Latina Latinae Gratia

As you are wrapping up the semester or planning summer vacations and what things you would like to study in the future, how about making the following resolution: I will learn Latin, the language of our Western heritage and the official language of the Catholic Church, the safeguard of that heritage.

If you are an undergraduate before you leave for summer break, march yourself to the registrar's office (or to their webpage) and sign up for a Latin 101 class for fall semester.

If you are a grad student no matter what field, also sign up for a Latin class. Some universities such as Catholic University have Intro to Latin for Graduate Students.

If you are no longer a student, you can always take Latin in a community college such as Northern Virginia Community College.

Though most foreign languages one can easily learn on one's own, you really should have a good teacher to help you with Latin, at least initially.

Spring Semester 2006 and Fall Semester 2006 at Christendom's grad school Notre Dame Graduate School in Alexandria, I took Intro to Ecclesiastical Latin and Intermediate Ecclesiastical Latin grad classes. They were extraordinarily enlightening classes, and they opened up a whole new world to the beauty and dignity of the Latin mass and music, as well as the wisdom and brilliance of Classical Civilization.

My professor was the excellent Catherine Caridi, who has a law degree in Canon Law from Catholic University and who is a very orthodox Catholic. For those of you in the Washington area, she also teaches at NOVA.

Two textbook recommendations: For a Catholic approach with Catholic examples in the exercises, the textbook A Primer to Eccesiastical Latin by John F. Collins and published by Catholic University is the best choice. That is the text we used in my classes. It is well organized and has many exercises. By the time you finish the book (which should take a year of study), you will know all the Latin grammar and will be ready for intermediate and advanced classes.

For a classical approach, Wheelock's Latin is the choice that everyone uses for Latin 101 and 102.

Both books together would be very useful.

So quit procrastinating: Let's throw off the collective amnesia and continue learning the language of our Western Civilization. If we don't know Latin, we don't know the language of our heritage. Make it your resolution to learn Latin..

Into Great Silence

I saw a most amazing movie this morning in downtown Washington: Into Great Silence. It is a stunning and incredible film, and if you live in a major metro area, you cannot miss this film. It has received terrific reviews by critics, and I would rank it as one of the best and most powerful movies ever made. It knocked me out emotionally and spiritually.

The power in this magnificent movie is all the more amazing in that there is virtually no dialogue in the entire almost three hours. I initially thought it would be an interesting, off-beat movie, but it was far, far better than I imagined it would be. It simply is one of the most powerful movies spiritually ever made.

Into Great Silence is never boring and trite; you initially get a calm, tranquil feeling and an awe at the ordinary that builds as the movie (one year in the life of the monks) into an insight of just what is God and what is Truth.

The movie takes place in a French Carthusian monastery high in the Alps, and it details the everyday ordinary activities of the monks and two novices in the monastery. The insight one gets is that the everyday spiritual activies are actually extraordinary in the spiritual realm, and that the monks, while outside of society, are truly the heart and soul of Western Civilization.

There is a meditative, almost Oriental aspect to the film that I used to feel while living and studying in Asia while in the mountains or traditional gardens, such as those in Japan. Many Westerners search out this feeling mistakingly embracing Oriental religions, when in fact this simplicity, traquility, and truth is at the heart and soul of our Western, Catholic traditions. You do not have to leave Europe and the West to seek it. Of course, many Westerners are in ignorance of the greatness of Western civilization because liberals have so often replaced our simple, dignified, and beautiful traditions in the liturgy and music with crass, vulgar, and lame modern aspects. Liberalism destroys.

To sum up: Go see this movie! It is a great film.

Not to degrade this post with liberal culture which seeks to destroy the best of Western society, but I could not help comparing Into Great Silence to some of the other films that were also playing at this cineplex in downtown Washington that caters to independent and foreign films . If Into Great Silence represents the best of tradition and the soul of Western society, compare it to the trailer and description of a movie--playing at the same cineplex--that represents the "best" of liberal and gay culture. The difference between traditionalists and preservers of our heritage and shallow liberals, destroyers of the same heritage who replace it with shallow pop nothingness, is stunning.

Can liberals now understand why so many people are against postmodern aspects that destroy our heritage, such as gay "marriage," that replace our wonderful heritage with demeaning pop culture and a false multiculturalism?