Distributism, Where to Begin?

Here's a suggestion on how to get started in supporting the idea of Distributism. It's from The Distributist Review.

November 17th Meeting to Feature "The Honor of Israel Gow"

Why not join us for our November meeting where we will be enjoying a viewing of Chesterton's Father Brown story, "The Honor of Israel Gow?"

From a guy named Geoff Prewett's web site:

The Honor of Israel Gow: The death of a nobleman is investigated by Father Brown and the now private investigator Flambeau. The piles of snuff, candles with no sticks, and the manuscripts with the name of God removed are not dark evil, but merely Israel Gow, who was promised all the gold in the house taking only and exactly what he was given.

October 20 Meeting

There were four of us at this month's meeting. As advertised, we listened to Christopher Check's "Lepanto: The Battle and the Poem." The talk is almost 75 minutes long, ending with a stirring recitation of Chesterton's poem Lepanto. Some of the folks took notes during what could easily be called a Mediterranean Catholic history lesson.

Dale Ahlquist's book was available for review.

G.K. Chesterton is Author of the Month at St. Peter Parish

Here are the Chesterton books (top 2 shelves) currently in The Holy Family Library of St. Peter Parish. The collection of Chesterton works is just getting started. Eventually, the Library will have a full collection of Chesterton's Collected Works.

The books on the bottom 2 shelves are on loan for display purposes to The Holy Family Library from my library.

Uncommonsense Podcast 32, Chesterton and Public Schools

The Chillicothe Chesterton Society and I get a mention in the latest Uncommonsense Podcast by Nancy Brown. Click the start button on the Podcast icon to the left.

September Meeting

Well, we had our first meeting in the St. Peter Parish library, The Holy Family Library. Several folks attended, which was a nice change from the last couple of meetings which were held in our previous venue. We read a couple of essays aloud from What's Wrong With The World and then commented on them. I fielded a question on Distributism and felt fairly comfortable with my answer.

We agreed to read and discuss Lepanto at our next (October) meeting. We're going to use Christopher Check's "Lepanto: The Battle and the Poem" CD as a major part of the meeting.

Finally, the folks who manage the library have asked if we could put together a display having G.K. Chesterton featured as the "Author of the Month" and also put a notice about it in the Parish Bulletin.

Draft Article for the St. Peter's Parish Newsletter

Chillicothe Chesterton Society

The Chillicothe Chesterton Society will now meet in the new Holy Family Library of St. Peter’s Parish Hall. While the previous meetings of the Society have been held at Schlegel’s Coffee House, all future meetings, beginning on September 15th, will be held in the new Library. Meetings are held on the 3rd Wednesday of the month, at 7 p.m. The meetings are scheduled for an hour.

The Chillicothe Chesterton Society is a group of people who are interested in the writings of British author Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874 - 1936). Here is some information on Chesterton which is taken from the web site of the American Chesterton Society. This was written by the President of the Society, Dale Ahlquist.

Chesterton argued eloquently against all the trends that eventually took over the 20th century: materialism, scientific determinism, moral relativism, and spineless agnosticism. He also argued against both socialism and capitalism and showed why they have both been the enemies of freedom and justice in modern Society.

And what did he argue for? What was it he defended? He defended "the common man" and common sense. He defended the poor. He defended the family. He defended beauty. And he defended Christianity and the Catholic Faith. These don’t play well in the classroom, in the media, or in the public arena. And that is probably why he is neglected. The modern world prefers writers who are snobs, who have exotic and bizarre ideas, who glorify decadence, who scoff at Christianity, who deny the dignity of the poor, and who think freedom means no responsibility.

The Chillicothe Chesterton Society was formed a couple of years ago as a local Society of the American Chesterton Society. The goals of the national society and the local societies are the same: to reintroduce people to the writings of G.K. Chesterton. Last year, as part of that effort, St. Peter’s and the Society sponsored presentations by Dr. John C. Chalberg in “An Evening With G.K. Chesterton” and “Old Thunder: An Evening With Hilaire Belloc.” Fans of EWTN recognized Dr. Chalberg as portraying G.K. Chesterton on “The Apostle of Common Sense” and Kevin O’Brien, President and Artistic Director of The Theater of The Word, as having portrayed just about everybody: Belloc, Father Brown, Stanford Nutting, etc.

For more information on the Chillicothe Chesterton Society check out our blog at chillicothe-chestertonian.blogspot.com or find us on Facebook at Chillicothe Chesterton Society. There are links on those sites to the American Chesterton Society.

Subject for September 15, 2010 Meeting - What's Wrong With The World

The 29th Annual Chesterton Conference has just ended (Aug 7, 2010). The Conference celebrated the 100th anniversary of Chesterton's book What's Wrong With The World. You can still see the Conference agenda here. You can read WWWTW at Project Gutenberg here. While it was not listed on the agenda, we had a great treat when G.K. himself made a special appearance. Yes, Chuck Chalberg (pictured above) attended the Conference and donned his wig, cape, hat, pince-nez and swordstick, as he provided a short visit from Mr. Chesterton. The crowd loved it.

At any rate, all that was simply to alert potential meeting attendees to the fact that the initial subject of discussion at the meeting will be selected essays from WWWTW. I'll suggest these three; The Emancipation of Domesticity, The Modern Slave, and Folly and Female Education. I'll have copies of those available. We can, of course, discuss anything and everything.

Society Meeting Location to Change

Effective with the September 15, 2010 meeting, we'll be meeting in the newly created Library of St. Peter's Parish Hall. This (above) is a view of the Parish Hall from Water Street. However, here (below) is the entrance we'll be using. It's back the walkway on the side of the Hall. I'll have signs posted on the night of the meeting.
















Here (below) is the newly painted, and as-yet-un-carpeted Library. Carpeting is scheduled for Monday, August 30.
















Fr. Hahn will also allow us to publish a meeting notice in the Church Bulletin. I plan to contact Fr. Hummer at St. Mary's to see if he would be willing to do the same.

A Look at Knott Auditorium, Mount St. Mary's, Emmitsburg, MD

Here's a couple of pictures of Knott Auditorium. It will be full of Chestertonians beginning this Thursday.

Emmitsburg, MD 21727

After having dinner in Emmitsburg, at Otts pub, my wife and I drove out to Mount St. Mary's University. It's only a 5 minute ride. You can't miss it. It's quite visible from the road (Rt 15 South). The buildings are well marked and we drove right to Knott (Marion Burke Knott) Auditorium by following the signs. The auditorium is the site of the Chesterton Conference. There are some obviously older buildings further up the hill that are quite attractive. You can view a campus map here.


I found St. Joseph's Church right in Emmitsburg for Mass tomorrow. I couldn't find any pictures of the inside of the church. Maybe I'll take some tomorrow. Here's a drawing of the church from the church's web site.

ChesterTones to Perform at ChesterTen Banquet

The about-to-be-formed Barbershop Quartet, The ChesterTones, will perform at the ChesterTen Banquet. Members of the quartet are: Kevin O'Brien (Lead), Bob Cook (Bass), Joe Grabowski (Tenor), and Don Brady (Baritone). All, of course, are Chestertonians. We've all been working on the music independently (Kevin, just since the first of this week). Our first time singing together will be a a yet-to-be-determined practice at the Conference. It should be exciting.

A Change of Opinions

Lord Kitchener

The other matter is much more important. Though the reverse of vivacious, Kitchener was very vital; and he had one unique mark of vitality—that he had not stopped growing. “An oak should not be transplanted at sixty,” said the great orator Grattan when he was transferred from the Parliament of Dublin to the Parliament of Westminster. Kitchener was sixty-four when he turned his face westward to the problem of his own country. There clung to him already all the traditional attributes of the oak—its toughness, its angularity, its closeness of grain and ruggedness of outline—when he was uprooted from the Arabian sands and replanted in the remote western island. Yet the oak not only grew green again and put forth new leaves; it was almost as if, as in a legend, it could put forth a new kind of leaves. Kitchener, with all his taciturnity, really began to put forth a new order of ideas. If a change of opinions is unusual in an elderly man, it is almost unknown in an elderly military man. If the hardening of time was felt even by the poetic and emotional Grattan, it would not have been strange if the hardening had been quite hopeless in the rigid and reticent Kitchener. Yet it was not hopeless; and the fact became the spring of much of the national hope. The grizzled martinet from India and Egypt showed a certain power which is in nearly all great men, but of which St. Paul has become the traditional type—the power of being a great convert as well as a great crusader. It is the real power of re-forming an opinion, which is the very opposite of that mere formlessness which we call fickleness. Nor is the comparison to such an example as St. Paul altogether historically disproportionate; for the point upon which this very typical Englishman changed his mind was a point which is now the pivot of the whole future and perhaps of the very existence of Christendom. For many such Englishmen it might almost be called the discovery of Christendom. It can be called with greater precision, and indeed with almost complete precision, the discovery of Russia.

I guess I consider myself "an elderly military man." I joined the Air Force when I was 17, right out of high school. I served for 20 years. I've been "retired" for 28 years. That is, I retired from the Air Force in 1982. While I've held quite a few jobs since 1962, I think of myself as "retired Air Force", not retired from Battelle, Northrup Grumman, Lockheed Martin, or NewPage, my last place of full time employment. No doubt that is because whatever I am today was pretty much formed by my 20 years immersion in the culture of the Air Force.

What's the point? Well, I guess there are several. First, I think the quote (in red above) is quite true, certainly it is for me. Next, every time I've seen this quotation it is referenced back to Utopia of Usurers. I recently read Utopia of Usurers; it's not in there. As the picture at the top of this post implies, the quotation is from Chesterton's book Lord Kitchener. My best guess on how this happened is that whoever made the first reference might have been using Volume V of the Collected Works. The standard reference says pg. 396, of Volume V, CW. And the quotation does, in fact, appear on page 396, but it's in Lord Kitchener. Utopia of Usurers starts on page 399. Who cares? Probably no one, unless you're reading Utopia of Usurers waiting to read the quote!

Finally, Chesterton says a change of opinion is almost unknown in an elderly military man. I don't think I've changed my opinions about much in the last 28 years, but I have about laissez-faire Capitalism. And that change of opinions was caused by the writings of Chesterton, Belloc and all the other Distributists I've been introduced to by the members of the American Chesterton Society.

See Any Resemblance?

Again, my thanks to Ben Hatke for the great work!

Material Success, Something to Think About

Material Success

The American businessman was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat were several large yellowfin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them.

The Mexican replied only a little while. The American then asked why didn't he stay out longer and catch more fish?

The Mexican said he had enough to support his family's immediate needs. The American then asked, "But what do you do with the rest of your time?"

The Mexican fisherman said, "I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take siesta with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos, I have a full and busy life, señor."

The American scoffed, "I am a Harvard MBA and could help you. You should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds buy a bigger boat with the proceeds from the bigger boat you could buy several boats, eventually you would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman you would sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing and distribution.

"You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then LA and eventually NYC where you will run your expanding enterprise."

The Mexican fisherman asked, "But señor, how long will this all take?" To which the American replied, "15-20 years."

"But what then, señor?"

The American laughed and said that's the best part. When the time is right you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich, you would make millions.

"Millions, señor? Then what?"

The American said, "Then you would retire. Move to a small coastal fishing village where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take siesta with your wife, stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos."

-- Anonymous

You Never Know When Someone Might Be Paying Attention

Yesterday I took a drawing of G.K. Chesterton (by Ben Hatke) to Hobby Lobby to have it framed. I asked the young girl (not as young as I thought, she's a college graduate) for help in choosing how to have it framed. She was very helpful, selecting a nice frame and some matting. As she was writing up the paperwork for the job, she asked me who the character in the drawing was. I told her it was G.K. Chesterton. She said: "I thought so." She continued: "You're the guy who sponsored the Hilaire Belloc presentation several months ago." I acknowledged that I had sponsored "Old Thunder." She said she enjoyed it. She then mentioned that she had recently graduated from Columbus College of Art & Design. I asked her if she had a web site for her work and she said yes. When I got home I checked out the site. The picture above is from the site. Here are the words that accompany the illustration:

New personal project, inspired by a line from The Everlasting Man by GK Chesterton. "The dark alien woman staring from her high lattice and hearing like the babble of a brook over a stoney street, the singing of little St Hugh" He was referring to the Medieval child martyr little Hugh, and the alien woman would've been a witch. Did a few character studies from Brian Froud and Alan Lee's book Faeries, just to have something to go from.

So, you just never know who your actions might affect.

I also gave her Ben Hatke's site, househatke.com, so she could check out his other work.

And here's the drawing I'm having framed.

Summer Break in Meetings

Summer is here and most folks are taking their vacations. In light of that, we'll be taking a summer hiatus. Meetings will resume on September 15, 2010. If you've got the time and inclination, you might consider attending the upcoming Chesterton Conference. Here's an info card I received in the mail yesterday. It should be a great Conference. (Click on the agenda to enlarge it.)

As Nancy noted on the ACS Blog, there has been a change in one of the presenters:
Msgr. Swetland, from the host institution, can’t be there. He’s just taken a new job: President of Seton Hall University. Dr. William Marshner, a theology professor from Christendom College to speak instead on “What’s Wrong with Theology?” (He’s brilliant. It will be a great talk.)

T-Shirts for What's Wrong With The World, 29th Annual Chesterton Conference

Here is the WWWTW T-Shirt. Once again, thanks to Ted Schluenderfritz for providing me the artwork. They should be available for sale at the Conference.

Watch This Space for Possible ChesterTen T-Shirts

I hope to have some T-Shirts made up for the upcoming ChesterTen Conference. If they look OK I'll post some pictures of them here. Even if they don't look OK, I 'll still post the pictures. We all have different ideas of what's OK. Right?

June Meeting Cancelled

Sorry for the late notice, but I will not be able to make the June meeting. So I supposed that means it's cancelled. I arrived home from Mt. Vernon, OH, the site of Barbershop Society's Apple Corps, to find that an uncle had died. So I'm leaving for Pennsylvania first thing Monday and probably will spend most of the week there.

ChesterTen Registration is Open.

It seems strange to access the blog and not see Max Beerbohm's caricature at the top. It looks to me like Mr. Ted Schluenderfritz (the logo designer) might have gotten some of his inspiration from Max's caricature of Chesterton. Then again, maybe not.

IHS Press

A Word From the Editors. IHS Press was launched in September of 2001 to bring back into print the classics of last century on the Social Teachings of the Catholic Church. IHS Press titles are sure to appeal to the Catholic reader who wants to know more about the wealth of information buried in the Church's Social Doctrine. And our titles will no doubt be a welcome and refreshing change for any socially-conscious reader who, in a search for a humane solution to modern social problems, is looking for a break from worn-out theories.

I thought I'd share the above information from IHS Press with others who might be interested in books dealing with Catholic Social Doctrine. IHS is a great resource. Of course, if the book was written by Chesterton, you might check with the American Chesterton Society first and buy it from them. You'd be supporting the ACS.

Latest Issue of Gilbert Has Arrived

I've read about half of the latest issue. It's excellent, as usual. What I did find to be different, however, is that Sean Dailey's editorial, "Clarity on Torture," is available on-line at the Gilbert Magazine Page. In my experience, the Gilbert Magazine Page has been static and not updated to correspond to the current issue of Gilbert. Having at least part of Gilbert available on-line is great.

Meeting on Wednesday Evening, May 19, at Schlegel's

Don't forget this month's meeting. 7 p.m. at Schlegel's Coffee House.

Distributism and "Just Price"

I've been reading several books by Hilaire Belloc, who was one of the main proponents of Distributism. He mentions "just price" several times, but I've been unable to figure out exactly what that means to a Distributist. So... I asked one of the authors at The Distributist Review, Richard Aleman, for some help. Here's what he said:

Dear Bob,

You are most welcome. Yes, regarding the just price I recommend reading Dr Peter Chojnowski's article on the School of Salamanca. http://drchojnowski.blogspot.com/

Eric Gill described it most succinctly as,

1. A just price (i.e. price reckoned in terms of labour costs)...[W]hat we want is just price, i.e. price fixed by maker.

The idea was to create a production outlet (or retail/manufacturer combo) that would sell flexibly with the smallest profit margin, competing via the distinctive creations of the producer (in Gill's case, artist or craftsman). This would, as much as possible, elminate middlemen and price wars as every product would be an original work based on the unique creativity of the small business owner.

This is still the case in small shops in Europe. Take bakeries for example. They measure how ingredient and labor costs, bake on premises, and sell directly to the consumer. They never undersell competitors or have a need to widen profit margins as they stand (or fall) on the quality of their unique, various products.

I can also recommend Msgr. John A. Ryan's book "The Living Wage" which you may normally find on ebay or for free on archive.org (PDF). http://www.archive.org/details/livingwage00ryanuoft

Also, if you have not read them, I recommend two more books by Belloc: Economics for Helen and the book Usury. In this last Belloc defines productive property and lending alternatives without the use of token interest.


Keep in touch!

Pax Christi,
Richard

PS: Let me know when you are ready to study the guilds. I will email you some PDFs by Arthur Penty.

Uncommon Sense Podcast #23 Now Available

Nancy Brown interviews Dale Ahlquist, President of the American Chesterton Society, in the latest Uncommon Sense Podcast. It contains lots of good info on the upcoming ChesterTen, this year's Chesterton Conference.

New Drawing of G.K. Chesterton

I just received my newest drawing of G.K. Chesterton today. It was done by Ben Hatke. What a great job. I love it. Thanks for the great work, Ben.

Note I've said nothing about our last Chillicothe Chesterton Society meeting. I guess the shows by Chuck Chalberg (G.K. Chesterton) and Kevin O'Brien (Hilaire Belloc) provided enough Chesterton related information for a few weeks. No one joined me for the meeting. Oh well, after enjoying an excellent Schlegel's decaf, I just went over to St. Peter and joined the on-going choir practice. Maybe next month some folks will show up!!

Interesting Book

I'm currently reading this book. How'd I end up here? Chesterton led me to Belloc. Preparing to attend "Old Thunder: An Evening with Hilaire Belloc" led me to Belloc's "Great Heresies", which led me to Cobbett's book. King Henry VIII, Cranmer, and Cromwell, the "tyrant and his ruffians." What nasty, nasty people. And what a different view of the Protestant Reformation.

Kevin O'Brien Caricature by Ted Schluenderfritz

I posted this caricature on Facebook and Kevin said: "It looks more like me than I do." I thank Kevin for his dramatic evangelization via The Theater of The Word Incorporated and Ted for his clever artwork.

Chesterton's Lecture at St. Peter Parish a Success

Last night Mr. G. K. Chesterton presented a lecture on Darwin. The lecture was presented at Chillicothe's St. Peter Parish Hall. About 35 people were in attendance. Mr. Chesterton noted that this was his third visit to America. He further noted that had Prohibition not been repealed he would not have returned to the United States. Mr. Chesterton is not a teetotaler. Although he has quipped that "We should thank God for beer and Burgundy by not drinking too much of them." While I can't recall that he specifically mentioned it, some of Mr. Chesterton's views on teetotalism may be found in his 1914 book, The Flying Inn. Mr. Chesterton gave the audience an insight to his early childhood, speaking fondly of his father, mother and siblings. He especially recalled his father's building him a toy theater and tellling amazing fairy tales.

While I can't recall all of Mr. Chesterton's statements made during the course of his lecture, here are a few of those that strike me as most memorable:

"Misers get up early in the morning; and burglars, I am informed, get up the night before."

"Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to that arrogant oligarchy who merely happen to be walking around."

"I would give a woman not more rights, but more privileges. Instead of sending her to seek such freedom as notoriously prevails in banks and factories, I would design specially a house in which she can be free."

"A modern vegetarian is also a teetotaler, yet there is no obvious connection between consuming vegetables and not consuming fermented vegetables. A drunkard, when lifted laboriously out of the gutter, might well be heard huskily to plead that he had fallen there through excessive devotion to a vegetable diet."

"Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die."

"Never let a quarrel get in the way of a good argument."

As you can see from the quotations, Mr. Chesterton departed from his prepared Darwinian Lecture notes quite frequently. At one point in the lecture he actually reclined on a sofa and spoke about drawing on the ceiling.

At the conclusion of his lecture, Mr. Chesterton answered question from the audience. All in all, a wonderful evening!

Above: Mr. Chesterton chats with members of the audience after his lecture.

See G. K. Chesterton on Friday, April 9, 2010

Bishop Flaget Grade School Sees Theater of The Word Performance

Bishop Flaget students sit on the gym floor as they await the start of The Great Adventure of The Faith.


Deadly Dark, (the villian in black) is flanked on his left by The Prince and on his right by The Guardian Angel.


AnyKid, (the hero in the red cape) receiving advice and guidance from The Prince and The Guardian Angel.

January/February Issue of Gilbert Has Arrived in Bainbridge, OH

Here's the cover of the latest issue of Gilbert. It arrived in the mailbox today. It's another great cover by Gilbert Art Director, Ted Schluenderfritz. I think I'll suggest a contest for the ACS Blog to see who can correctly name all the folks caricatured on the cover. I recognize a few of them, but not all. I'll have to do some research.

Attention all Lurkers

If you check out this blog occasionally (but have not made comments), and attend any of the up-coming Theater of The Word or History on Stage events, please say hello to me. I'd love to meet you. I'll be at all the events.

Theater of The Word to Perform at Bishop Flaget School March 26, 2010, at 9:30 a.m.

From The Theater of The Word Promotional Material:

Quests, Obstacles, Virtues, and Vices—what will keep our young heroes from living the Great Adventure of the Faith? And what will they need for help? This interactive epic, starring the kids of your parish or church, will answer the question! The choices they make determine the very plot of the show—and the obstacles they encounter along the way.

In this updated and funny version of the allegorical drama Everyman, we take several volunteers from the audience, one of whom plays Anykid, the hero, who must make right choices to complete his quest. Other volunteer actors portray the allegorical figures Faith, Hope and Love, as well as the Seven Sacraments,Beauty, Truth, and Goodness. Each volunteer has a short poem to read at some point during the show.

When that dastardly villain, Deadly Dark, steals our hero’s Faith, Hope, and Love, our hero’s prince and guardian angel must help him to recover them—through three dangerous adventures: the Forest of Doubt, the Way of Despair, and the Valley of Tears. Along the way, our hero must ask for help from the Sacraments, must combat the Seven Deadly Sins, and must learn the value of Love and the necessity of depending on God’s grace.

A perfect combination of catechesis and entertainment! Your kids on stage with our professional actors—Faith, Formation and Fun!

This is scheduled to be perfomed on Friday, March 26 at Bishop Flaget School. Time is 9:30 A.M. The Chillicothe Chesterton Society is supporting this presentation.

March 17 Meeting

It was a beautiful summer-like evening last night. Folks were sitting at the tables outside of Schlegel's. A photographer was taking pictures of a couple seated at one of the tables. I took it as an ill omen. Folks would be out playing in their yards or relaxing on their porches and not driving into Chillicothe to talk about Chesterton at Schlegel's. In fact, after waiting for only five minutes after the 7 pm start time, with no one other than me and Andrew (who was working and is the guy on the right in the picture) attending, I was about to leave the Coffee House and attend choir practice at St. Peter's. At 7:05, the member with the longest drive, Tim Binkley (the guy on the left in the picture), walked in the door. Tim drives down from Columbus, after work, to attend the meetings, and then has to drive about 50 miles to Lancaster, OH, to get home.

So, Tim and I discussed several things. Tim mentioned that he had tried to generate some interest in Chesterton at the Lancaster Catholic schools, and the public library, to no avail. I mentioned that when I requested that the Chillicothe Library allow me to post a notice of the Chillicothe Chesterton Society, my request was rejected. However, on a very positive note, The Chillicothe Gazette ran a very nice article on our up-coming one-man shows. For that, we are very grateful.

We then talked a bit about Kevin O'Brien's The Theater of The Word, Incorporated and Chuck Chalberg's History on Stage. Tim said he planned to attend both events. Since I had brought along the nine new Belloc books I recently bought, we talked a bit about Belloc and, of course, ChesterBelloc. Tim had not heard that term. Now he's heard of it. The hour flew by and before we knew it, the meeting was over. We both hope that the up-coming presentations will generate a little more interest in our Society. It would be nice to have a couple more folks join in our conversations.

Take a Look at This Before our "Old Thunder" Presentation

I must confess, I did not know what The Great Heresies were. From Belloc's perspective and his book, they are: 1. The Arian; 2. The Mohammedan; 3. The Albigensian; 4. The Protestant; 5. The Modern. Three of them are still with us. If you want to learn more, read the book. It's available from TAN books, and/or attend the upcoming March 22, 2010 presentation of Old Thunder: An Evening With Hilaire Belloc. The presentation is a Theater of The Word production. Kevin O'Brien will portray Belloc. It should be an exciting evening. Here's Kevin as Belloc.

Gilbert ?????

Who knows what the next cover of Gilbert will look like? Not me, but I've heard that it should be mailed out during the week of March 8th. I'll be checking my mailbox.

March/April Issue of The St. Austin Review

From the ACS Blog:

Dear Fellow Chestertonian,

The March/April issue of the Saint Austin Review is hot off the press. It's another exciting, power-punching issue, filled to the brim with great articles. The theme of the next issue is "G. K. Chesterton: Fidei Defensor" and we've assembled a veritable cornucopia of Chestertonian delights for the delectation of our readers.

Belloc's Books Arrive

My Belloc books arrived yesterday from TAN Books. I didn't notice them on the front porch until late. I've pretty much given up on the Post Office for any shipping requirements. UPS is much safer. And you can track the status of your orders on-line.

I've started on The Great Heresies, in anticipation of Kevin O'Brien's upcoming performance of "Old Thunder: An Evening With Hilaire Belloc". From the quick scan I did of the book, it looks like I'll be learning quite a bit of history from the Catholic perspective. I'm looking forward to it.

Standford Nutting of The Theater of The Word Incorporated

Here's another episode of Standford Nutting. I think this is hilarious! Who knows, maybe we can get Kevin O'Brien to do a few minutes of Standford Nutting before or after his Old Thunder preformance.

This sketch is from Season 5 of The Apostle of Common Sense.

Watch The Apostle of Common Sense on Your Computer

I finally was able to watch The Apostle of Common Sense on Sunday night at 9 p.m. on my computer. Fantastic. We recently gave up our satellite dish and went to a regular antenna. It's much easier on the budget! Here's the link for EWTN, the Eternal Word Television Network, the network which carries The Apostle of Common Sense. The Apostle of Common Sense is also shown on EWTN at 2 p.m. on Fridays.

Humor from EWTN and The Apostle of Common Sense

Enjoy. We'll have Kevin O'Brien here in Chillicothe on March 23 at St. Peter Parish Hall. Why not plan to attend and see Kevin live. Kevin plays Stanford Nutting in this skit. Dale Ahlquist is the host.

Maybe some day we'll be able to host Dale Ahlquist for a visit.

Reflections of a Community College Professor

Here's an interesting article by Professor John C. Chalberg. Dr. Chalberg is, of course "Chuck" Chalberg or as we Chestertonians know him, G.K. Chesterton. He portrays several other historical figures as well. We look forward to his presentation here in Chillicothe on Friday, April 9 at St. Peter Parish Hall.

New Promotional Video for The Theater of The Word Incorporated

The Theater of The Word will be performing in Washington Court House (St. Colman Church)on March 22 and in Chillicothe (St. Peter Church) on March 23, then again in Chillicothe for Bishop Flaget students on Friday, March 26.

Caricature of Hilaire Belloc, by Ted Schluenderfritz

I figured if we're going to host Mr. Belloc here in Chillicothe, we should at least have a caricature of him available for potential fans. And in keeping with the wishes of the person who commissioned this work and now owns it..... "As the image has already appeared on the Web, I would ask, if anyone wants to use it, that they acknowledge the artist - Ted Schluenderfritz - and the fact that it is in the private collection of the owner - the Owl - thank you!"

February 17 Society Meeting

Well, Margaret and I had a nice meeting. The fact of my poor planning, Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, probably didn't help attendance. While we were waiting to see if anyone else was going to show up, Margaret got a little more work done on the Barbershop arrangement of the song the "Chestertones" Quartet hopes to sing at this year's Conference. While Margaret worked, I read a few pages from What's Wrong With The World. When we realized no one else was going to show up, we talked a bit about Margaret's recent appearance (as the lead) in a locally written and produced play, The Fall Collection. The play was presented at Ohio University, Chillicothe (OU-C). The OU-C theater is a very nice venue. (Just a thought now, maybe we could get them to present Chesterton's The Surprise.) We finished up taking turns reading from Dave Armstrong's new book The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G.K. Chesterton.

G.K. Chesterton to Appear in Chillicothe, Ohio, April 9, 2010

Chuck has graciously extended his visit to Ohio to provide Chillicothe with a visit from G.K. Chesterton. Chuck portrays Chesterton on EWTN's The Apostle of Common Sense with host Dale Ahlquist, president of the American Chesterton Society.