Fall Colors

Some photos I took recently: native sunflowers, mountain mint, goldenrod.

Circular Polarizer

This morning I went for a walk and played around with a circular polarizing filter on my camera. I took a series of before and afters:

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

La Marche des Scythes

"La Marche des Scythes" is a piece for harpsichord by Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer (1705 - 1755). Fiery, virtuosic, moody, humorous; I have trouble believing fingers can move like this. The growling of the bass is fantastic.

Skip Sempé has the best performance I've heard.

Jean Rondeau has an impressive performance also, but a little less precise.

Silence

I like this observation from Fr. Ray Blake, which I saw on Fr. Z's blog:

Why do attacks on the Church always begin attacks on contemplatives? It was the Carthusians the French masonic government first attacked in 1903, just as bloody Henry had begun his English Reformation with martyrdom of St John Houghton and his Carthusian companions. 

The silent Church is always a greater threat than the chattering Church. The chattering Church is easily manipulated, it depends on its own resources, its own wisdom and insights, it is receptive to novelties and eager for change. The silent Church is close to Christ, it contemplates the essential mysteries of the faith, it is in the World but not of it, it depends not on its own resources but the Power of God. It is united to an unbroken Tradition.

I really must watch Into Great Silence again soon...