#G.K. Chesterton

[apesoformythoughts]

"God has never told us what a turkey means. And if you go and stare at a live turkey for an hour or two, you will find by the end of it that the enigma has rather increased than diminished."

— G.K. Chesterton

[macrolit]

I wish we could sometimes love the characters in real life as we love the characters in romances. There are a great many human souls whom we should accept more kindly, and even appreciate more clearly, if we simply thought of them as people in a story. - G.K. Chesterton

[dk-thrive]

You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.

— G.K. Chesterton, "Orthodoxy" (John Lane, 1908) (via Wait-What?)

[fictionadventurer]

It's so funny how Heretics is G.K. Chesterton publicly dragging his friends and they still stay his friends! Imagine if you did an in-depth analysis of every mutual's worldview and why they are wrong. It would be chaos. And yet this guy manages to publish this book, get paid money for it, and still maintains these friendships for several more decades. Only G.K., I tell you.

[garrett-strangelove]

If you show me a criminal be sure I'd want to rehabilitate them.

Father Brown did it very well with Flambeau (I'm shocked it actually happened in canon).

[momentsbeforemass]

Worth doing badly

One of the most harmful ideas that we have about God is that God demands perfection.

The spoken or unspoken notion that God expects nothing less from us than perfect performance. 100%. Every time. Or it’s not good enough.

Or we’re not good enough.

That idea is the source of so many terrible things. Ranging from crippling anxiety to turning your back on God. And it couldn’t be farther from the truth.

Because God isn’t looking for perfection from you and me.

What is God looking for? We see it in today’s Gospel, in Jesus’ story about the two sons.

One says that he will do what his father asked him to do. But then doesn’t do it.

The other says that he won’t do what his father asked him to do. But then does it.

That is what God is looking for.

Not the one who says they’ll do it. And then does it. Perfectly.

Actually, that isn’t even an option in Jesus’ story. Because in reality no one ever does that. So Jesus doesn’t even bring it up. It’s like He knows us or something.

What God is looking for is the one who does it. Period.

Not the one who says they’ll do it. And then does it. Perfectly.

Not the one who says they won’t do it. But then turns around and does it so amazingly well that it more than balances out their initial “no” to God.

Just the one who does it. Even if they got off to a bad start. Even if it’s not perfect.

As G.K. Chesterton puts it, “Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.”

Not that you’re trying to mess things up. But when it comes to the things in life that truly matter – telling someone that you love them, raising a child, your relationships, including your relationship with God – you doing it is worth the risk that it won’t be done perfectly.

Why? Because that isn’t the important part.

The important part is that you did it. That’s the bit that matters.

That’s what God is looking for. Even if it’s not perfect.

Today’s Readings

[thebeautifulbook]

THE NAPOLEON OF NOTTING HILL by G.K. Chesterton, 1874-1936. (New York/London: Lane/Bodley Head, 1904)

source

[patriciqn]

Hey G.K. quick question: what do you mean Father Brown has Flambeau on an invisible leash. what does that mean?

don’t walk away i just wanna talk!

[hexagr]

G.K. Chesterton on democracy and tradition, from Orthodoxy.

[married-to-a-redhead]

[palatinewolfsblog]

" A society is in decay, final or transitional,

when common sense really becomes uncommon."

G.K. Chesterton.

The Socialite (for my old friend and follower @cchris47 ) ...

[apesoformythoughts]

"It is absolutely useless and absurd to tell a man that he must not joke about sacred subjects. It is useless and absurd for a simple reason; because there are no subjects that are not sacred subjects. Every instant of human life is awful. Every step, every stirring of a finger, is full of an importance so huge and even so horrible that a man might go mad if he thought of it. If it is wrong to joke about one's death-bed it is wrong to joke about the veal and ham pie which, if pursued with too much devotion, may very likely have a great deal to do with bringing one to that death-bed. If it is wrong to joke about a dying man it is wrong to joke about any man. For every man is a dying man; a man dying slow or fast. In short, if we say that we must not jest about solemn subjects, what we really mean or ought to mean is that we must not jest at all [...]

I think we may jest on any subject. But I do not think that we may jest on any occasion. It is really irreverent to speak frivolously at those particular moments at which the seriousness of the matter is being specially and fiercely felt. We joke about death-beds, but not at death-beds [...] Life is serious all the time; but living cannot be serious all the time.

[In] anything that does cover the whole of your life--in your philosophy and your religion--you must have mirth. If you do not have mirth you will certainly have madness."

-- G.K. Chesterton: The Daily News, 1 September 1906

[themaninthegreenshirt]

"A people that forgets its ancestors will care little for its descendants."

G.K. Chesterton

[fictionadventurer]

In doing some research for the Inklings stickers I came across this and had a good laugh🤣thought of you bc you’re reading Chesterton right now

First off: Research for the Inklings stickers? Hooray! Can't wait to see what you come up with!

I love that story! It's got everything--the Chesterton-Shaw frenemy-ship, jokes about Chesterton's weight. (It's even better now that Heretics gave me more details about Chesterton and Shaw's debates.)

Don't forget the story of the woman who came up to Chesterton while WWI was raging and asked, "Why aren't you out at the front?" to which Chesterton replied, " If you will go around to the side, you will see that I am."

Also, this reminded me of maybe my favorite moment in the Chesterton-Shaw friendship: this hilarious letter that Shaw sent to Frances Chesterton. I'm not sure what's better: his elaborate plan to needle Chesterton, the fact that he roped his wife into it, his suggestion to stand there reading at them for 90 minutes, or the fact that Shaw loved Chesterton's work so much he wanted to prompt him to write things Shaw disagreed with.

Actually, my favorite thing about their friendship might be the time Shaw said that if he ever got to heaven, it would be because of the friendship of G.K. Chesterton. (I hope he was right).

[garrett-strangelove]

❗FATHER BROWN & FLAMBEAU ANIMATIC❗

[momentsbeforemass]

The best argument against Christianity

One of the saddest things in ministry is finding out why someone left.

Why someone turned away from your church. Or worse, turned away from God.

It’s humbling and heartbreaking. All in the same moment.

Because it usually comes down to one of two things.

One, as they see it, God didn’t do something. Or God allowed something terrible to happen.

Which means that we (official church people, parents, other teachers of the faith, etc.) have failed them. By leaving them with a defective understanding of God and God’s love for them. Setting them up to have exactly this happen, when they hit the hard things in life.

Or two, someone they understood to be a Christian said or did something that so completely repulsed them that they (understandably) want nothing to do with the Faith.

This is the more subtle one. And it’s because of something that Jesus points out in today’s Gospel, “You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden.”

Translation – as followers of Christ, you and I are always visible. There is no time when what we say or do does not reflect back on God. There is no time when what we say or do does not impact someone’s understanding of God.

You and I may not intend to teach the Faith. But rest assured that every waking moment, you and I are teaching the Faith to someone.

Whether we know it or not, someone is looking at what we say, what we do, what we post online, and saying to themselves, “that’s what Christians do.”

That time that you treated the clerk like a thing, and not like a person? Someone saw that and said, “that’s what Christians do.”

That “just for fun” repost of nasty stuff about the people whose politics you disagree with? Someone saw that and said, “that’s what Christians do.”

When you and I let that be our witness? It should be no surprise that they want nothing to do with us or our Faith.

“The best argument against Christianity is Christians.” – G.K. Chesterton

Today’s Readings