Blumudus

Trump will win this election, again

Yes, I know this time it’s an easier prediction, but I hesitated for months to call this race because I feared the one element that I felt was impossible to control or factor in: cheating, as per the 2020 example. But this time it’s different. Slightly less opportunities for cheating since there’s no Covid excuse; plenty of reasons for everyday Americans wanting, again, to send a strong signal of disapproval to Washington DC. Notwithstanding the crazed reactions from the, admittedly large, leftist bubble. The Deep Heart of America is absolutely enraged against the Deep State. Here’s my audio contribution, where I try to set the stage as seen from…

Podcast: On Trump vs. Biden, insane comments

Mark Cuban on Trump vs. Biden debate, in a tweet

Let’s try this experiment: my comments in audio format, since I cannot seem to be able to find enough time to write things down. Presenting my ideas on the recent debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. I’m focusing on a comment made by Mark Cuban that I found particularly egregious (as many are, these days) in not just missing the point, but reversing a perception of reality. How can you possibly, in the same breath, say that Biden had that kind of awful performance, but he’s not the guy people around the world laugh at? And don’t get me started on who’s the “liar”! Here’s the tweet. You be…

The perfect music combo

This is quite odd: I cannot fully explain it to myself. The thing is, these two songs that you can find below, represent for my mind the most effective, exhilarating, emotional combination that I could possibly find. A perfect marriage between two deeply contrasting flavors. Try listening to them, strictly without interruption, one after the other; please don’t paying attention to the videos that add nothing, if anything they take away. Have a good fight, have a good future! I know, I’m weird.

Pseudo-Homilies 27 – Jesus, a backward xenophobe?

Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A Oh, this reading was meant to spark controversy! Jesus is in pagan land, in the region of Tire and Sidon. A local woman (Canaanite) asks him to save her sick daughter (she was said to have “a demon”, but that’s not necessarily meant as a demonic possession in the proper sense). Jesus, at least at first, appears unfriendly, contemptuous. He states that he’s been sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel! Only after doubling down, comparing pagans like her to house pets, It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs…

Pseudo-Homilies 26 – The Assumption

This celebration is so special that in some countries, including Italy where I live, it’s a public holiday. Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Mass during the Day This is to celebrate the concept that, by unique privilege, Our Lady is proclaimed to be already in Heaven in body and soul, anticipating the undeserved destiny of us creatures spoiled by the Original Sin. If we can make it, we’ll have to wait for the end of the world for the resurrection of our body. You may have been brought to believe that the Assumption was a recent Catholic invention, given that the dogma of the…

Pseudo-Homilies 25 – The gentle breeze

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A God revealing Himself. Last time we discussed a shock-and-awe-some sign: like ancient patriarchs, the three apostles were afraid and prostrated themselves to the ground when they heard the voice from heaven, the voice of God; yet initially, faced with the glistening cloud from God, Peter seemed quite excited by the experience, surprisingly confident and in the zone, since he proposed to stay, enjoy the moment, make it last, make three tents. Peter’s exuberance is also found in the Gospel read on this particular Sunday: after initially being taken aback and even scared by the arrival of Jesus who was walking on water, he…

Pseudo-Homilies 24 – The Transfiguration

Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord – Year A This is the feast of the revelation of the divine nature of Christ. From the Gospel of Matthew: while on a mountain together with three apostles, the face and clothes of Jesus become very bright; Moses and Elijah also appear next to Jesus, representing the Law and the Prophets respectively: in Jesus the Old Testament finds its fulfillment. Then Peter, James and John are covered by a bright cloud, and a voice from the cloud proclaims that Jesus is the beloved Son. A sign, through the glimmering of this intense light, which overcomes those men, and which we find testified…

Pseudo-Homilies 23 – The Pearl

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A As always, once again I will make an exception to the rule I have given myself, and I won’t focus on a single theme. At least I’d hope to be concise, but even that would be a (desired, unlikely) change. On predestination (reprise) Our first topic comes from the Second Reading, which in a way represents a continuation of our discourse on predestination addressed in the previous article. In fact St. Paul in the Letter to the Romans parallels these two planes, which seem impossible to reconcile: the eternity of the creation, whereby God “already” knew everything “immediately”, and our becoming. Are…

Pseudo-Homilies 22 – The Sower II

Actually I wanted to call it The Sower II – Revenge of the Sower. But then I realized that these stupid jokes were better left unsaid. Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A In this case the readings revolve around a main parable, which once again presents Jesus as the Sower, introduced by short passages which explain how God brings together his perfect justice and his unique mercy, accompanied by the insertion of two very short parables. The Kingdom of God seen as a small mustard seed that grows into a large tree, and again: the Kingdom, or the Church, like leaven, which, despite being a small quantity, makes the…

Pseudo-Homilies 21 – The Sower

Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A The First and Second Readings refer us to a grand divine plan, of course hard to grasp with our limited minds. This plan entails Creation in all its manifestations of the physical world as we know it (including the Matterhorn, the Great Barrier Reef, a vulture eating a half-rotten carrion), but it contains, by design, as a crucial element, the painful journey of the Church (with all its limitations and glories). Just as we can appreciate the self-sustained nature of the water cycle that we all studied in elementary school (or whatever these schools are called now), similarly the Word of God doesn’t…

Pseudo-Homilies 20 – Flesh

Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A This time I decided to focus on the Second Reading, if only because I wanted to explore an angle, a way of seeing it, which isn’t usually taken into consideration by today’s homilists. I’ll start slightly earlier; from the Letter to the Romans, chapter 8. My passage goes from verse 5 to the verses 8 and 9 which are read in churches on this occasion: For those who live according to the flesh are concerned with the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the spirit with the things of the spirit. The concern of the flesh is death,…

Pseudo-Homilies 19 – a Communion of Love

XIII SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME – YEAR A The first theme of the day is hospitality. This family from the First Reading does everything they can to properly host the prophet Elisha. And Jesus in the Gospel praises, among others, those who “receive a prophet because he is a prophet”. In fact, generosity doesn’t come from letting your heart be touched by the most atrociously desperate stories of the most miserable people. Stories that may manage, thanks to their dramatic nature, to win our consciences, which have become numb as a form of selfish defense: desensitized by a thousand requests, we’re accustomed to move on, unfazed. No, generosity is confident,…