A Deo et Rege

The premier “reasserter” Anglican blog, TitusOneNine has a new home. Have a visit.

I absolutely love the Animal Planet’s show Meercat Manor. I don’t get cable, but I catch it at the YMCA as often as I can. It’s more like an adventure show than a documentary about the interesting meercats of the Kalahari desert. They are very social animals and form "gangs." They forage, dig burrows, plunder rival gangs, and even attack the territory of those gangs. It’s all quite fascinating and addicting. The researchers have given them all names so it draws the viewer in even more. I really want to know what happens next!

For beautiful photos of meercats, go here.

This is Isadore (named after St. Therese’s uncle), our newest resident:

The results are in from a recent survey of men about to be ordained in the Catholic Church in the USA. The results are interesting. First, the average age of the men is 35. This is out of the "baby boomer" range and is encouraging for the future of orthodox theology and solid liturgy. The group is also highly educated, which I think is important. Six percent of the men are converts from Protestantism and one was formerly a Buddhist. I think converts bring a nice perspective to the Church (as do cradle Catholics), so this statistic is hopeful as well. I was surprised by the education and military background of many of the future priests too. Things seem to be improving. Praise God!

Hat tip: Catholic Report

Pope Benedict, in recent speeches, has been emphasizing the importance of the Church Fathers. I think it’s safe to say that for many of the more academic minded converts to Catholicism, reading or studying the Church Fathers played an instrumental part in their conversion. It certainly was in mine (not that I consider myself terribly academic minded!). The mention by Benedict is timely since Dr. Francis Beckwith, president of the Evangelical Theological Society, has converted to Catholicism and one of his major reasons for doing so was the influence of the Church Fathers. Welcome to the Catholic Church, Dr. Beckwith!