St. Stan
Totally random, but: You ever read about Stan Musial? Man, the guy was practically a saint, it would seem. A few entries from Wikipedia:
Even though Musial left [his hometown of] Donora after high school, he retained close ties to the town throughout the rest of his life. He maintained membership in local social clubs, and regularly sent a local doctor boxes of autographed baseballs, with the town's mayor using some for United Way fundraising. Musial also gave free meals at the restaurant he owned in St. Louis to any customers who presented valid ID proving they were Donora residents.
Musial met Lillian Susan Labash, the daughter of a local grocer,[155] in Donora when both were 15, and married her in St. Paul's Catholic Church in Daytona Beach, Florida on May 25, 1940. They had four children: son Richard, and daughters Gerry, Janet, and Jeanie. Lillian Musial died at 91, on May 3, 2012; their marriage had lasted for almost 72 years.[158] In his final years, Musial suffered from Alzheimer's disease.
During his playing years, Musial believed in racial equality and supported Jackie Robinson's right to play. After learning about the harmful effect of smoking in the 1950s, he refused to endorse tobacco products.
Mickey Mantle . . . once said that Musial "was a better player than me because he was a better man than me".
Open his cause! The first American professional sports saint. All based on a Wikipedia entry.
From the Notebooks: The Catholic Church–The Roman Catholic Church–inherited what was left of Rome. As the Empire fell, its soul passed into the Church. This might be the closest the Church gets to embracing the transmigration of souls, and it highlights a very important point: The Catholic Church is the patron and guardian of Western Civilization. As the Catholic Church goes, there goes Western Civilization.
The pitiful state of Catholicism in the West–from the child abuse scandal to Catholic majorities who reject Church teaching on fundamental things like homosexual marriage and contraception–and the rise of pornography, drug abuse, broken homes throughout western societies is no coincidence.
Catholicism and Western Civilization go together. Catholicism is the vehicle that carries the Civilization. To the extent that vehicle breaks down, Western Civilization breaks down. The Roman Catholic Church sedan is broken. Still running, sputtering, but broken. And the “progress” of Western Civilization has slowed to a crawl, with large segments of its population opting for other forms of civilization (Western Civilization isn't the only civilization. It's important to keep this in mind, though thoughtful reflection confirms that it's the best civilization and responsible for everything good that remains in western society today).
