We’re continuing mixing ideas until my head gets on straight. God of Good Days and of Bad Days It’s been brought home to me that the point of prayer is not to ask for only good days. An…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
You have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thy enemy. But I say to you, Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you: and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you: That you may be the children of your Father who is in heaven, who … Continue reading (d) – OMG I Love That Author| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Part of the problem of being plugged into the Catholic Community of Substack is that I see a lot of things that annoy me. And because I am a sinful man, I indulge these annoyances at my peril. This…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Why do I write? I grew up around people who didn’t really care what I think. There are some people I have never convinced of anything. If I told them the sky was blue, they’d ask for so…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
2 posts published by Scoot during September 2025| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Continuing a thought that I need to exorcise. Only writing because of some desired outcome is consequentialism. I don’t write because of outcomes, so Paschal’s wager doesn’t apply. There’s no gamble that my writing will have any impact whatsoever. My writing only matters to ME and perhaps to God and that’s all the calculation you … Continue reading DXLVIII – Thinking Out Loud| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
There is no unifying thread. Sometimes I feel the desire to be more unapologetic. I just don’t feel like there’s a lot I can be unapologetic about. It’s a question of choosing wha…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
I already published this but accidentally took it offline when futzing about on the mobile app. if you’ve received this a second time, I apologize. I had some fun on Substack the other day im…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
10 posts published by Scoot during August 2025| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Or, complaining about the taste of lizard in the cafeteria of the Abbey of St Leibowitz| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
I was thinking on the drive home from Mass today about the fact that pringles conducted research designed to optimize the crunchiness of their chips. What they were optimizing for was the exact crispiness that made you reach back into the tin to get a second chip. What occurred to me while I was driving … Continue reading DXLVI – Reap What You Sow (Grab Bag Edition)| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
“So and so are still working because they can’t retire!” What is retirement? When in history has anyone retired? I think retirement is a fiction generated by the industrial revolution, which really only one generation got to enjoy freely, and the rest of us have had decreasingly leisurely aspirations for life after 60. Retirement requires … Continue reading (b) – What Even Is ‘Retirement’| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Regarding Love God’s agape love for us is foundational and constant. We can offer him storge in return, by heroic virtue which is unwavering and constant love returned to God. God’s philia love for us is the love of His family, we who are adopted by the waters of baptism. We can offer him eros … Continue reading (a) – An Immediate Afterthought| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Before I formed thee in the bowels of thy mother, I knew thee: and before thou camest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee, and made thee a prophet unto the nations. (Jeremiah 1:5) And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, you that work iniquity. (Matthew 7:23) … Continue reading DXLV – Layers Of Love| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Listening to a talk shared with me by a dear friend. “Hope, which does not obtain.” That is to say, Hope is a perpetual reaching and never grasping. Well–no, that’s not quite right. We only have to hope for our lifetime. 80 some years, on average. 80 Years of suffering, sorrow, pain. But also–80 years … Continue reading DXLIV – It’s Not That Bad| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
At some point, governing terminates in an act of authority which makes no apology for itself. We can dress up the song and dance all we want with procedure, tradition, bureaucracy. But eventually, …| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
AD MAIOREM DEI GLORIAM| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
10 posts published by Scoot during May 2025| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Every year, for some time now, I have taken a patron saint over my personal life and my year as a whole. Last year my patron saint was St. Therese of Lisieux, and my “theme” for the yea…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
4 posts published by Scoot during March 2025| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
I have been working my way through the entire corpus of the Manly Saints Project which has a podcast I access through apple podcasts and listen to on walks. I’ve been working my way through t…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
You know why Catholicism thrived between the first Easter Sunday and the 95 theses? Because it spent a lot of time under persecution. Persecution is penance for the Body of Christ, as a multitude. …| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
10 posts published by Scoot during June 2025| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
The “Resistance Narrative” is the story that the plucky underdogs can stand up to the overpowered Evil Empire and win. Normally this is considered an “underdog story”, but t…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Any system, if planned and performed by properly formed Catholics, can work to good and the glory of God. Any system. Communism or Capitalism, if effectuated by properly formed Catholics, can both …| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
So in my previous musings on the stock market and my subsequent addendum, I walked through a scenario where Rai Stones were used as “Equity” and Fish were used as currency. This helped …| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
10 posts published by Scoot during May 2021| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
I’m really not sure how to arrange these ideas. The thought came to me in one of those moments of clarity before I fell asleep recently and I just wrote some notes down but haven’t real…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
There’s this idea that has been popping up in the comments of various articles critiquing modernity, that the dual vices of modernity are irrationality and distraction. The core concept at pl…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
What follows is a lightly edited version of a comment I made on my previous article (here), in response to commenter Sally Eggman. First: Hat-tip to Sally for going toe-to-toe with me on these theo…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
I don’t know what it is. Apologetical battles keep finding me. Maybe because I am stupid, maybe because God is sending them to me to help me practice. Maybe both. LIKELY both. I lost my cool …| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
I have gotten into no less than three apologetical discussions with or about protestants recently, with a focus on Scripture. Because I am not able to articulate my thoughts fully in those conversa…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
Protestantism and Nominalism go together because they call themselves Christian and aren’t. (I think protestantism =\= christian is a new but not unreasonable red line. What is christianity but God…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
God bless Pope Leo XIV! We have a Pope! The flurry of activity surrounding his ascension has been so beautifully Catholic. Hambone and I were trying to figure him out in the hours after the announc…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
There’s been a lot on my mind lately, and I’ve opened wordpress to write something, and the words wouldn’t come. So today instead of writing a lot about a few topics, I’m go…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
There’s a point I arrived at in my previous article which I would like to expand upon. This is the comparative utility of money and resources. In that article, I talked about how the corporat…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
There’s an interesting mix of things happening in my brain but it all converged on this moment. I’ll tell you the moment, and then backtrack. A friend texted me concerned about the news…| Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth
