Insight Scoop | The Ignatius Press Blog

Cardinal Kasper: It's time for Anglicanism to "clarify its identity"

From The Catholic Herald:

Speaking on the day that the Archbishop of Canterbury met Benedict XVI in Rome, Cardinal Walter Kasper, the president of the Pontifical Council of Christian Unity, said it was time for Anglicanism to "clarify its identity".

He told the Catholic Herald: "Ultimately, it is a question of the identity of the Anglican Church. Where does it belong?

"Does it belong more to the churches of the first millennium -Catholic and Orthodox - or does it belong more to the Protestant churches of the 16th century? At the moment it is somewhere in between, but it must clarify its identity now and that will not be possible without certain difficult decisions."

He said he hoped that the Lambeth conference, an event which brings the worldwide Anglican Communion together every 10 years, would be the deciding moment for Anglicanism.

Cardinal Kasper, who has been asked to speak at the Lambeth Conference by the Archbishop of Canterbury, said: "We hope that certain fundamental questions will be clarified at the conference so that dialogue will be possible.

"We shall work and pray that it is possible, but I think that it is not sustainable to keep pushing decision-making back because it only extends the crisis."

Read the entire piece.

ABC News = "All Benedict Clichés"

This May 2nd ABC News piece goes looking for the "softer" and "gentler" Pope Benedict XVI, breaks out some burnt out clichés, and produces a vague "story" about how the media responds when the subject of a media-created stereotype fails to go along with that stereotype:

During his recent visit, Benedict showed a side the public had never seen before. He became the first pope to visit an American synagogue and noticeably doted on babies.

Benedict has, however, visited a synagogue in Germany (in 2005), and he has apparently doted on non-American children. If by "the public" is meant the "American public", then this makes some sense. But since this was Benedict's first visit to the U.S., I'm inclined to conclude that nearly everything would be a "first": Benedict takes his first step on U.S. soil. Benedict breathes his first breath of U.S. air. Benedict makes first visit to the White House. Benedict says his first Mass at Yankee Stadium. And so forth.

He's been pontiff for three years, but for many Americans, Benedict was still best known as the pope who followed John Paul II.

Hey, are Americans smart or what? (Raucous laughter.) I bet most Americans also know that Benedict is quite likely the pope who comes prior to the pope who follows him. This is very good stuff!

He seemed to be the very opposite of Paul, who was something of a rock star among Catholics and chipped away at the Iron Curtain and won over the hearts of Catholic youth with his very public warmth.

Seemed to be. Why? To whom? Really now, shouldn't a journalist be interested in getting past stupid caricatures that don't help explain, clarify, or demonstrate anything? Why, I can think of quite a few similarities between the two men: Catholic priests, intellectually gifted, well-educated, theological experts at Vatican II, dialogued with Jews and others, addressed secularism and relativism and numerous related problems, worked closely together for over 20 years, and so forth and so on.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger -- as Benedict used to be known -- was considered to be a stern hard-liner. He served John Paul II as "defender of the faith," responsible for protecting Catholic orthodoxy, earning the nickname of "God's Rottweiler."

Again, why? Seriously: who was it that labeled Ratzinger as "a stern hard-liner" and named him "God's Rottweiler"? Who is it who comes up with all of the negative, often infantile, nicknames? Who has promoted those nicknames heavily? And honestly, did anyone in the MSM really think that John Paul II wasn't a "hard-liner" who upheld Church teaching? Anyone?

But Benedict's first visit to the United States was one that portrayed him as cuddly and soft. This has led some to question whether the pope so many had written off as a tough guy is really a teddy bear in disguise.

What is this: a news report or a note in a high school yearbook? "hi jimmy. i'm so glad u and i got to no each other this year. at first i thought u were stuck on yerself. but yer actually really cool. yer like a teddy bare! yer friend. xxx ooo, beth." And how, I must ask, does a visit "portray" someone?

Now, however, the world stage has seen this warmer side. Many are watching and waiting, to see whether the soft side of the pope will emerge more frequently, particularly during his trip to Australia this summer -- now that he's seen how well it went over in the states.

What is this: a piece of journalism or a gossip column for People magazine? "The in-demand actor is considered warm and approachable, a spring personality with a summer wardrobe, whose presence melts hearts and brings smiles to the most hardened industry veterans. The emergence of his effusive, sunny side has been a welcome surprise, especially since it was only three years ago that he, in a fit of drunken rage, stormed off of the 'Tonight Show' after being asked if he still tortured small animals and listened to Rush Limbaugh."

Well, enough fun for now. The ABC piece was apparently the print version of a "report" given by reporter Claire Shipman. NewBusters.org has the full story, including audio and a transcript, of Shipman's shipwreck of a report.

Happy Birthday, Papa Benedict!

Joseph Ratzinger was born 81 years ago today, in 1927, in Marktl am Inn in Upper Bavaria,, on Holy Saturday. In Salt of the Earth (pp 42-3), he said this about being born just before Easter:

...I'm please to have been born on the vigil of Easter, already on the way to Easter, but not yet there, for it is still veiled. I find that a very good day, which in some sense hints at my conception of history and my own situation: on the threshold of Easter, but not yet through the door.

Little Joseph was baptized four hours after being born, at 8:30 in the morning.

And the coincidence that I was born at the very moment when the Church was preparing her baptismal water, so that I was the first person baptized with the new water, does indeed mean something to me. Because it situates me particularly in the context of Easter and also binds birth and baptism in a very suggestive way.

Read more about the Pope's childhood, in his own words. Christopher Blosser has another, similar quote, from Milestones: Memoirs 1927-1977,  along with a nice gallery of pictures of the Holy Father taken over his lifetime.

On a related note, here are Pope Benedict's remarks given earlier today at the White House. EWTN has print and video coverage of the Pope's visit to the White House; it can be accessed here.

Fr. Joseph Fessio's television schedule this week...

...includes appearances on CNN, PBS, FOX, and NBC:

Wednesday, April 16:

• CNN: 10 a.m. - 2 p.m. Eastern

Thursday, April 17:

• PBS "Newshour with Jim Lehrer": 6-7 p.m. Eastern

Friday, April 18:

• Fox News Channel: 5-6 p.m. Eastern

Saturday, April 19:

• NBC "Weekend Today": 7-9 a.m. Eastern  
• CNN "Saturday Morning": 9:30 - 11 a.m. Eastern

Sunday, April 20:

• CNN coverage of Yankee Stadium Mass: 2-6 p.m. Eastern

FOX News special about Pope Benedict XVI's visit will include...

...parts of an interview with Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J. I've not see the special, "Mission To America," but have been told that Fr. Fessio was interviewed and taped for it back in late February. The program, which is hosted by Chris Wallace, will air this Sunday evening, April 13 at 8:00 pm Eastern (5:00 pm Pacific) and then again at 11:00 pm Eastern (8 pm Pacific). FOX Religion Correspondent Lauren Green has written a bit about the program and about the Holy Father:

One of the greatest challenges in creating a special about the Pope’s visit is trying to figure out what he’s going to say. The Vatican is none to eager to hand us the Pope’s talking points. So we’re left with asking various high-level sources some probing questions, like “What’s on the Pope’s mind?” “What does he want to tell Americans?” “Will he reprimand wayward Catholics?”

But one thing’s for certain … this Pope wants to inspire a resurgence of faith in Christianity and, of course in Catholicism, in America.

In the course of research, I’ve learned lots about this Pope, and have tremendous respect for him. Even many who don’t agree with his theology, acknowledge that he’s the “go to guy” when it comes to peaceful religious dialogue.

But if you want to learn more about the Holy Father, I can suggest you read one or some of his many books. He’s truly a scholar, the professor pope, who’s written practically a library of materials. Some good reading would be Milestones, which is his memoirs as Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, before he was elected pope. But another interesting tome was not actually written by him but was an interview he did with a journalist. It’s called The Salt of the Earth. And the Pope’s latest book Jesus of Nazareth, is a great read for getting inside his theological mind and also to understand how personal faith is for him.

Read Green's entire post. All of the books she mentions, and many more, can be found on the Ignatius Insight page for Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI.

• The Pope's Childhood: In His Own Words | Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) | From Salt of the Earth: The Church at the End of the Millennium
• The Papal Visit | Fr. James V. Schall, S.J. | April 8, 2008

NBC producing Catholic-bashing mini-series, "The Last Templar"

Variety reports that NBC is producing a four-hour mini-series based on the novel, The Last Templar, by Raymond Khoury, which was one of about five billion Da Vinci Code clones released since Dan Brown's novel sold ten billion copies:

Oscar-winning thesp Mira Sorvino has signed on to star in "The Last Templar," an NBC miniseries based on the bestselling novel from Raymond Khoury.

Sorvino joins a cast that also includes Victor Garber. Shooting begins next month in both Montreal and Morocco for an airdate later in the year.

Romantic adventure-themed mini stars Sorvino as Tess Chaykin, a Manhattan archaeologist searching for the medieval Knights Templar. Garber plays Monsignor De Angelis, who helps find the artifact.

My first thought? "Here we go again..." And as if to confirm my semi-cynical, world-weary perspective, a post on the Blend Television blog offers this breathless, confused commentary:

What I love about the story of the Knight’s Templar is that, whether it is based in truth or not, it is still interesting. It has captured imaginations for eons, and will continue to because it can’t be proven or disproven. This miniseries will hopefully be a nice taste of the story that won’t cause too much outrage amongst Christians who can’t comprehend that fiction can be fun, and that it sometimes it is just fiction, not anything else.

[Commence sarcasm] Yeah, those stupid Christians. Sheez. You write a novel claiming to be based in fact and full of damning evidence showing that Christianity and the Catholic Church are based on nothing but lies, big lies, and more bloody lies, and what do they do? They get upset. Can you believe that? What gives? Morons. Ungrateful, prudish, backwards thinking lowlifes. Don't they know it's just a story? Well, hey, let's check out what the author's website says about The Last Templar:

On one level, The Last Templar is a fast paced contemporary adventure/thriller set in New York and in various settings around the Mediterranean, intercut by five epic chapters set during the closing years of the Crusades in which the last Templar of the title, entrusted with the Order's secret, escapes from the burning city of Acre and struggles to make it back to France. On another level, The Last Templar works as a thought-provoking exploration of religion in today's world, and of historic fact versus faith, particularly regarding the origins of the Catholic Church. Through the investigation into the Templars' history and their mysterious discovery, and though the interplay between Tess - the agnostic, scientific skeptic - and Reilly, who turned to the Church after his father shot himself when Reilly was just a boy, the book presents a spirited look at the early days of the Church and invites the reader to question matters which most of us take at face value.

See, you silly, overreacting Christians? It's just a novel that tells the truth about your outrageous, infantile beliefs? Don't you get it? [Cease sarcasm. Wipe brown with damp towel.]

Robert P. Lockwood, in this May 2006 article for The Catholic Catalyst, took a long look at some of the Coded Clones, including The Last Templar:

Because of the movie connection Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code has received most of the attention. But the proliferation of these additional anti-Catholic novels proves an ancient adage: there is money to be made in appealing to visceral anti-Catholicism.

The plots in The Third Secret and The Last Templar center on intrepid couples running around the globe tracking down hidden historical truths that will prove the Catholic faith to be fake.

In The Last Templar, our intrepid couple track down the diaries of Jesus, which had been discovered in the Holy Land during the Crusades by the Knights Templar. The diaries reveal that all that stuff about miracles, salvation and the Resurrection was a fabrication of the Church to consolidate its power. <snip>

  These books in one way or another sell three anti-Catholic stereotypes that are as old as the Reformation. The first anti-Catholic legend is that the Catholic Church forcibly repressed a true Christianity that had existed since the days of the Apostles. It was a common post-Reformation propaganda point that there was a pure Christianity subversively maintained over the centuries that served as a counterpoint to the apostolic claims of the Church. The real Church was this "invisible Church."

Khoury's book takes that anti-Catholic tenet and gives it a New Age twist. He describes the alleged purity of the original teachings of a thoroughly human Jesus mouthing pious platitudes. Berry puts in the mouth of the Blessed Mother a laundry list of contemporary secular grudges against the Church that can be found in any news story: abortion, contraception, homosexual marriage, celibacy and a male-only priesthood. <snip>

Khoury portrays a Church that first paid extortion, then viciously suppressed the Knights of Templar so that their secret would be maintained and the Church could still exercise power.<snip>

Khoury has his Church leadership arguing that it knows the Scripture to be false, but that it maintains its beliefs solely because people can find some glimmer of hope in an otherwise senseless world. <snip>

Khoury's book is the least offensive of the two, if only because of a plot twist at the end and at least a vague acknowledgment that faith accomplishes some good in the world. (Although he is at pains to point out that it is a faith not grounded in reality.)

Say, here's an idea: a mini-series about how the major networks and MSM, while accomplishing some good in the world, are really about making money, gaining power, sensationalism, distorting what is true, praising what is false, saying there is no "true" or "false", and suppressing stories that contradict their view of the world. What's that you say? Too grounded in reality? Yeah, you're probably right...

Those interested in the true story of the Templars, see pages 194-222 of The Da Vinci Hoax. Also recommended is The Templars (Cambridge, 1999), by Piers Paul Read.

• "It's "a thought-provoking exploration of religion in today's world, and of historic fact versus faith..." (Dec. 31, 2005. An Insight Scoop post about The Last Templar.)

"When one believes, you should want to know more about what and why."

This post sponsored by a fortuitous collision of stories. The three stories/articles are:

• "Six Surprising Things About Benedict XVI, 'The Puzzling Pope'", by David Gibson for Beliefnet
• "Talking to Kids About God", by Kathleen Deveny for Newsweek (ht: John Mallon)
• "A ‘model theologian’ prepares to step aside", by Gary Stern on Blogging Religiously

The topic of the Pope's puzzling persona has been out and about for a while now, and Gibson, who has written a book about Benedict XVI, takes it up again as he seeks to introduce Beliefnet readers to the paradoxical Pontiff:

There are many paradoxes about Benedict XVI, but this may be the biggest: For a generation, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he was one of the most prominent and controversial men in Roman Catholicism. And now he is the Supreme Pontiff, arguably the most visible and influential religious leader in the world. Yet on the eve of his first visit to the United States as pope, American Catholics—and everyone else—know little about him. In fact, Andrew Greeley’s review of my biography of Benedict, in Commonweal magazine, was titled, "The Puzzling Pope."

Am I the only one who finds it a bit strange that some people think Benedict XVI is "puzzling," "paradoxical," "enigmatic," "mysterious," and "a Catholic mystery wrapped in a theological enigma and covered with secret papal sauce" (okay, I made that last one up), while, I think it is safe to say, many people think they know an actor because they watch his television show, or a musician because they listen to her music? I put it that way because it seems to me that there are several, intersecting reasons the Pope is seen as "puzzling" or "mysterious" to many Americans (not a few of them Catholic), including the fact that our culture is celebrity saturated, intellectually slothful, and sound bite driven (soundbitten!).

Let's put it bluntly: for large swaths of the population, if you aren't an actor, musician, athlete, entertainer, or celebrity, you really aren't that important or memorable. Don't mention books or even articles—if it isn't in a thirty to sixty second sound bite set to hip-hop and featuring 3.2 frames per second, don't bother. Please package it with clear, simple labels and add an extra shot of artificial flavoring and a bit of sex. Oh, and make it sensational, preferably with some sort of confrontational or scandalous element, the better to keep us awake and paying attention.

I know it may sound arrogant and condescending, but the reality is this: we aren't, in far too many ways, a serious people. We are an entertained, coddled, and unserious people.

Now, I can appreciate that Joe American, especially is he isn't Catholic, might not set a high priority on becoming familiar with the entire body of work penned by Joseph Ratzinger. And there is certainly an important place for helpful introductions and popular works addressing the Pope's life, thought, and so forth. But how shall we make sense of well-educated, lifelong Catholics who not only know next to nothing about Catholicism, but are largely clueless about why or how they might rectify this significant deficiency? Which brings me to the second piece, a column in Newsweek written by a Catholic about her admitted failure to understand her faith:

  Why does the subject of religion make me so uncomfortable? OK, so I'm divorced (twice!) and I haven't always been, um, a paragon of virtue. Still, I consider myself a practicing Roman Catholic. I take my kid to church most Sundays. (In the winter, at least.) I grew up as a Catholic and I find comfort in the familiar rituals of the mass. I am glad my daughter is getting some religious training.

But when confronted by my daughter's questions—Does God have arms? Do you really have to drink blood?—I'm completely lost. What was I doing during all those years of weekly CCD classes? I learned that Jesus loves me and I listened to a lot of bad guitar-playing at mass when I was growing up in the 1960s. But I didn't memorize the Baltimore Catechism and I couldn't name the seven deadly sins if my life depended on it. I could come up with only eight of the Ten Commandments!

It's not just about the gaps in my education. As a "cafeteria Catholic," I don't accept all the tenets of my religion. I am never going to teach my daughter that evolution is a fraud, and someday I will encourage her to think critically, not doctrinally, about issues like artificial birth control, stem-cell research and abortion.

I doubt many of us are surprised that Deveny received rotten catechesis; I've heard similar stories from many Catholics who came to age in the 1960s and 1970s. What is far more disconcerting is that after admitting she doesn't know much about Catholicism, she blithely condemns the Church for supposedly teaching that "evolution is a fraud"—something the Church has not said. And she then dismisses (using a riff on the old "I'm not dogmatic" line) the Church's teachings about artificial birth control, stem-cell research and abortion, even though it's a fair guess she has not even a basic understanding of why the Church teaches what it does about those issues.

Sure, Deveny had lousy CCD classes, but the greater problem is that as an adult Catholic she has apparently never bothered to learn anything about the Church except what she has absorbed through media sound bites. As an older Catholic friend once told me, "We thought that once we were confirmed, we magically knew everything we ever needed to know about being Catholic." Of course, as he also noted, not only was that woefully incorrect, we can never know enough about being Catholic, because we can never fully plumb the depths of Jesus Christ and His Church—but we sure as shootin' should be trying to do so, by the grace of God.

Amy Welborn, in a post yesterday, pointed out that there is a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy at work with media stories about how Benedict XVI is "puzzling" or "mysterious":

I maintain that when we’re moving in the arena of “People got JPII but don’t get B16,” we’re essentially talking about superficial media-driven impressions, not truly “getting” the person.

2) The decision to structure reporting around “B16 is a mystery” isn’t reporting anything that’s really demonstrably news, both for the reasons in #1 as well as the arbitrariness of it.

The facts are that when it comes to evidence - book sales (in the US and worldwide)  website hits, internet discussions - it seems as if there are lots of people interested in Benedict who are not scratching their heads at his purported impenetrability, but rather intrigued by and nourished by what he’s saying.

An amorphous mass that you can pin a label on that says “Thinks B16 is a mystery” is much less an object for real reporting than a more specific group you can actually (sort of) count and trace behavior of and talk to.

It's an excellent point that highlights how the information age can be either a curse or a blessing, depending on how we freely, knowingly choose to navigate it. If a person really wants to learn, to know, to understand, they will figure out how to find the right information, even if there are missteps along the way. Or we can decide to be spoon fed and passively soak in a barrage of images and noise that suck away our spiritual hunger and intellectual curiosity.

Finally, a quote from Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J., who will be retiring this year (at the age of 90) from teaching at Fordham University. It comes via Gary Stern's blog:

[Dulles] has said that it is the theologian’s job to “show why the church is teaching what she is.”

I’ve had the opportunity to interview Dulles twice. He was gracious, humble and chose his words carefully. I don’t think he’s too smitten with the secular media.

I asked him in 2001, weeks before he was made a cardinal, why theology should matter to Catholics in the pews. He answered:

"When one believes, you should want to know more about what and why. What are the implications of belief? If you understand marriage as a sacrament, for instance, like the marriage between Christ and the church, you may have a better marriage than those who do not. Theology has real relevance."

Over the course of the next few weeks, there will be a flood of stories about Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the U.S. Some will be helpful, informative, and worth reading. Some will be shallow and misleading, treating the Pope as a sort of strange celebrity whose specific role in entertaining the masses is not really clear. In the end, the best way to understand who the Pope is and what he all about is to read his writings. Read some excerpts from his writings. Read good articles about him. And, of course, listen to and read what he actually says while he is in this country. No, he isn't a movie star, a rock musician (he is a classically trained pianist, however), or an athlete. But he is one of the greatest theologians of our time. Oh, and the Vicar of Christ and the successor of Saint Peter. That is reason enough to take him seriously.

"Did Jesus Really Rise From the Dead?" DVD now available

The DVD, Did Jesus Really Rise From The Dead? A Critical Examination of the Facts About the Resurrection of Jesus, is now available from Ignatius Press. To learn more about the DVD, visit www.resurrectiondvd.com, which has information about the DVD, bios of the many contributors, and three clips, each about two minutes long, from the DVD: clip #1, clip #2, and clip #3.

A Cross-less "Stations of the Cross", created by...

... the Episcopal Church and the  Episcopal Relief and Development office. The stations, reports Christianity Today, are called "Stations of the Millennium Development Goals", and the "liturgy" consists of the following "stations":

Set up for the Liturgy
•    Designate eight stations around your church.
•    For each station, have a poster-size paper listing one of the eight MDGs:
MDG 1:    Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger
MDG 2:    Achieve Universal Primary Education for Children
MDG 3:    Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women
MDG 4:    Reduce Child Mortality
MDG 5:    Improve Maternal Health
MDG 6:    Combat HIV/AIDS, Malaria, and Other Diseases
MDG 7:    Ensure Environmental Sustainability
MDG 8:    Create a Global Partnership for Development

There is, in fact, only one reference to a cross:

Station 5: Have a poster-size piece of paper for each pilgrim and a thick black permanent marker.  Ask each pilgrim to write the first-name only of every woman they know who had a baby in the past year.  When the list is complete, draw a black cross next to the name of every 16th woman.  Explain that this represents the plight of women in sub-Saharan Africa, where one in 16 pregnant women die from complications of pregnancy and childbirth each day.

Not surprisingly, some Anglicans are less than happy with the political proje—er, "liturgy." (Note to self, file this story next to the one about striving to have a smaller "carbon footprint" during Lent.)

Someone, I'm guessing, will read this and say, "Hey, mean person, what do you have against helping poor people and fighting disease in Third World countries?" The short answer is, "Absolutely nothing at all." But liturgy and devotions such as Stations of the Cross should never be turned into social projects or political forums; they are meant to transform us by bringing us into closer communion with Jesus Christ. Then we are to go into the world and apply our love of God and our knowledge of man in doing the vital work of helping the poor, fighting disease, and so forth.

When liturgy and devotion become the servants of political activism, it is inevitable that people will—logically, it should be noted—wonder, "Why bother doing this when I can simply participate in this or that social project or political movement." And then they leave Christianity behind, thinking it has little or nothing to offer the world that cannot be found many times over in secular movements.

Back from 'Bama and back in the saddle

A short post to say "Thank you!" to all those who have sent me e-mails after having watched my appearance on "The Journey Home" this past Monday evening. I'm trying to get to all of the e-mails, but it may take a few days. The episode can be viewed this week (until it is replaced by next week's show) by going to EWTN's streaming audio/video page and clicking on "The Journey Home" link; once the show is archived it can be found by using this search page. You can also download the audio as an mp3 file from the EWTN podcast page.

Special thanks to Tony and Amanda Clark for their wonderful hospitality, to Marcus Grodi, to the EWTN staff, and to Father Mitch Pacwa, for conversation and putting me up at his house for a night.

A couple of quick remarks on the show. For those who aren't familiar with the "back story" of our conversion, you can read about it in this 1998 This Rock article. My responses to any and all of the questions could have been more detailed, of course, and in a couple of instances, could have been much better. Specifically, my attempt to discuss nominalism left something (everything!) to be desired. For those who are interested in the connection between nominalism, the Reformation, and deconstructionism, see my October 2005 article for This Rock titled, "What's In a Name?"

As for the "great apostasy," much more could be said. In the show I touched on some of the anti-Catholic understandings of that term as they relate to Church history. Some may be surprised to learn the Catholic Church officially teaches that there will be a great apostasy in the last days:

Before Christ's second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers.  The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth  will unveil the "mystery of iniquity" in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 675).

Finally, on a related note, I've been slowly working on completely revising my personal website as my old site was in bad need of updating. The process will likely take a little time (weeks, months, years?) as it isn't something I have much time to work on at the moment.