All posts by bradbirzer

By day, I'm a father of seven and husband of one. By night, I'm an author, a biographer, and a prog rocker. Interests: Rush, progressive rock, cultural criticisms, the Rocky Mountains, individual liberty, history, hiking, and science fiction.
Philosophy, Politics

Focus on Reining in the American Bar Association | The Literary Lawyer: A Forum for the Legal and Literary Communities

If I had one suggestion for the Department of Education going forward, it would be to strip the American Bar Association of its accreditation authority over law schools, leaving state supreme courts and state bar associations to determine whether graduates of any given law school may sit for the bar examination in their state. This move would require pressure from law schools, state legislators, and state supreme courts. It could unite conservatives and progressives in common cause.
— Read on allenmendenhallblog.com/2018/12/03/focus-on-reining-in-the-american-bar-association/

Philosophy

When Elites Were Elites | UB

That element is the “Republic of Letters,” which, Fumaroli explains, is today often a sort of jibe or ironic self-parody of the pompous and barely hidden commercial and professional competition of the literary world. The term, however, once meant something very different. It referred to a pan-European “society of literary and solitary savants,” with an overwhelming focus on the wisdom of antiquity. They studied the ancient world, engaged in a reading, rereading, and reinterpreting of its wisdom, and applied it to scholarly debates and European affairs. Their work did not render the original thinkers obsolete; this enterprise was viewed as a communion with the thinkers of old in a similar way that Christians honored and prayed to the saints. The Republic of Letters formed a “society within another society, a contemplative society within an active society, and a society united by letters, beyond death and distance in the same intellectual adventure.”
— Read on kirkcenter.org/reviews/when-elites-were-elites/

Philosophy

Inner and Outer Freedom ~ TIC

It is in this inner space that imagina­tion and thinking have their place. Or perhaps better, it is in this place that we think things out in the imaginative presence of everything we care about. One might say that the possession of such an inner place is identical with being free: here, inaccessible to the world’s manipulations but not isolated from its gifts, we fulfill our most intimately proper function, which is to think… (essay by Eva Brann)
— Read on theimaginativeconservative.org/2018/12/inner-outer-freedom-eva-brann-90.html

Art, Film

Daredevil canceled with S4 mapped out, even Marvel execs ‘stunned’ | SYFY WIRE

A whole season flushed away.
— Read on www.syfy.com/syfywire/daredevil-canceled-with-s4-mapped-out-even-marvel-execs-stunned-by-move

Sheesh, this makes me so sad. For what it’s worth, Daredevil season 3 is the best thing I’ve seen on large or small screen since Stranger Things season one. All great things seem fleeting in this world. DD was, by far, the most heroic and most Catholic thing I’ve EVER seen on the big and small screen.

Art

Authors, It’s Time to Grow Up

In every corner of the art world, there are salacious tales of petty arguments, long-held feuds, squabbles and fiascos. Whether it’s actors who vow never to
— Read on goodereader.com/blog/indie-author-news/authors-its-time-to-grow-up

Mercy is a fine writer, and I very much appreciate the call for civility.

Faith

Can America Become a Christian Society Again? ~ The Imaginative Conservative

Bishop Chaput, who oversees a large Catholic school system, notes that most Catholic school children attend public schools and “only 3 percent of Hispanic Catholic children attend Catholic schools,” with the consequence that ”the freedom and ability of Catholic families “to raise their children according to Christian beliefs is also, in everyday practice, becoming more difficult.” But Bishop Chaput does not approach the subject with the passions of Dr. Esolen, and he takes a somewhat distant approach, letting various sources he cites make the more stinging comments. He makes no plea for Catholics to attend Catholic schools, no argument that his own Catholic schools offer an alternative, and gives no details about what a Catholic or Christian education would look like.
— Read on theimaginativeconservative.org/2018/12/america-become-christian-society-thomas-ascik-timeless.html

Poetry

Colosseum Books Poetry Series – Franciscan University Press | Franciscan University of Steubenville

Colosseum Books is an annual series of volumes of new poetry and poetry criticism that exhibit spiritual and intellectual depth and an understanding of verse as a craft guided by enduring tradition, metrical rigor, and a commitment to the well-made thing. Each Colosseum book will be published by the Franciscan University at Steubenville Press.

In the ancient world, the civilizational achievements of Rome were transformed and leavened by the spirit of Christianity. The Colosseum stood as a symbol of the struggle and suffering such a new birth entailed, but also of final victory and union, as Christendom emerged to take possession of the treasures of Athens and Jerusalem with Rome as its spiritual capital. In the modern age, the English writer Christopher Dawson edited the review Colosseum as a forum for the Catholic intellectual world to engage contemporary arts and culture. In its pages such great minds as Dawson, Jacques Maritain, and E.I. Watkin studied and discussed the literary achievement of T.S. Eliot, Sigrid Undset, and other writers of the Catholic literary revival and beyond.
— Read on www.franciscan.edu/press/colosseum-books/

–James M. Wilson is an excellent poet, brilliant thinker, and good ally. Very happy to see him as editor of this new series.

History, Politics

Manifest Destiny and the American Nimrods ~ The Imaginative Conservative

Whatever one wants to label it, American expansion has led to the habit of empire, expansion, and war. As Americans, we might very well cover our actions and deeds in fair, liberal, and republican language, but these adornments cannot change the essence of imperialism, by whatever name. The repeated government removal of American Indians is certainly one blatant example of this imperialism in the 19th century, which often failed even to discriminate against those Indian tribes hostile to American interests (such as the Sioux) and those in admiration and alliance (the Nez Perce).
— Read on theimaginativeconservative.org/2018/11/manifest-destiny-american-nimrods-bradley-birzer.html