The Sanguine Sixties

                         Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, Peoria native, was beatified today in St. Louis. Beatification is an important step on the road to sainthood and involves a miracle being attributed to the intervention of the person. In Sheen's case, a baby who was stillborn with no heartbeat or respiration for the first 61 minutes of his life came alive after the prayers to Fulton Sheen by the baby's family. This baby, James, is now a normal, healthy 16-year-old boy. The Diocese of Peoria led the successful investigation to beatify the Archbishop. There is not a facility in Peoria large enough to hold the number of people attending the beatification Mass, so the beatification was moved to the Dome in St. Louis, which could hold the 50,000 attendees. Some of my friends and relatives attended. I was tempted to go, but today is also my Dad's 95th birthday. So I am watching the Mass with him and my Mom at Buehler. It was f...

On September 11, 2001, at 9:00 am, I was on a plane at the Newark airport waiting to fly home. I wrote a couple of articles shortly after that appeared in the Catholic Post, the Diocese of Peoria newspaper and the Peoria Journal Star. Here is a link to another of my blogs that has copies of these articles.  Today, 25 years later, I put down some other memories I had of that day.  September 11, 2026 I can’t believe it was 25 years ago that I was sitting on a TWA jet on a runway at Newark next to Joe Knapp when we heard the captain say, “If you look out the left side of the plane, you'll see smoke coming from the World Trade Center." A plane had hit the building, the pilot went on to explain and our flight was cancelled.” I remember not feeling particularly alarmed as when we were looking at the towers a few days earlier, a small plane was flying near it and we had wondered aloud if the towers had ever been hit by a plane. By accident. This is what we thought had happened that m...

Count me in the all inclusive group of those who loved Dolly Parton, and didn't realize how much until she left us. Or God called her home, as she and I--we--might put it. Dolly seemed like everyone's best friend. I had thought for a long time that she should run for President. She would win and she would be good. It's fun to imagine her on the world stage, negotiating with Putin or Xi. They wouldn't know what to do. Since Dolly's passing, I've been falling down the rabbit hole of watching videos, reading about Dolly, and reflecting on memories.  It was not love at first sight with me for Dolly. I remember seeing her on television in the mid-70's in an especially outlandish wig, thinking that she was rather strange. How could someone want to look like that? Was she for real? Of course, a major part of Dolly's appeal was how real she was behind all the makeup, glittery outfits and wigs. Those were a part of her too, but not the most important part.  Count...