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[ by Charles Cameron — Pope Francis recently canonized him — this is my belated tribute ]
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The Economist, El Salvador’s most famous martyr, Óscar Romero, is canonised

The Atlantic, What Óscar Romero’s Canonization Says About Pope Francis

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He was already a popular saint. For years the faithful have congregated every Sunday for mass by his tomb in the crypt of the cathedral in San Salvador, inspired by the man they called San Óscar or San Romero de América. Now it is official. On October 14th in Rome, Archbishop Óscar Arnulfo Romero was canonised, almost 40 years after he fell to a gunman’s bullet while finishing a private mass at a chapel that is today a site of pilgrimage. He had recited the 23rd Psalm: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.”

As the archbishop read the Gospel, the assassins pulled up to the chapel. As he raised the consecrated bread and wine, the gunman fired a shot to the heart.

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The Economist’s graphic, above, gets it wrong. It’s not the struggle, signified by the familiar raised, clenched fist that grabs the halo of sanctity, it’s the diminutive (humble) figure in clerical garb, his hands holding a cross and giving a blessing on whom the halo descends, as noted by Pope Francis.

The theological and political twists and turns of Romero’s life are succinctly presented in my heading, with further details in the two articles.

What I have wanted to illuminate here, however, is the sacramental nature of the arch bishop’s martyrdom, assassinated while saying Mass. Cavanaugh has an entire, brilliant book, Torture and Eucharist: Theology, Politics, and the Body of Christ demonstrating torture in S America as the inverse of sacrament, the attempt to wipe out all traces of the body of Christ present in those who receive it in the Eucharistic sacrament, and the martyrdom of Romero is a summation and eloquent proof of Cavanaugh’s thesis.

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As I mentioed here before, in Of sacrifice and martyrdom, I have a particular interest in eucharistic martyrs, ghaving served Mass often enough, kneeling on the paving-stones of the lady chapel of Brightwell church near Wallingford, Berks — or is it now Oxon?

There in the Lady Chapel, embedded in one of those stones, is the brass of a priest of Brightwell, who too was assassinated while saying Mass.

The brass might as well be illustrating the holy death of Saint Oscar Romero, archbishop and martyr.

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Oscar Romero, ora pro nobis.

[ by Charles Cameron — and a few ppl whose views on trump’s strategy document I’d also like to read ]
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Tim Furnish, Trump’s New Counter-terrorism Strategy: The One-Eyed Man is Still King

Trump, 2018, National Strategy for Counterterrorism

Obama, 2011, National Strategy for Counterterrorism

Tim Furnish, Sectsploitation: How to Win Hearts and Minds in the Islamic World

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I wanted to draw your attention to our blog-friend and sometime contributor Tim Furnish‘s post, which offers a lucid introduction to the Trump administration’s National CT Strategy paper, situating it in contrast to the Obama admin’s version, and linking it to a very helpful breakdown of what we might call (remembering William James, but in mostly lower case) the varieties of Islamic experience.

Let me just say that from my POV:

1) Tim Furnish has a way superior understanding of the said varieties than John Bolton ever will have — plus he has a taste for pop culture asides!

2) that the key issue to be further explored could be expressed in terms of the overlaps, Venn diagram-wise, between “literalist”, “mainstream” and “authentic” Islams.

That’s a project I’ve been circling for more than a decade, and the closer I get, the more subtleties arise to be considered. Still circling in..

Thomas Hegghammer, JM Berger, Leah Farrall, Adam Elkus, Will McCants and John Horgan are others whose varied voices and opinions regaarding the new CT Strategy text I’ll be watching for.

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Tim’s essay and associated matters: Warmly recommended.

Zen — pray chime in.

[ by Charles Cameron — a non-alcoholic Monday morning pick-me-up ]
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Congratulations to this year’s winner of the Rooney Literary Prize, for more reasons than one — first, for an exemplary example of life imitating art..

Second: that’s wonderful!

And huzzah! is a polite, secular hallelujah!

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Sources:

Good Will Hunting:

Washington Post, This author also works as a janitor.

See also:

Quartz, A prestigious university just awarded a literary prize to one of its janitors

it was the fact that Lally scrubs lecture halls, offices, and a library at Trinity every morning, rising at 4:45 am, and cleaning from 6 am to 9:30 am, before returning home to care for her infant daughter, that brought her international media attention.

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Nota bene: I am not the first to note the parallel between Good Will Hunting‘s plot line and this year’s Rooney Prize story — but the pair of them also make for an exemplary DoubleQuote example, eh?

[ by Charles Cameron — between the cloture vote and the final Senate nomination vote on Judge Kavanaugh for the USSC, a moral moment ]
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Two to be read in counterpoint:

Brett Kavanaugh, I Am an Independent, Impartial Judge

Brett Kavanaugh, The Judge as Umpire: Ten Principles

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Judge Kavanaugh‘s extended description of the function of the judge as umpire deserves its place right alongside his recent op-ed apologia and apology — indeed it’s interesting to see an apology within an apologia, which, as Cardinal Newman well knew, is not inherently about apologizing but an apologia pro vita sua or [proactive] defence of one’s own life — both as an expanded sports and politics metaphor, and as an urgent indicator within which to frame his op-ed.

Now is decision time: consider these two in tandem.

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With Sens. Collins’ and Manchin’s Yes votes now declared shortly after I posted the above, the nomination of Judge Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court seems all but assurred.

[ by Charles Cameron — lady justice courted by an unsuitable suitor? ]
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Kavanaugh‘s op-ed. and my learned friend’s comment:

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Sources:

Wikipedia, Nemo iudex in causa sua

Wall Street Journal, I Am an Independent, Impartial Judge

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One of the texts embedded in our Zenpundit graphical header is by James Madison in Federalist 10:

No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judgment, and, not improbably, corrupt his integrity.

I think we have two or three headers, so look up at the top of this page and you may see it..

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Of course, writing an op-ed isn’t a judgment, it’s not an amicus curiae brief either — it’s advocacy, in fact self-representation. So maybe the better legal tag would be:

A lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client.

Even that’s not exact, but I don’t know quite how to pin it down: something is fishy in the state of play? Is that vague enough? I think there’s an ouroboros loose in the title of Judge Kavanaugh’s op-ed, is all..

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Written after the procedural vote and before the final vote:

In his WSJ op-ed, Judge Kavanaugh says, “I Said a Few Things I Should Not Have Said”. Is someone who at a crucial point under oath addressing the Senate Judiciary Committee, by his own admission said things, acutely partisan, visibly furious things he should not have said, is someone to be relied upon to avoid doing the same on the Supreme bench on issues of inflamed political passions and high consequences?