The lunar eclipse tonight is going to be a good one (assuming cloud coverage isn't a problem). David Warren has details and a history.
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My most-recent blogging column is at The Register. Subscription required. It's about charity on the Internet. Excerpt:
The Christian practice of self-denying charity – which we're all thinking about daily now that we're in the heart of Lent – started in the very first centuries of “The Way.”
Ordinary Christians fasted and gave the savings to the poor; rich Christians donated greater sums; the Church cared for widows and orphans; St. Augustine established a hospice, ransomed slaves and gave clothing to the poor; St. John Chrysostom founded hospitals. (Meanwhile, wicked Julian the Apostate railed against it all, bitterly complaining that the Christians not only fed their own, but fed the pagans as well.)
Charitable causes and institutions established by the Church during the Middle Ages are legion: efforts to abolish gladiator games and slavery, a hospital in nearly every major city, monasteries that distributed alms, inns for weary travelers, orphanages. Even early Italian capitalist firms in the high Middle Ages and Renaissance eras were charitable, allocating dividends and liquidation proceeds to the poor as if they were stockholders.
When looking for Catholic charity bloggers, I discovered there aren't any. I was really surprised. You can find a blog dedicated to everything, but not to Catholic charities. There's a niche there for someone.
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I received an email about Oprah and her efforts to promote New Age religion. She's apparently into the crystal-loaded anti-Christian stuff ("Aw, Eric, we're not anti-Christian. We love everybody. We just hate dogma."). I did some research and it appears to be true. Here's a blogger who discussed it last November. Here's a link from Oprah's site that seems to indicate that she has, indeed, endorsed the New Age. If this is "old hat," my apologies, but Oprah is incredibly influential (witness Obama). If she's promoting this (dangerous?) mental trash as a mainstream good thing, it's disturbing. New Age religion is the meth (I can't spell "methamphetamine") of the spirit. Alright, that's an exaggeration, but it's debilitating stuff because it puts people on the wrong road in a self-righteous and noble-feeling kind of way. You're better off being a drunk. With booze, you feel bad right away and look for something better, but it could take thirty years to wake up from a New Age binger.
This would make a good segment for Mitch Pacwa at EWTN, whose Catholics and the New Age is an excellent primer on New Age issues.
