Alleluia! Christ is Risen! - Easter 2026

      

 
"Who [indeed] is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?"

Today I was thinking very much of my friend Matt who passed away this past June.  I was also thinking of something my friend Plucko said once: "If there is no afterlife, then everyone's life is tragic."

This, of course, does not prove that there is life after death.  But it does highlight how drab our world truly would be if there was nothing more than this life.  Every love you ever have would only be a temporary thing.

But in our bones we know that love is forever.  This includes the love of friends.

I think this is why we still love the dead.  You could write it off as some sort of coping mechanism of the mind.  But I think that it reaches into that deep reality that we know: that this life is not the end.

Today is the day that reminds us of that.  Jesus Christ rose from the dead to show us that our end is not the grave but life!  In Him, if we truly love each other, then we can hold onto each other forever.

Because of Jesus, one day I hope to see my friend again and shake his hand.  I live in this hope because the One who promised to me is trustworthy.  Jesus is offering us eternal love.  This means that He can make our loves eternal.

For those of you who have lost loved ones, I grieve with you.  But I offer you the hope that can only be found in Christ: hope that parting is not permanent.

Because death has been defeated by the Lord of Life!

He is Risen.

Alleluia!

Divine Mercy Novena Starts Tomorrow

      

(most of the text below is a repost from 2022)

A reminder that the Divine Mercy Novena begins tomorrow (Good Friday) and continues through until Mercy Sunday.  You can find the novena here:

https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/devotions/novena-13366

This has been a powerful and profound devotion in my life and many graces have come to me through a devotion to Jesus' Divine Mercy.  

Very recently, I experienced such an overwhelmingly powerful act of mercy.  I am acutely aware that under Divine Justice, there is much for which I have to answer.  Each day I seem to be racking up a debt of sin.  But even more concretely, the way I treat the people I claim to love is often selfish and shameful.  When confronted with this reality, I often shrink with shame.  I struggle with this.  I think that God loves me but because of my sins, He doesn't like me very much.  It is an image that is horribly unfair to Our Lord.

Sin is a real barrier between God and us, but God's love is greater than that.  Not too long ago, I had to admit my faults to someone, expecting them to return to me bitter (but just) judgment.  Instead, this person simply smiled at me and told me that all was well.  There was no trace of bitterness or judgment.  There was only pure kindness and love and a joy that I could unburden myself on them.  

This act of mercy lifted a great burden from my heart.  And it acted as a symbol for how God's mercy is similar.

It is a beautiful lay your faults bare to someone and have them look beyond them is a beautiful thing.  Too often I think we define ourselves by our sins.

Pope John Paul II once said that we are more than the sum total of our sins.

God sees us as we are, beyond our sins.  He wants us to come to Him and lay our sins on His mercy.  

I look forward to joining all of you in spiritual communion through this novena.

In these days with all of the worries and struggles that we have, we have a greater need to throw ourselves at the Mercy of God!

Film Review: Project Hail Mary

  

Sexuality/Nudity No Objection

Violence Acceptable

Vulgarity Acceptable

Anti-Catholic Philosophy Mature

Project Hail Mary feels like a rare movie where the sci-fi spectacle is there to support a story and not vice-verse.  This is a movie about big human themes, wrapped in a sci-fi package.

The movie centers on Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling), who wakes up on a spaceship several light years away from Earth.  He has partial amnesia and does not remember immediately why he is there or what he is supposed to do.  Through a series of flashbacks we find out that our sun is dying along with several other stars in the galaxy except one.  Eva Stratt (Sandra Huller) is leading an international team to send a team to that star on the spaceship Hail Mary to find out why before it is too late.  When Rylan gets to the new solar system he encounters another alien on a mission that he names Rocky.  Together they learn to communicate and form a friendship as they work together to save both their planets from doom.

.One of the things I really liked about this movie is that it is about something: courage and friendship.

The movie deals with what it means to be brave.  Rylan is someone who is very smart, but he is incredibly nervous and seems to lack the courage necessary for such a mission as his.  What he does, he does more out of necessity and desperation.  Even though he comes to remember that this mission is a one-way trip with no hope of return, his approach to solving the problem does not seem particularly borne from a stout heart.  As the story progresses, Rylan faces his fears little by little so that when the moment of truth comes, he has shaped his character to a place of bravery.

The movie also makes clear that courage must be rooted in love.  There must be something or someone to be brave for.  This is wear the exploration of friendship really takes center stage.  I've always said that part of friendship is speaking the same language.  In the case of the movie, this is literal as Rylan has to figure out a way for he and Rocky to communicate.  But in a deeper sense, friends must see the same truth and so their minds take up the same space.  This creates a special language between them that can only be found between friends.  These inside jokes are the fortifying walls of the relationship that reinforce its strength.  If I said the word "pals" or "golly," to my closest friends, it would have resonance with them and elicit chuckles in ways it wouldn't with others because of this shared language.  We can see this when Rylan and Rocky give each other the "thumbs down" for encouragement or Rocky yells, "Amaze!  Amaze!"

And this friendship is what draws you into the story and gives it its beating heart.  Not only does this movie show an strong example of friendship, but it is a very masculine type of friendship.  Here, the friends do not speak much about how they feel about each other.  Instead, it expressed in action.  It is expressed in the way that they joke with each other.  And it is expressed most in the sacrificial love that each one has.  To be sure, Rocky and Rylan talk deeply about their feelings, but it is done in a way men do, by peeling back the layers to help a friend in need.

I also love how respectful this movie is of faith.  With a title like Project Hail Mary, there could be a lot of jokes made at the expense of the Blessed Virgin.  Instead, the movie leans into this imagery.  In fact, the main character's name means that the Hail Mary is full of "Grace."  At one point Rylan asks Eva if she believes in God and she responds, "It's better than the alternative."  To be clear, this is not a Christian movie that tries to evangelize faith.  But it doesn't need to be.  What impressed me wasn't that it was promoting Christianity, but that it simply treated it with respect.

Visually, the movie is great.  Directors Philip Lord and Christopher Miller used as many practical effects and avoided CGI when possible.  I have no problem with CGI if its used well, but too often is seems rushed and artificial.  There is a tactile reality presented with the puppeteering of Rocky or the tangible sets of the Hail Mary.

The whole movie stands or falls on Gosling's performance and he is great.  There could be a lot of parts where he could go for overly emotional deliveries.  But he understands his character is more reserved and introverted.  This allows him to use his emotion with restraint.  But in doing so, every thing he does has power.  When he lets the damn break and allows himself to hope a little, you can see how that invigorates and hurts him at the same time.  His performance invests you in the central friendship.  Huller is the perfect Yang to Goslings Ying.  She is the lead weight of seriousness and lets his heart and humor fly.

The only issue I have with the film is in the flippant way it treats suicide.  When the astronauts talk about how the mission is a one-way trip, they speak very casually about how they will kill themselves at the end.  One of them says they hope to do it with lethal injection and heroin.  There is never any ethical pushback on this, which I found very odd.  It implied that there were no moral objections to euthanizing the crew.

Other than that though, the movie explores the issues of friendship and hope with real vigor.  You become thoroughly uplifted and invested in the fate of the characters and you know no matter how the story ends, you are going to be moved by what happens to them.

New Evangelizers Post: The School of the Cross

                                        

I have a new article up at NewEvangelizers.com.  

Recently I was speaking with a priest and said something that has stayed with me. He said, “Priests are trained to go to the school of the cross.”

He said that it is a constant learning experience for priests to come back to the cross of Christ and to learn from Him. On that cross, we learn what it is to be a priest, to be a Christian.

I would imagine that many of us have been going to the school of the cross during this Lent. We have made certain Lenten sacrifices. Perhaps we attended extra liturgical events like the Stations of the Cross. These things we do in order to draw closer to the cross of Christ and to learn from the school of the cross.

There is a story that St. Maximillian Kolbe had a vision when he was young. He was presented a crown of glory and a crown of thorns. He was told to choose one or the other. Maximillian chose the crown of the thorns. He wanted to have the same crown that Jesus had in this world. He was learning from the school of the cross.

Those who know his story mostly know about how it ends. But Maximillian spent his whole life at the school of the cross. He traveled the world spreading the good news. He founded radio stations to broadcast the Gospel as far and wide as he could. He dedicated his life day after day to God. He picked up his cross and died to himself every day. This is part of the lesson from the school of the cross: if you die to yourself every day, then your final day is just another day that you have to die.

The school of the cross helps remove the sting of death. We see this in Maximillian’s story. I always find it fascinating that all of his great evangelical work is often forgotten. He is remembered most for the thing he did when he was reduced to just a number. Maximillian was sent to Auschwitz. One day, the commandant chose ten men from his barracks to be placed into a room and deprived of food and water until they died. One of the condemned men fell to his knees begging to be spared because he had a wife and child. Maximillian stepped forward and requested to be taken to death in this man’s place. When the commandant asked if Maximillian knew the man whose place he was taking, the priest said no. But Maximillian said that the man had a wife and child, but he did not. Maximillian was taken and locked away with the other without food or water. Normally, the prisoners in this situation would be howling like beasts by the second day. But the guards who witnessed this said that they only heard prayers and singing from that cell. After ten days, Maximillian and few others were still clinging to life. The guards took them and injected them with carbolic acid to kill them.

Maximillian Kolbe learned from the school of the cross. He spent his whole life giving his life away so that he could do it in that final moment. At the school of the cross, he learned that real love is sacrifice.

Pope Benedict XVI made this point clear when writing about Jesus. Our redemption from the cross is not about the blood that was shed per se. If that were so, then it would make God the Father a blood God who desired violence to satisfy His vengeance. But Pope Benedict XVI said that the reason Christ goes to the cross is because it is the only way we would ever truly know who God is: God is love.

And love is expressed in complete self-donation. Jesus on the cross shows us that He is willing to pay any price just to have a chance that we would choose to be with Him forever. And in that love learn how we are supposed to love each other. We are to give our lives away.

You can read the whole article here.

Sunday Game: Thoughts on Oscars 2026 and Oscar Game Winner

   

So this year we have another Oscars in the history books. 

Below are my thoughts on the night.

THE GOOD

1. Bring Back Conan

 I have always been a huge fan of Conan O'Brien.  I love his sense of silly, self-deprecating humor.  He had me smiling during his entire opening monologue.  Even his digs against those on the opposite side of the political spectrum seemed all in good fun.  I especially liked how he tried to "memify" Leonardo DiCaprio and made fun of how young people don't watch the Oscars anymore.

2. K-Pop Demon Hunters

The Oscars honored one of the rare breakout hits of the year with Best Animated Feature and Best Song, both of which were well-deserved.  In a show where most people have not seen the movies that won awards, it was nice to have something to root for and win.

3. Rob Reiner Tribute

I thought Billy Crystal not only euligized Reiner well (despite his deviation into divisive politics), but he was able to point out the great cannon of films he made.  And then the representation of actors on stage paying tribute to him was very nice to see.

 

THE BAD

1.  The Show Still Drags

I know it is a cliche at this point, but the show goes on way too long.  And I always find it very mean when they cut off some winners and not others.  At least there were fewer meaningless time-filler numbers.

2. Too Much Politics

Oscar ratings have cratered.  One of the reasons is that half of the audience in the US feels targeted and insulted.  This is not a statement of agreement or disagreement with the political positions espoused, but it is an observation about the show's tone.  The regular viewing audience is really not interested in hearing a political message out of entertainers.

3. Who Saw The Best Picture?

With One Battle After Another, we once again run into the problem of very few people having seen the Best Picture.  Last year,  Anora was number 85 on the list of top Box Office draws for 2024, making just a little over $14 million.  This year's Best Picture winner was better at number 30, at $71.5 million.  But compare both of those with 2023's Best Picture Oppenheimer at number 5 and $325 million.

I was not a big fan of Sinners but it was a legitimate hit at number 7 and $280 million at the box office.

Even the critically panned (though a movie I enjoyed) Tron: Ares made more money than One Battle After Another.

So those are my thoughts.  What are yours?

And now, the moment you've been waiting for... the winners of this year's CATHOLIC SKYWALKER OSCAR GAME.

With no clear frontrunner in most of the major categories, scores were generally lower this year, with the lowest score being  -2.9

In third place with a combined score of 3.2... Justin R!

In second place, with a score of 4.2... Catholic Lois Lane!

And in first place with a score of 17.4... me.

I posted my predictions and choices, so everyone can see that things are above board.

This year, I seeing as many of the nominated movies improved my chances.  I bet heavily on One Battle After Another and Sinners.

When grading purely on predictions, the order of the top three winners remains the same (Me = 12.9, Catholic Lois Lane = 2.2, Justin R = 1.2)

When it came to scoring purely on choice, I still won (4.5), But the Garden Stater came in 2nd (2.5), and Catholic Lois Lane and Justin R tied for third (2). 

Thank you to everyone who played this year.  Good luck in next year's game!

Film Flash: Project Hail Mary

 

 

15 words or less film review (full review to follow soon)

Touching movie about courage, friendship, and sacrifice wrapped in a sci-fi package

Trailer Time: Spider-Man - Brand New Day

 

Click here to see the trailer on YouTube

I think of the MCU franchise movies, the Spider-Man series might be one of their best.  Tom Holland has given us a fantastic Spider-Man and No Way Home was the best of the series.

I am very curious about this film.  Instead of dealing with multiversal madness, it seems to be dealing with more street-level issues, albeit still involving super-villains and ninjas.  I love seeing Jon Berthnal's Punisher and will be curious to see if the two actors have chemistry.

There are two shots in this trailer that I really liked.  The first was from inside of Peter's mask and you get his strong sense of isolation.

The second was the one where he stops the sword with his web.  There is no rational explaination for why I liked it except the 13-year-old in me shouted "Cool!"

I am actually a little surprised that there is still such a focus on MJ and Ned.  I thought perhaps Peter was going to get a fresh start, but it seems that this is not the case.  

I'm still not sold completely on the concept, since I don't know what the main story is.  But this franchise has built up enough good will that I am excited to see it.

Thoughts?