Went to Texas A & M this last week. What a delight. The students were great, the reading went very well, and I got to spend some time with Chuck Taylor, Janet McCann, and Bedford Clark. And what a blessings, to be able to talk about Jesus and humility at a big secular place--no venal concerns for church/state stuff. Just another open forum, which is what university life is supposed to be about.
The other big thing was a dear priest friend got convicted of some kind of imposition. My wife caught some of it on the local news: a history of drinking problems. I didn't see it, but it sounded like the usual media job. The priest said it was a cultural misunderstanding in a letter. (He's African.) I really don't know about any of it, but loved the guy as a priest and intellectual. So if you think about it, keep both him and the poor girl in your prayers.
As an old girl friend once put it to me: "Well, your track record isn't so good." I didn't get married until I was forty, so though I never got involved with anyone anywhere near the age of the girl in question, I did lots of stupid. Too often. (Once would be so.) I tell my kids and students: do things God's way.
Young people are squeezed for all sides on the sexual matters. The media tries to whisper "gay" in their ears; sex as commodity is everywhere. (A student of mine--and my son--just turned me on to FIREFLY. Well-written sci-fi, but it clearly pushes "sex-workers.") I'm glad I'm not young these days. We all have enough to repent of.
Pray, pray, pray.
