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.

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.

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.

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.)

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

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

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!!

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.

January Meeting Quite Successful

Our January meeting was our best attended yet. We had 7 people, counting the Schlegel's customer who found our conversation so interesting that he joined us for the evening. Here are a couple of photos of the group. This is before our seventh person joined us, and Andrew Thurston was taking the picture. Next time I'll take the pictures.

Monthly Meeting on Wednesday, January 20 at 7 p.m.

Don't forget the monthly meeting coming up this Wednesday, January 20th. I'll have a couple of books availble for your review. Here they are. The Apostle of Common Sense is by Dale Ahlquist, the president of the American Chesterton Society. It's an introduction to a few of Chesterton's books. The Romance of Orthodoxy is the newest Chesterton biography. Dr William Oddie is Chairman of the Chesterton Society. (That is THE CHESTERTON SOCIETY in the UK.)

December 16 Meeting of the Chillicothe Chesterton Society

Andrew Thurston was the single attendee at last night's Chillicothe Chesterton Society Meeting. Andrew is always there because he works at Schlegel's on Wednesday nights. That means Andrew also won the membership to the American Chesterton Society. We didn't even have to draw names out of a hat! I'm not positive, but I think Andrew would attend the meetings even if he were not working. He has been reading the Chesterton books I've left at Schlegel's and has printed one off the Project Gutenberg web site.

Andrew also introduced me to Father Rick Terry, of the Chillicothe Anglican Fellowship (AMiA/Rwanda). Father Terry's church is just up the street from Schlegel's. (Father Terry had just stopped in for coffee) Father Terry and I talked a bit, he has read Orthodoxy, and I invited him to attend future Chesterton Society meetings if he has the time.

Before the meeting, I stopped in Book World, our local mom and pop book store. The Chesterton books they ordered in are still there. Unless there is a great rush to buy Chesterton books for Christmas presents, it would appear my library will be increasing some time in mid January.

And finally, I went Googling for "Chesterton on hope" and found this, from Heretics, Chapter XII, Paganism and Mr. Lowes Dickinson:

It is somewhat amusing, indeed, to notice the difference between the fate of these three paradoxes in the fashion of the modern mind. Charity is a fashionable virtue in our time; it is lit up by the gigantic firelight of Dickens. Hope is a fashionable virtue to-day; our attention has been arrested for it by the sudden and silver trumpet of Stevenson. But faith is unfashionable, and it is customary on every side to cast against it the fact that it is a paradox. Everybody mockingly repeats the famous childish definition that faith is “the power of believing that which we know to be untrue.” Yet it is not one atom more paradoxical than hope or charity. Charity is the power of defending that which we know to be indefensible. Hope is the power of being cheerful in circumstances which we know to be desperate. It is true that there is a state of hope which belongs to bright prospects and the morning; but that is not the virtue of hope. The virtue of hope exists only in earthquake and eclipse. It is true that there is a thing crudely called charity, which means charity to the deserving poor; but charity to the deserving is not charity at all, but justice. It is the undeserving who require it, and the ideal either does not exist at all, or exists wholly for them. For practical purposes it is at the hopeless moment that we require the hopeful man, and the virtue either does not exist at all, or begins to exist at that moment. Exactly at the instant when hope ceases to be reasonable it begins to be useful.

Thanks to Fr. Hahn of St. Peter Catholic Church

When seeking Father Hahn's support for the upcoming (March 2010) Old Thunder: An Evening with Hilaire Belloc presentation, I also asked him if he could put a notice in the Weekly Bulletin about the upcoming Dec 16 Chillicothe Chesterton Society Meeting. He has done that, and I thank him. We'd love to see one or two additional members of St. Peter's parish at the meeting!

November 18th Meeting

Well, another successful meeting. It's always a success when someone joins me for the meeting! In the picture above, it's me, Jim Maimone, and Tim Binkley. Andrew Thurston was gracious enough to take the picture. While Andrew has to work during the meetings, he is a member of the Chillicothe Chesterton Society, so maybe I'll never attend a meeting by myself, at least as long as Andrew continues to work at Schlegel's.

Jim Maimone attended his first meeting last night. When I asked Jim how he found out about the meeting, he said he had read about it in St. Peter's church bulletin. The notice in the bulletin was quite old, but Jim had saved it and finally had the opportunity to join us. I'll be asking St. Peter's to run the notice again. I may get yet another member!

We talked about Distributism. All of us are new to the concept so we've decided it will also be the subject of our December meeting. We'd like to know more about it. We've got lots of reading to do.

Since both Jim and Tim are new to Chesterton, I showed them some links we have on this blog. Using one of those links (YouTube) we listened to one of the few recordings of Chesterton. We all enjoyed it. Chesterton's self deprecating humor is refreshing.

And, finally, the big announcement. See the post below. Hilare Belloc will be visiting Chillicothe, Ohio in March of 2010.

An Evening with "Old Thunder" aka Hilaire Belloc

Here's the announcement made last night at our monthly meeting. We're really excited about this!

While it's a way off at the moment, The Chillicothe Chesterton Society will be sponsoring Old Thunder: An Evening with Hilaire Belloc in 2010. Save the date. It will be Tuesday evening, March 23 at a venue which is yet to be determined. To learn a bit about Hilaire Belloc, just click his name.

Old Thunder: An Evening with Hilaire Belloc is a one man show presented by actor Kevin O'Brien, who is the founder of Theater of the Word, Incorporated.

Here's what G.K. Chesterton had to say about Belloc: [Belloc is] "the man who has made the greatest fight for good things of all the men of my time."

As the date approaches we'll make up flyers and provide some advertising for this event.

Exciting Announcement Due at Wednesday's Meeting

What is it? Come to the next meeting on Wednesday at 7 p.m., November 18th at Schlegel's and find out! As usual we'll be talking about everything and, eventually, Distributism. The discussion will not be too deep, because I'm just learning about Distributism. I'll have a copy of Chesterton's The Outline of Sanity, and Belloc's The Servile State available for review. These two books were recommended to me by the President of the Society for Distributism. I'll also have my laptop and we'll take advantage of Schlegel's Wi-Fi so we can check out the sites providing information on Distributism.

Here's something else we might discuss. It's a quote from Chesterton.

"The free man owns himself. He can damage himself with either eating or drinking; he can ruin himself with gambling. If he does he is certainly a damn fool, and he might possibly be a damned soul; but if he may not, he is not a free man any more than a dog." - Broadcast talk 6-11-35

Hmm! Was my recent vote against casinos consistent with Chestertonian thinking? Based on the above quote, I guess it wasn't.

Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936)
“Who is this guy and why haven’t I heard of him?”

From the American Chesterton Society’s web site: Chesterton was equally
at ease with literary and social criticism, history, politics, economics,
philosophy, and theology. His style is unmistakable, always marked by
humility, consistency, paradox, wit, and wonder. His writing remains as
timely and as timeless today as when it first appeared.



Come learn a bit more about Chesterton at the next meeting of the
Chillicothe Chesterton Society. It will be held on Nov 18th at 7:00 P.M.
in Schlegel’s Coffee House located at 80 N. Paint St. Chillicothe, OH.
For more information call Bob Cook at 740-703-5651.

October 21st Meeting

(Pictured above are, from left to right, Tim Binkley, Andrew Thurston, and Bob Cook)
A small, but dedicated, group gathered to discuss all things Chesterton. We began with Lepanto. I had loaned Tim my copy of Christopher Check's CD presentation of "Lepanto: The Battle and the Poem". He was able to listen to it on his drive to work. He said he found it fascinating. Mr. Check's presentation added significantly to his enjoyment of the poem. I'd have to agree. I've listened to the CD several times and always found something new and interesting. The CD is still available from St. John Fisher Forum.

We then talked about many different things: Anita Dunn, White House Communications Director, whose favorite philosopher is Chairman Mao; Charles Krauthammer's latest article in The Weekly Standard, Decline is a Choice; Nancy Brown's facebook post of the Silent Monks Singing Halleluia; a little about Handel and his composition, The Messiah; why people ususally stand for the Hallelujah chorus; (an aside from Wikipedia -- There is another story told about this chorus that Handel's assistant walked in to Handel's room after shouting to him for several minutes with no response. The assistant reportedly found Handel in tears, and when asked what was wrong, Handel held up the score to this movement and said, "I thought I saw the face of God."); and finally, Distributism. I know little, if anything about Distributism. I did know it was related to the Catholic social doctrine of subsidiarity. So we agreed that at out next meeting we would educate each other a bit on Distributism. We'll be using information gleaned from the references on Richard Aleman's facebook info page. We should learn a lot!

Leaving Chesterton books lying around sometimes attracts new readers. (There are several on the bookshelf at Schlegel's.) Here, Julie, displays the Chesterton book she's currently reading. While she didn't join us Wednesday evening, she has found she enjoys the Father Brown stories.

Successful First Meeting

The September meeting of the Chillicothe Chesterton Society got off to a great start tonight, with three of us meeting at Schlegel's. We talked about Chesterton and everything else. Pictured above, from left to right, are Tim Binkley, Margaret Breidenbaugh, and Bob Cook. Tim is from Lancaster and Margaret resides, for the next few days at least, in Chillicothe. Tim is reading The Everlasting Man, Margaret is reading Orthodoxy, having recently completed reading several Father Brown stories. The subject for our October meeting will be Lepanto, the battle and Chesterton's poem. I'll post a bit more about Lepanto over the next few days.