloom:

To this Bloom replies that such translators have, “the assurance that they have a sufficient understanding of Plato’s meaning, and that that meaning is pretty much the kind of thing Englishmen or Americans already think. However, it might be more prudent to let the reader decide whether ‘the beautiful and the good’ are simply equivalent to ‘moral values.’ If they are the same, he will soon enough find out. And if they are not, as may be the case, he will not be prevented from finding that out and thereby putting his own opinions to the test.” 

Coffee, Tea, Books and Me talks about soup and cookbooks.

"Tamar Adler shared why most of us have bland bean soup and why the soup she made for Chez Panisse was delicious.  It is because we I have believed an old wive's tale about not salting beans that are cooking from the very beginning."

Socks for a cause at Ten Thousand Villages.

Prime Periwinkle thinks about bees (sort of).

To Sow a Seed has some words for parents.

"These brief years of raising children give way to a lifetime of relationship. The little boy who comes to you for ten bandaids today, the little girl who tattles on her sister every chance she gets… these are the people who will hold your hand as the older generation passes away, who will comfort you as your own days come to a close and Jesus is nearer than ever before."

Something to read today: "Words fail, but hearts understand"

A post on the Circe Institute Blog by Adam Andrews : "The Limitations of Language."

"What if [Jesus] isn’t underusing the language at all? What if He’s overusing it, stretching it to its absolute limit – all the way to the edge of simile and metaphor?"

From the archives: Leisure, the Beehive, and Plato

First posted November 1, 2009. I liked this so much that I reposted it last year, but I didn't include the Beehive link.

In tribute to The Beehive's very important post On Leisure, Learning, and Large Rooms:

"You are, in short, blind, and should take a week or a month of delightful leisure during which you set aside all these lowly values that have enslaved you, open your eyes to honor and virtue, engage in a pleasant humanizing conversation with some truly wise people, and, well, repent of your miserable miserliness. Because the more actively you inflict your vision on education, the more damage you are doing.

"There is no education without leisure for the simple reason that education is a leisure activity. It requires all of the other values: controls, freedom, money, and honor. But it’s only true end is virtue for the simple reason that only virtue is big enough to rightly order the other goods. The wise man knows where and how to get honor, money, freedom, and controls, and he knows how to use them. Because he is not driven by them as by an unruly mob. Instead he governs them."

--from Leisure, Plato’s Republic, and American Education
Posted on Quiddity, December 9, 2008 by Andrew Kern

Good reading today at Circe: History all around us

Joshua Gibbs has posted his typical intro to a medieval history class on the Circe Blog. A sample:

"You learn about Pearl Harbor, Charlemagne, the age of Martyrs… the past gets closer and closer to you until you can’t really tell the difference between 1000 BC and yesterday. You learn about Charlemagne, you learn about yourself, your father, your children, the future. History is the human things, the eternal things, the always things, the omnipresent things. Charlemagne isn’t in the past. Charlemagne is in your blood. The study of Charlemagne isn’t the study of a man who was, it’s the study of a man who is. For the Christian, the past is above us, not below us. For the Christian, the past is not without us, the past is within us."

Worth a visit!

Oh yes, please do read this today

More than once, I've gone back to Wendell Berry's novel Hannah Coulter; even posted about it here in relation to the way the children in the Branch family grew up, learning what they needed to learn and doing what they needed to do. One of the latest Circe Institute blog posts looks at the theme of education throughout the book, discussing what happened to Hannah's own children (who became successful in the modern sense, but lost too much personally). As the article asks, does schooling (and then work outside the home) have to mean the loss of one's roots?

Plugs and podcasts, now with an extra link

Some useful stuff for teaching parents:

Discover Reading, by Amy Tuttle. How an experienced homeschool mom applies Charlotte Mason's early reading lessons.

Let's Play Math, by Denise Gaskins. Just about everything you need to be a great homeschool math teacher, all in one book. I was impressed by the fact that this is not just another book of website links: it's something I actually enjoyed reading (even without anybody homeschooling here now).

Some things you might like to listen to:

The most recent episode of The Mason Jar, with guest Naomi Goegan. You too can do nature study!

And more nature study: The Deputy Headmistress reads from a CM-era conference paper. The Reverend Thornley is said to have been a favourite guest with the student teachers at Ambleside.

Episode 13 of Your Morning Basket. About Plutarch. With guest...me. I hope you enjoy it. (There is a new volume of The Plutarch Project coming out soon too.)

Something to read today: Is it all so clear and obvious?

Joshua Gibbs on the Circe Institute blog muses on "Call No Man Father," among other texts.

A Week of Joy: Something to listen to

Quiddity #59 (Advent Edition) features Christine Perrin and Matt Bianco discussing T.S. Eliot's "The Journey of the Magi." (You can hear T.S.  Eliot reading his poem here.)

Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you might say) satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again... 

Quote for the day: Delightful Leisure

I found this posted in our archives and thought it was worth reposting.

"You are, in short, blind, and should take a week or a month of delightful leisure during which you set aside all these lowly values that have enslaved you, open your eyes to honor and virtue, engage in a pleasant humanizing conversation with some truly wise people, and, well, repent of your miserable miserliness. Because the more actively you inflict your vision on education, the more damage you are doing."

"There is no education without leisure for the simple reason that education is a leisure activity. It requires all of the other values: controls, freedom, money, and honor. But its only true end is virtue for the simple reason that only virtue is big enough to rightly order the other goods. The wise man knows where and how to get honor, money, freedom, and controls, and he knows how to use them. Because he is not driven by them as by an unruly mob. Instead he governs them."

--from "Leisure, Plato’s Republic, and American Education" (read the rest!)

Posted on Quiddity, December 9, 2008 by Andrew Kern

Circe Quote for the Day: Preparing a lesson is not the same as just writing it

"There's no substitute for a teacher's quality preparation. Without preparation a teacher can't teach with purpose.  This obviously refers to photocopies and supplies and crafting lesson plans, all of which are important.

"But it also refers to the kind of preparation that involves contemplation. A good teacher reflects on both the subject he is teaching and his role as a cultivator of wisdom and virtue; he doesn't lose sight of (or ignore) the purpose of his calling. That is, he doesn't allow contemplation of the lesson plans to keep him from preparing his own mind and soul for the act of seed-planting."

Full article: 3 Things Teachers Can Learn from Cooking, by David Kern

Scientism--what a great word

I linked to this post earlier today:

The Problem of Scientism in Conventional Education, by Jason Barney, at the Circe Institute Blog. "Educational schools have become labs, where white-coated practitioners test the latest theories on the thousands of children scattered in their suburban and inner-city habitats across America. The best teachers read the educational journals and carefully follow the latest research on how to most effectively manipulate the environments of their subjects in order to attain society’s desired ends. Scientism listens to evidence and data, not to history or philosophy."

In Norms and Nobility, David V. Hicks says this (page 8):

"Man's lust for power, not truth, feeds modern education. But this fact does not worry the educator....[the new way] better suits his scientific problem-solving approach....the the old self asserting a knowledge of man derived from the transcendent ideas and inherited truths of religion, art, and letters, and the new self insisting that man can know himself only by examining the composition of the material universe and drawing his inferences from that."

"I showed my masterpiece to the grown-ups, and asked them whether the drawing frightened them. But they answered: “Frighten? Why should any one be frightened by a hat?” My drawing was not a picture of a hat. It was a picture of a boa constrictor digesting an elephant. But since the grownups were not able to understand it, I made another drawing: I drew the inside of the boa constrictor, so that the grown-ups could see it clearly. They always need to have things explained." ~~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince

Good to read today: what's education for, anyway?

Andrew Kern has a very CMish post on the Circe blog: "For Gold's Sake."