Author: D. A. Hosek
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A visit with my younger self: 13 September 1988
Take one young would-be writer, full of himself, who has never undergone any sort of creative writing instruction to speak of, let alone workshop with a professor who not only allows abuse in the workshop, but perpetrates some of it himself and you get some seriously hurt feelings. Well, I’ve undergone the first real criticism of…
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A visit with my younger self: 7 September 1988
The fall of 1988, I enrolled in the only creative writing class I ever took until I started grad school. The class, under the direction of Robert Mezey, focused on writing metric verse. This entry is apparently one of my attempts. The waxen complexion gazes from its berth— A former | person, | bathed |…
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Today’s saint picture: Saint Diomedes of Tarsus
Diomedes was one of the Holy Unmercenaries, an epithet¹ applied to a number of early Christians who did things like care for the sick without charging for their services. He was ordered arrested by the Eastern Roman Emperor Diocletian and along the way, Diomedes stopped to pray and fell dead. The soldiers, being mindful of…
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Catholic nerd pilgrimage: Assumption
I have a sentimental attachment to the Assumption of the Virgin Mary as my baptismal parish and the church which established my expectations of the norms of Catholicism was Our Lady of the Assumption in Claremont, California. I would guess that these days, three decades after I left Claremont, there’s nobody that I know there…
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Catholic nerd pilgrimage: National Shrine of St Maximillan Kolbe
Most of the time when I go to a weekday Mass, it’s no more than a dozen people present, St Rita being the main exception thusfar, but today’s trip to Marytown, home of the National Shrine of St Maximilian Kolbe was the most packed Mass I’ve seen, including Sundays. I arrived just as the Mass…
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Catholic nerd pilgrimage: Saint Jane de Chantal
At one point in the Renew My Church process, Saint Jane de Chantal and Saint Camillus were united as a single parish taking the combined name of Saint Faustina Kowalska. Then Saint Camillus was closed. The archdiocesan directory still lists Saint Jane de Chantal as the name of the church, but none of the signage…
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Catholic nerd pilgrimage: Saint Clare of Assisi (St Colette)
Thanks to the Renew My Church initiative, we have parishes which have one or more churches by a different name than the parish itself as parishes are merged and the combined parishes choose to take on a new name even as the individual churches keep their original names. The parish of Saint Clare of Assisi…
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A visit with my younger self: 6 September 1988
The fact that I face it alone makes the pain that much more unbearable. The dream is almost always the same: the general premise is that I meet Beth in some unexpected place and find that something has happened that will permit us to be together. Sometimes we make love. Sometimes I find myself dragged…
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Catholic nerd pilgrimage: Saint John Vianney
The parish of Saint John Vianney is located in the nearish suburb of Northlake, which is not so named because it’s near a lake but because it is located at the intersection of Lake Street and North Avenue. For some reason, I had it in my head that the Mass began at 8a even though…