Mercy and Mary

But most likely such a movie will never be made… I think a documentary was made in German, though.

The story of Blessed Karl Leisner — brought to the Dachau concentration camp as a deacon, and ordained a priest inside the camp! A bishop was also a prisoner there, and permission for ordination was obtained secretly through a network of people that would secretly pass mail in and out of the camp.

An article about him can be found here.

I learned of him thanks to an old radio show: “The Hour of St. Francis.” Here’s the episode about him online:
The Victory of Father Karl

In this time of natural disasters, this video is quite appropriate.

“Your Mysterious Ways” from the Catholic rock band Critical Mass:

I saw her talk and perform years ago. I think it was 1993. Here’s a decent interview with this young woman who was chosen for abortion, but survived the attempt. She is a “sign of contradiction” by her very presence, as are all abortion survivors.

A cool classical music commercial:

I’m excited to hear the news, although I doubt I will be among those who are able to see it. Still, one never knows…

He died this morning. I just saw him on Sunday at the nursing home he was staying at. Fr. Boniface was one of the priests I deaconed for during my time in Plano and I worked with him when I was a priest there also. He was 89.

Please say a prayer for the repose of his soul.

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him.
May he rest in peace. Amen.

I’m heading out for the funeral.

There’s a new article on this topic that suggests that there might be some connection. I’m happy without a cell phone. I’d probably be even happier if I never watched TV.

Working with an old reel to reel tape deck to transfer some recordings. I’ve found some episodes of “The Hour of St. Francis” radio program. Here are links to 2 episodes (can be downloaded as MP3 files):
Mr. Tompkins and St. Francis
The Victory of Father Karl
These episodes are different from the two circulating among old time radio collectors.

The above picture shows the Concord tape deck I’m working with. It’s an old gem. It says “transistorized,” but there are still some tubes in there.

The stats are out. There are slightly more priests worldwide, but the number of sisters is declining. There are definitely women discerning a vocation out there, but only a few communities that are really growing, and they can’t accept all the women who would like to join.

On an extreme tangent, I found this little video which I immediately related to. I was one of the kids who played the “Clubhouse Pow” game the video refers to. I came away with second place that day (out of 3) and received a “TV 11 SUPER SUMMER” t-shirt as a consolation prize. It was a rather brief experience of being on a TV game show.

I remember Mr. Heim from TJ and the ANT, which I watched quite a few Friday nights.