#moved to Canada when Lance was born

[nico-di-genova]

Bridgerton strollonso idea is winning.

[somethingsomethingwords]

Hello hello hello!!! This was born because I needed more Nando being besotted and Lance getting some deserved rest, no other reasons. Thank you for reading. Enjoy 💜.

Fernando was starting to feel some not so vague sense of annoyance at himself.

He and Lance were supposed to go on a date, the first one in a while, because their lives were chaotic and busy as hell.

They were both in Canada, Lance staying home, relaxing after a rough start of the season and some previous commitments, while Fernando was there for some sponsor event that absolutely required his presence, not at all having begged for something to do in Canada, granting him an excuse to be near the other man.

But he must have prayed a little too hard, because not only the event had run later than programmed, but it was followed by a long wait in the car due to the heavy traffic.

While he was sitting in the car, he started making a mental list of all the things he would have to do to make it up to Lance.

The young man had been so happy about finally having some time off together. Despite being visibly tired, he had made some plans, and the promise of more to come once they were back home.

It was strange to think about a manor in a forest as a home for Fernando, but it wasn't home, not really, just like his own house in Monaco wasn't. It was Lance that made every single building that they were in a home.

Love-safety-protection.

But right now, he had to think on how to apologise, because Lance must have been mad as hell.

Usually, when Fernando was late, Lance would write him a text every 10 minutes until he arrived. It was his way of annoying him and still making sure he knew he cared.

Now, it had been radio silence the whole evening. He prayed Lance would let him in, even if just to take a change of clothes.

When he finally arrived, he parked the car and went to the front door.

It was strange, because it was getting dark, but he couldn't see any of the lights on.

He started feeling worried. What if Lance was so mad he left? What if he fell and knocked himself out?

He took a deep breath and opened the door.

First things first, he turned on the lights, and he was going to scream Lance's name, when he finally saw the Canadian.

He was lying on his very comfy sofa, asleep and without his shirt on, because on his chest was napping a peaceful looking blonde baby, thumb in her mouth, wrapped in a blanket, that he recognised as Lance's favourite, and protected by Lance's arm around her. Her cheek rested on his naked skin, seeking his warmth and lulled by his heart beat.

Oh.

Oh.

This tender moment, the softness of niece and uncle bundled together and asleep in the safety of a house Lance promptly opened to Fernando, it was getting to him.

He could almost see Lance with another baby, their hair brown as their eyes, grins mischievous and big smiles, crawling slowly on this same parquet, then running on some sandy beach, speaking fast English then Spanish then French then Italian, their pale skin easily turned red by the sun.

He could see them starting karting, or playing hockey, or maybe wanting nothing to do with sports.

He could see them graduating, moving out, having a family of their own, while he and Lance grew old and grey, happy and satisfied and together.

Together. It seemed impossible, but maybe it wasn't, after all.

The thoughts of a home somewhere quiet, a ring and a child filled his mind, and he softly smiled at a future now lying sleeping on a couch.

At that exact moment, the baby girl started waking up, moving her little arms and softly whining.

He could see Lance starting to wake up as well and decided to intervene. He smiled at the baby, picking her up and gently rocking her. He bent over his lover, and left a kiss in his hairline.

"Keep sleeping cariño, I got her" he whispered, melting at the sight of Lance relaxing once more and mumbling something along the lines of "safe with you".

He rose up and walked to the kitchen. There was already a bag for the baby full of clothes and diapers and baby bottles.

"Are you hungry, mi amor, or you didn't agree with waking up, uh? Your uncle is the same, don't worry" he said, while waiting to understand what she needed: that was pretty clear when she put her whole fist in her mouth.

"Hungry it is. Just give me five minutes, and don't eat your hand" he laughed softly, before sitting her on the high chair Lance had stressed over while buying.

He quickly heated up the milk, making sure it wasn't too hot before feeding it to the girl.  She hungrily took it, and made her way through it, almost finishing it all, before pulling away.

Fernando took her up, and started walking, gently tapping her back until she burped. He then cleaned her up, and returned to the living room.

The moment her eyes were on Lance, the baby tried to reach for him.

Fernando giggled and re-wrapped her in the blanket, depositing her once again on his chest.

Instinctively, Lance put his arm around the baby, and their breaths soon synchronised.

Fernando was left once again the only one awake. He decided to wait for Lance to wake up, sitting on the armchair near his head, just at touching distance. He started passing his hand through the younger man's hair, and was rewarded by a deep sigh of happiness.

Date night could wait, when they had a baby to take care of and some well deserved rest to look forward to.

[hannahhook7744]

Modern Merlin Moodboards (Part 4) (Revamped);

Character: Sir Lancelot Du Lac.

Modern name: Lance Griffin.

Age: 39 years old.

Modern job: Detective.

Short rundown of their modern life: Lance Griffin grew up the son of a solider and because of that, he and his family often moved around. That is, until the night his parents and grandparents were all killed in a robbery gone wrong after burglars broke into their house.

Lance just barely managed to escape being killed as well by hiding in a cupboard until the cops arrived.

After that, he was placed in foster care where, after a couple of years of acting out (from ages 7-11) Lance was put in military school where he met and befriended Percival. He was there for a couple of years until an old friend of his mom's petitioned for custody of him and got it. Allowing for him to stay there during the school year and spend the summer with her.

He joined the police academy after graduating and eventually, after being promoted to detective, he was partnered up with Detective Leonard Grant (who preferred Leon) who introduced him to Doctor Merlin Everstone.

The pair are now roommates (along with Leon's wife, Vivian).

Character: Merlin of Ealdor (also known as Emrys).

Modern name: Merlin Everstone.

Age: 36 years old (physically at least).

Modern job: Physician/Doctor.

Short rundown of their modern life: Merlin has walked the Earth waiting for Arthur to rise, constantly running into Leon and getting into trouble in the meantime. Helping those in need as he did so and eventually becoming a licensed doctor.

Not long after Lancelot popped up, Merlin met Freya (who had nothing to her name) and re-fell in love with her. Eventually Freya's memories returned and the pair settled down, got married (after meeting Will and Elena and attending their own wedding) with the pair (along with Lancelot, Leon, and Vivian) as their witnesses, and had one (magical) son named 'Dragonet'.

As well as a daughter named Stephanie.

Character: Freya (Also known as the Lady of the Lake).

Modern name: Freya Everstone.

Age: 36 years old.

Modern job: Strawberry Farmer.

Short rundown of their modern life: Freya Everstone was born to an Amish community in Canada where she spent the first eighteen years of her life.

She lost her family when she was young, causing her to be raised by the rest of the community until she was attacked by a man, causing her to kill him accidentally in self defense. Which caused her to be ousted by her community and attacked by the man’s mother, which caused her to flee to the U.S.

She ran into Merlin when she was twenty three and soon fell in love with him: eventually causing her memories to return. After that, the pair bought a farm with a few fields filled with wildflowers, near a lake and mountains. Planted some strawberries and got a couple of cows.

Not long afterwards, she and Merlin attended Will and Elena's wedding and decided to tie-the-knot in a courthouse wedding with their friends as their witnesses.

Less than a year later, their only daughter, Stephanie, was born. Two years after, their last child, Dragonet, was born.

Character: None.

Modern name: Stephanie Guinevere Everstone.

Age: 13 years old.

Modern job: None. She's a student.

Short rundown of their modern life: Stephanie Guinevere Everstone was born fourteen years ago was born to Merlin and Freya, and grew up having to keep her magic a secret from most—except for Leon and her family.

Because of this, she grew up feeling bitter and became very rebellious towards her parents. Wanting nothing more than to not hide who she was.

Eventually leading to her disappearance.

Character: Dragonet the Royal Court Jester.

Modern name: Dragonet Everstone.

Age: 11 years old.

Modern job: None. He's a student.

Short rundown of their modern life: Dragonet was born to Merlin and Freya 11 years ago, and grew up having to keep his magic a secret from most— outside of Leon, his sister, and his parents, of course.

He eventually ended up befriending Artie, Everard, Marcel, and Salem, and now does his best to keep them out of harm while trying to keep his magic a secret. Just till his parents and Leon say it's okay for him to tell them.

Which is likely to be sometime after they awaken everyone.

(It's a good thing he's somewhat patient).

Character: Gilli.

Modern name: Gilligan 'Gilli' White.

Age: 28 years old.

Modern job: Carpetener.

Short rundown of their modern life: Gilligan 'Gilli' White was born to a disgraced Magician who was murdered when he was only twelve years old.

After this, Gilli ran away and joined a traveling group of magicians who were apart of a traveling circus. Hellbent on learning all the tricks his father had denied him knowledge of and on tracking down the men who murdered his father (which, given that he doesn't know they are... Well, is not easy).

In the circus, he met his boyfriend, Daegal Norrington, and his friends, Sophia Tiermore and Lamia Scales.

Eventually, he left the circus. Still practicing magic, but becoming a Carpenter and moving into a motel where he still resides to this day with his now med student boyfriend, Daegal Norrington.

Character: Daegal. 

Modern name: Daegal Norrington.

Age: 25 years old. 

Modern job: Med Student.

Short rundown of their modern life: Daegal Norrington grew up the only child of a single magician and fortune teller in a traveling circus. 

Never knowing who his father was. 

When he was eight, an older boy named ‘Gilli’ White joined the circus and they became friends.

When he was nine, a girl named ‘Sophia Tiermore’ was left at the circus by her father. 

When he was thirteen, a girl named ‘Lamia Scales’ was found and brought to the circus and taken under the wing of his mother.

When he was seventeen, his mother was killed by a Penace Industries product and was laid to rest by the rest of their circus troop. 

When he was eighteen he left the circus with Gilli in hopes of attending med school and supporting the other man’s dream of being a carpenter. Now they live in a motel together.

[vicsy]

Full interview since it's under paywall:

Chloe

I’m three and a half years older than Lance. The day he was born Dad took me to play in the park near our home in Montreal. I remember he picked me up, gave me a big hug and said, “OK, let’s go to the hospital and meet your baby brother.” And there was Lance.

My father, Lawrence, was born to Jewish parents in Canada and later made his fortune in fashion. He is now the executive chairman of Aston Martin and owns the company’s Formula 1 team too, which Lance drives for.

I’m not sure Lance and I bonded from the start because we weren’t interested in the same stuff. I was very much the goody two-shoes as a kid, calm and easy. Lance was a bit more rambunctious and colourful. I hated being in trouble, so I didn’t do anything outside the box, like him, that would anger my parents.

We did have a phase where Lance wanted me to teach him piano, in exchange for showing me how to play video games. My brother always had great reactions on a computer, perhaps a clue to his future success as a racing driver. Back then I think Lance wanted to hang out with me more but that didn’t last long. We do more together now than we did as kids growing up in Canada.

The whole family was very sport orientated. Mum, the fashion designer Claire-Anne Stroll, would tell us not to come home from school until we’d done an activity, whether it was basketball, tennis or soccer.

Lance’s transition to go-karts wasn’t a shock, especially as Dad owned a fleet of Ferraris, as well as the Circuit Mont-Tremblant racetrack near Montreal. When he was ten, Lance wanted to take karting more seriously and suddenly I wasn’t competition enough. He thought, “Right, I’ve beaten my sister a few times — now I want to race real drivers.” That’s how his career started and I suppose I played a small part.

Lance left home when he was 12 in 2010 to join the Ferrari Driver Academy in Italy. The whole family then moved to Geneva, but Mum and Dad were back and forth to Canada for a while. In terms of being academic, I definitely excelled more than Lance but then I couldn’t drive a go-kart like him. Lance was fantastic on the track and I always supported him when he raced. It was really cool watching him win but there was never a “wow” moment, he just gradually got better and better. Our parents were always behind both of us — they said if you have a dream, go for it and we will back you for ever.

My brother has never taken me out on the track and I’m not that bothered. When you’ve grown up around fast cars, they tend not to interest you any more. It would be cool to go for a lap with him, but nowadays he has better things to do racing for Dad’s Aston Martin team.

Lance actually introduced me to my future husband, the Olympic snowboarder Scotty James. Lance said, “You’ve got to date this dude,” but I wasn’t ready for my little brother to set me up with someone. Then Scotty and I secretly met in New York for dinner the following year and got together in 2019. We kept our relationship quiet from Lance until one day he called up on Scotty’s phone and I answered. Scotty and I married in Italy last year. We had a party in Venice, with friends like Sarah Ferguson, Toto Wolff, Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones celebrating with us. Lance gave a fantastic speech and I had a few tears.

We have a home in London now and Lance often comes to see us when he’s not racing. He’s extremely kind, laid-back and caring. We also love his girlfriend, the Canadian model Marilou Bélanger. Lance is still pretty young to get married but if it’s what he wants we’d all be very happy for him.

The siblings whale watching at Monterey Bay in California, c 2002

Lance

I should point out that when we were kids Chloe was faster than me on a go-kart — but only because hers was way more powerful. She definitely cheated as her engine was bigger. That upset me but I’ve been in a car with her more recently and she actually is a good driver.

There was a lot of love in the house growing up, but sometimes sibling conflict too. I know it annoyed Chloe when I snuck into her bedroom and stole her duvet. She had a much more comfortable set-up than me, so when she was downstairs watching TV I would creep in, grab the goods and carry them back to my room. We would have a tug of war with that duvet on a regular basis. Finally, Dad had to remove the lock on my bedroom door. Otherwise I would turn the key and stop them coming in to recover it.

Other than annoying Chloe, my passion was F1. My dad was big into cars and a hobby racer himself, so I spent a lot of time around racetracks. I got the bug at a young age — especially Ferrari and Michael Schumacher, who was my hero. I pinned posters of him to my bedroom wall. Even so, I never imagined I would end up racing in F1. I did try other stuff, like surfing, tennis and golf. We loved exercise as a family, especially skiing.

Although I love to race fast cars, Chloe is definitely competitive too. She doesn’t like losing, whether it’s a chess match or a blackjack game. Thankfully, as kids we quickly realised that motorsport would be my thing and singing her speciality. Chloe always used to sing around the house and she was really good, even back then. Her favourite album was Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. I used to really bug her to sing tracks from it over and over again.

Now she’s doing it for real. I did fly in to watch her perform at her first concert in London earlier this year. She absolutely killed it. One thing’s for sure: nobody wants to hear my voice. I keep it strictly for the shower.

We both live some of the time in London, so I get to hang out with her and Scotty. She sometimes comes to watch me in F1, usually the races with nice restaurants and parties afterwards, which I don’t blame her for.

We still have some racing left this season and it would be nice to pick up a few more points before the final round at Abu Dhabi in December. The team has some work to do to get better and fight our way further up the grid.

I met Scotty for the first time at the Australian Grand Prix in 2017. I was taking a leak ten minutes before the race and looked across to see him. It was, like, “Damn — that’s Scotty James!” That was the start of our little bromance, which ended up in a family wedding. I’m also pleased that I was the one who introduced Chloe to her future husband. I’m sure they will make some cool babies and then I’ll become a cool uncle.

Lance and Chloe gave an interview to Sunday Times, speaking about their childhood relationships, sibling rivalries, passion for racing and their life in general. A very nice little inside look into the Stroll family ✨

[autisticlancemcclain]

Lance looked at her strangely.

“Pidge,” he said slowly, “I’m Canadian.” Pidge sputtered.

“What? I thought you were Cuban!”

“I mean, I was born in Cuba, but we moved to Scarborough when I was, like, 2,” Lance explained. “I grew up in Canada.” Pidge blinked at him, her calculating face on. Lance felt a little exposed, like he was a torn apart robot carcass that Pidge was analyzing.

“You know,” Pidge started, pushing her glasses up her nose. It only made her look more like a creepy robot-carcass-analyzing evil scientist.

“That explains a lot. Like why you say ‘eh’ so often, for example.” Lance rolled his eyes.

“Oh, shut up,” he said. “I don’t say ‘eh’ that often. I don’t know why Americans think that. You gonna ask me if I live in an igloo, next? If I ride a polar bear to work? Please.”

originally written 20/03/22

[thomasdekkerinfo]

Bio

Thomas Alexander Dekker (born December 28, 1987) is an American actor, musician, singer, director and producer. He is known for his roles as John Connor in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Adam Conant on The Secret Circle, and Zach on Heroes.

Dekker did the voice of Littlefoot in The Land Before Time V-IX (singing voice in The Land Before Time V) and as Fievel Mousekewitz in An American Tail: The Treasure of Manhattan Island and An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster. He played Jesse Braun in the 2010 remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Smith in Gregg Araki's film Kaboom. Dekker starred as Gregory Valentine in the TV show Backstrom.

He has also written and produced two albums. 

Dekker was born in Las Vegas, Nevada. His mother, Hilary (née Williams), is a concert pianist, acting coach, actor, and singer, and his late father, David John Ellis Dekker, was an artist, set designer, opera singer, and actor. His mother is Welsh and his father was American, with English and Dutch ancestry. His maternal grandfather was Alun Williams, a radio broadcaster for the British Broadcasting Corporation. As a child, he and his parents moved all over the world, including his mother's native United Kingdom and Canada.

Starting his acting career at age six, Dekker was first seen in the soap The Young and the Restless. He then appeared in Star Trek Generations, two episodes of Star Trek Voyager and Village of the Damned. Dekker has also appeared as a child actor on "Seinfeld" (season 5, episode 16, 1994) and as Bobby (season 7, episode 4, 1995.) In 1997, he became a regular on the Disney Channel show Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: The TV Show which is based on the movie of the same name where he played Nick Szalinski for three years. After the show ended in 2000, he went on to appear in Run of the House, Fillmore!, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, House, Boston Public, Reba and 7th Heaven. He appeared in films such as Campus Confidential and An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster. Dekker has won three Young Artist Awards for his work in The Land Before Time films and one for his guest appearance on Boston Public. In 2001, he played the part of young Donny Osmond in the film Inside the Osmonds.

In 2006, Dekker landed a recurring role on Heroes playing the character of Zach (Claire Bennet's best friend). He played Zach for eleven episodes before leaving Heroes to take a starring role in Fox's new show Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles as John Connor, starring opposite Lena Headey and Summer Glau. That show debuted January 13, 2008 and was canceled on May 18, 2009. Dekker also played the lead character Nate Palmer in the web-based science fiction series IQ-145.

In 2009, Dekker appeared in From Within (filmed in 2007), My Sister's Keeper, a drama in which he starred with Cameron Diaz, Alec Baldwin, Abigail Breslin and Medium star Sofia Vassilieva, and Laid to Rest alongside Lena Headey. In 2010, Dekker starred in the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street, released on April 30, 2010. His character's name was Jesse Braun, loosely based on the character Rod Lane in the original. That same year he also had a role in All About Evil, an indie horror film.

Dekker starred in Gregg Araki's Kaboom. It is the first film ever awarded the Cannes Film Festival "Queer Palm Award" for its contribution to LGBT presence in cinema. Dekker was a "top candidate" for the lead role in Paramount's remake of Footloose (2011), but the role went to Kenny Wormald.[10] In April 2011, Dekker starred as Lance Loud in the HBO original film Cinema Verite, about the creation of America's first reality television series, An American Family. Dekker played the role of Adam, the male lead on the television series The Secret Circle developed by The CW.

He appeared in Daughtry's music video for their single "Waiting for Superman", which was released September 17, 2013.

Dekker was a regular on the 2015 Fox crime drama Backstrom, playing Gregory Valentine, the gay underworld contact and roommate of Rainn Wilson's title character, revealed to be his half-brother.

Dekker was brought up with a musical background, and started writing music at age ten while living in Canada. At the age of fifteen he landed a record deal; however after feeling that he wasn't as involved in the music as he would have liked, he left to concentrate on making his own music. At the age of sixteen, Dekker started writing and producing his own classical music influenced by electronica which he describes as "electrofolk". His debut album Psyanotic[13] was released in 2008.

Dekker has stated that for much of his childhood, he was a victim of sexual molestation. In his teenage years, he was part of a "metalhead" subculture, where he "caused trouble in Las Vegas", and was arrested "five or six times".

Dekker was involved in an auto accident on October 15, 2009, when he hit a 17-year-old cyclist training for a race on a freeway onramp.Originally charged with two counts of felony DUI, the charge was reduced to one count of misdemeanor reckless driving when it was found that the cyclist was at fault. He pleaded no contest, and was sentenced to a fine of $300 and two years of informal probation, and ordered to attend a 12-hour alcohol-education class.

Dekker is a vegan.

On April 20, 2011 in an interview with Out magazine Dekker spoke about his sexuality, which had been the subject of speculation:

I've only really had relationships with women, but I'm certainly not closed to it. If there are possibilities of being able to do anything in life, why would you say you would never take any up? In the later chunk of my teen years I was so all over the place with sex. It was terrible. I never really had a real relationship at all. During puberty, it's all about sex, and it's all about figuring yourself out. I think I overdid it when I was younger.

On July 13, 2017, Dekker came out as gay and revealed that he married Canadian actor Jesse Haddock in April.

Awards

Young Artist Award  — Best Performance in a TV Comedy Series — Leading Young Actor (Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: The TV Show) (1997)

Young Artist Award  — Best Performance in a Voice-Over: TV/Film/Video — Young Actor (An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster) (1999)

Young Artist Award  — Best Performance in a TV Series — Guest Starring Young Actor (Boston Public) (2000)

Young Artist Award  — Best Performance in a Voice-Over Role (The Land Before Time IX: Journey to the Big Water) (2002)

Albums

Psyanotic (2008)

Into the Night (2018)

Soundtracks

From The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island:

From An American Tail: The Treasure of Manhattan Island:

From The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock:

From An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster:

From The Land Before Time VII: The Stone of Cold Fire:

From The Land Before Time VIII: The Big Freeze:

From The Land Before Time IX: Journey to the Big Water:

From 7th Heaven:

1997: "Friends for Dinner", "Always There", "Big Water"

1998: "Anywhere in Your Dreams"

1998: "Bad Luck", "The Legend of the Lone Dinosaur", "On Your Own"

1999: "Get the Facts", "Who Will"

2000: "Beyond the Mysterious Beyond", "Good Inside"

2001: "Family", "The Lesson"

2002: "Imaginary Friends", "No One Has to Be Alone", "Chanson D'Ennui", "Big Water"

From the episode Red Socks

2005: "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive"

2008: "From Within"

[tabloidtoc]

Globe, March 23

Cover: Prince Harry and Meghan Markle shunned 

Page 2: Up Front & Personal -- Tyra Banks outside Stephen Colbert’s show, Maria Bello kisses fiancee Dominique Crenn at an LA fundraiser, Neil Sedaka 

Page 3: James Caan in a wheelchair with son Jacob, Hugh Bonneville and Paddington Bear 

Page 4: Tim McGraw dumps wife Faith Hill to snatch solo tour deal, Miranda Lambert’s husband has quit the New York Police Department for a cushy job on her security team

Page 5: Lisa Marie Presley is locked in a raging war over men and money and Elvis’ legacy with mom Priscilla Presley who she blames for her disastrous life 

Page 6: Cover Story -- Having worn out their welcome in England and been banished across the Atlantic spoiled Harry and greedy Meghan Markle have now enraged their hosts in Canada and Hollywood -- Canadian officials and taxpayers have balked at the couple’s demand for an army of security guards with costs topping a staggering $25 million a year -- Meghan’s stirring resentment in Hollywood by scheming to become the highest-paid actress in the world by using her Duchess of Sussex celebrity to land her a plum superhero gig in a Wonder Woman-like smash 

Page 8: Harry Styles has revealed a terrifying brush with death at the hands of a knife-wielding mugger 

Page 9: After being cruelly dumped by Jamie Foxx and with her acting career in the tank Katie Holmes has sworn off men and she’s quitting Hollywood to become a full-time model, Michael Jackson’s youngest son born Prince Michael and a.k.a. Blanket and now called Bigi just turned 18 and he’s plunked down a cool $2.6 million for a starter home in California 

Page 10: After a decade of staying on the wagon Keith Urban is still in a frenzied battle to keep off booze and drugs and save his marriage to Nicole Kidman 

Page 11: Party-crasher Tom Cruise climbed an intimidating gate to bust into a wild bash thrown by Kate Hudson and her brother Oliver Hudson while their famous folks were out of town, Paris Hilton’s hotel-heir parents Kathy and Rick Hilton are being sued by their former live-in housekeeper who says the cheapskates didn’t pay her overtime and now the Hiltons claim the woman cleaned up by ripping them off 

Page 12: Celebrity Buzz -- Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Grimes has chosen a name for her baby with Elon Musk that everyone hates, Jenna Bush Hager uses a blow-dry to fix her underarm sweating, Helen Mirren who suffers from horrible anxiety and self-doubt says gardening really helps calm crippling negative thoughts, Megan Fox is set to play Aurora on the big screen -- a female astronaut stationed in outer space who discovers shock waves are bending time

Page 13: Joan Collins on her way to dinner, Lil’ Kim, Leonardo DiCaprio gives a tourist directions in NYC, Marie Osmond says a fan went to extreme measures to meet her brother Donny Osmond when he was a teen idol -- she mailed herself in a box to the hotel 

Page 14: Sean “Diddy” Combs is so clumsy he’s had 4 surgeries in 2 years, The Bachelor’s spin-off is looking for seniors over 65, Fashion Verdict -- Shailene Woodley 3/10, Katie Holmes 2/10, Cate Blanchett 6/10, Kate Bosworth 2/10, Elle Fanning 8/10 

Page 16: Desperate to move with her kids to London Angelina Jolie is begging ex Brad Pitt to set them free but miffed Brad is determined to keep her and the kids in LA 

Page 17: Crooner Sam Smith says he was ashamed to take off his shirt as a youth because he had boy boobs and kids make fun of him and he underwent liposuction at age 12 to reduce them and now posting shirtless pics on social media has helped him come to term with his earlier torment, Mandy Moore is sizzling with her hit TV show This Is Us and new album Silver Landings but in 2016 she was ready to walk away from showbiz with a crumbling marriage and four failed TV pilots 

Page 18: 10 Things You Don’t Know About Liu Yifei, Mark Wahlberg’s 10-year-old daughter Grace refused to dance with him at a father-and-daughter dance, Rolling Stones legend Bill Wyman -- an original band member who played bass guitar for the band from 1962 to 1993 -- is auctioning off his $3 million collection of rock memorabilia

Page 20: True Crime 

Page 23: Starsky and Hutch heartthrob David Soul has gone from crooning No. 1 hits to a recluse who’s lost his voice 

Page 24: Shocking Fear: Pope Francis dying of coronavirus -- coughing fits strike terror as Rome reels from killer plague 

Page 26: Health Report -- milk linked to greater risk of breast cancer

Page 38: Real Life 

Page 44: Straight Talk -- get this, athletes -- doping’s for dunces -- swimmer Sun Yang, baseball players Jose Canseco, Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Alex Rodriguez, Lance Armstrong 

Page 45: Worried Billy Ray Cyrus thinks daughter Miley Cyrus’ new boyfriend Cody Simpson is a dud and is pleading with her to kick the Aussie singer to the curb, David Backham is one romantic dude -- after two decades of marriage to Spice Girl Victoria Beckham and four children he still treasures a train ticket on which she wrote her phone number 

Page 47: Hollywood Flashback -- Three Men and a Baby, Bizarre But True 

[noussommeslessquelettes]

banana-ghoul replied to your post: vaguelygenius replied to your post: ...

Go ahead. Post the full description from Convenient.

What if I posted the full fic instead :3c

If u enjoyed Convenience come bust a gut w me under the readmore

AUTHORS NOTE:

Wow thank you for reading my name is Nan and I am 25 years old and I wrote this fic i hope u like it. I was born in July of 1993 meaning I am a cancer which is an emotional zodiac and a water sign, this mprning I woke up and fed my cats and then I went to work and at work i did work and then I got home and I ate like two bowls of cereal and then i was like OH i should post my new fic about hockey because i am very knowledgable about hocey and it is a great sport especially if you are gay just like keith and lance.

have u ever seen the move called Bee Movie? I watched it and it touched my heart there are so many good moments like when the bee falls in love with the lady :) love stories are good and that's what THIS STORY IS ABOUT, it's just like the movie!! And Shrek! there is love iN Shrek too which is SO COOL

Okay let me teach u about hockey, there is a thing called the NFL and it is where GOOD hockley players go, just like how we go to heaven when we die (or hell). Anyway in hockey you are ice skating just like in Yuri on Ice which is GAY JUST LIKE MY STORY and you have sticks and hit little black circles around (JUST LIKE IN MIGHTY DUCKS THE MOVIE ABOUT HOCKEY).

BTW everyone is fiction!!! I don't want to characterize real hockey people I've never met them before and only god can judge them.

SORRY IF U ARE FROM TORONDO AND YOU NOTICE THE STORY IS DIFFERENT FROM REAL TORNTO soMETIMES I MAKE MISTAKES AND WE ARE ALL HUMAN DONT COMMENT ABT IT JUST ENJOY THE STORY OK

----

CHAPTER ONE

Hi my name is Keith I like hockey and I am also a hockey player which means I play hockey but I play GOOD hockey and today I am in Canada (A/N cananda is a country in the north pole) because I might be in the NHL (A/N idk what that is but google said it's a hockey thing pls don't comment abt this I am trying my best). My brother is here two, but he doesn't play hockey so I don't know how he got into cananda bcause u can't go to Canada if u don't plAy hockey (A/N Canada is like that).

Anyway it was a hot day it was so hot that I sweated so much, Shiro said I'm only sweety cuz I am wearing a MCR shirt and a black MCR hoodie and black skinny jeans (with chains) and my knee high red converse but this is my style and sometime u have to suffer for fashon. My brother went to a 7/11 and I followed because what else will i do outside? I don't go out there usually and Torondo is scary.

My brother was talking to some guy at the counter and the guy said “hola” (A/N this means hello) and I didn't say anything back because I don't speak French. Anyway they talked about some hockey team called the Leaves and I didn't listen because I didn't want spoilers for the new season of Hockey. All I wanted was. Coke (because it's colors are red and black which are my favorites) but they didn't have that because canadianns dont drink that so i didn't get anything at all bwcause i dont drink anything else (A/n this is canon I read it on the internet which means it's true don't comment abt this). Shiro got gum, which is ok but I wouldnt have gotten that but it's his choice because it's his body and he can choose what he wants to do with it even if I don't agree, that is the law of both man and god.

And then I saw the guy behind the counter and I realized he was really cute and also Cuban meaning he doesn't speak French, he actually speaks Cuban. Which is strange because people in cananda speak French but I like confusing guys ALSO I forgot to tell you I am gay but I am a secret gay which means no one knows I am gay, not even god.

The cute guy said “I hope Keith kogane gets picked for the Leaf team” and I blushed because that is my name but I don't know what the leaves is but it sounded like a hockey thing and I like hoggey.

We left the convenience store and Shiro was like “u should be happy bcuz you will be in hockey”

I was REALLY NERVOUS because I am secret gay and I don't want ppl to know becaySe it is a secret but ball is life so I was excited.

Shiro said “you are so sweaty” Shiro said, and I realized I was sweatier than the swamps of Thailand so he was right.

SCENE CHANGE

A/N Big spoiler do NOT read if u have not watched the new season of Hockey

SO I was picked for the Leaf team and we moved to canda and my brother had to illegally cross the boarder because he is not hockey. We moved to a condo and I was so hungry all I could do was look in a pantry I was so hungry. Shiro told me to ear pizza but I only eat chips and cok so I knew it was starvation time.

“Here's a idea how bout u go to the convenience store we went to, do u remember that? It was like two paragraphs ago” and I nodded because I did remember that

So I went to the convenience story and I remmembered the really smexy Cuban guy who said my name one time.

I got to the store and he was there!!!! He saw me and was like “HEY u are the GUY!!” And I blushed and said “yeah lol”

And the guy said “Larry” and I was like “huh?” And he said “my name is Larry, it's short for Lance Mccaline” and then he said “HEY have u been to places in Canada before?”

I said “no” because I don't go outside and Lance said “OK I will show u around Canada “

I said ok but I was NERVIUS because I'm gay and he is cute. I put twenty bags of Doritos (gamers eat Doritos) on the counter and also a coke because they actually do have coke in cananda they were just out when I went before (A/n I edited this part in just now because a bunch of fucking nerds told me in the comments).

Lance rang me out but he didn't know math ): so I got everything for free I love cananda economy. Everything is free if you don't know math and pennies aren't real.

I got home and ate all of my chips it was so delicious and Shiro was like “did u see the boy” and I said “yeah he told me something about a tower” and Shiro said “YOU MQDE A FRIEND” and I said “pfffffft nO. I didn't”

And Shiro was like “u should have him show u tower” and I said “ok” because I am secret gay and Lonce is cute.

THE END

[lancestans]

June 16, 2018: Dear Taylor Alison Swift, My name is Laetitia but my family and friends call me Lance and I have loved you since I was 6 years old. I turned 16 on June 8th and yes it’s been 10 years and my love for you and your music hasn’t faded yet and I know that it never will. I was born and raised in the Philippines and I’ve always wanted to see you perform live. My mom, Ella, every time we’d hear that you’re coming to my home country would freak out and try and get in on ticket draws (or giveaways?) that radio stations would do, or even try and buy our own ticket for two but it would always be sold out! Of course, my young self was definitely heartbroken by the fact that I wouldn’t see you, and it had happened over and over and over again. I moved to Canada 4 years ago, and I definitely love living in this wonderful place i now call home. My dad Jaspher and my mom Ella LOVEEE singing to your songs, my dad really likes Delicate and my mom definitely loves King Of My Heart. We play your Rep album everyday when we’re on our way to school and work, or even on road trips! We do also listen to some throwback songs of yours such as, You Belong With Me, or Clean, or maybe Love Story. Just recently, on January 10th of 2018, I was spending family time with my whole family in Los Angeles and something happened. My auntie Carmen came up to me and my mom and showed me her iPhone. At first I was confused on what the picture was, it looked somehow like a stage structure and there was a highlighted part near the stage, and i looked down and I read the text on the screen and it said “Reputation Stadium Tour — July 21, 2018” (East Rutherford, NJ) And at that very moment my whole body was weak and my eyes started watering, I was beyond happy. I hugged my Aunt Carmen and my Uncle Victor because they were the ones who got the tickets for me and I was so grateful because I finally get to watch you, my inspiration in life, ON LIVE. I hugged my mom because she saw how happy I was because this has been my dream, to see and hear you in real life. I am flying from Vancouver to San Diego this July, and I’ll be meeting my Auntie’s and we’ll be flying from San Diego to New Jersey! Unfortunately, my mom wouldn’t be able to go with me to your concert because she has to work, so I’ll make sure to take videos of you that I’ll be showing her and my dad when I get back from my trip! :) To end this whole message, patience is TRULY a virtue, and I cannot wait to see you. I love you with all my heart Taylor. Love, Lance❤️ @taylorswift @taylornation @taylorswift @taylornation

[my-chemical-friendzone]

Ask Jane’s Creator (Part III)

I have two questions: How did Jane and Jester meet, and when did Jane first come to the castle?

-From Tara

Jane was born at the castle. Her mother and father were already in service to the Royal family. And so Jane first met Jester when he arrived with his family of traveling players to perform for the King. You can find that part of Jester’s history on the profile pages. 

Will Jane ever get sent on an "urgent" mission for the king where she actually leaves the castle and travels to a different kingdom? And if she does, how do they react to Dragon?

-From Jolly, 12

Jane has been on several diplomatic missions. Part of the reason is so that the King can show off the fact that he has a young apprentice with a rather powerful dragon at her disposal. It’s a smart way to send a message when you know that your castle is under-powered with soldiers and guards! 

In the episode "The Tooth Fairy," I noticed some cave paintings on Dragon's cave wall. I saw different animals such as a giraffe, a dolphin, and also a ship. Do these mean anything?

-From Rachael Jane, 15, Celina, Ohio, USA

Some of paintings were done by Dragon before he met Jane, when he first returned to his cave after all his adventures. He tried painting all the different animals and large vessels he’d seen in different countries. He calls them his "musings" and told Jane that he had seen others on cave walls all around the world, and hoped they were also the musings of other dragons from thousands of years ago. But some of the runes and paintings in Dragon’s cave are much older and were there 300 years ago when Dragon was born, though he was too young to remember them. 

When will Jane be strong enough to wear full armor like a breastplate and vambraces and all that great stuff? And will she ever use any other weapon besides a bow and a sword?

-From Rhapsody, 15

Jane has also learned to use staves for single combat and lances for mounted attack. She also has to learn the assault machines such as the trebuchet and the catapult. She can wear her armor now as it is very light and strong, made from the same steel tempered in dragon fire as her sword. 

Do Jane and Pepper wear bras? I was just wondering because they are the right age to wear them. I love Jane and the Dragon!

-From Tara, 12

Bras are quite a recent invention, but women have improvised clothing to give them support from as long ago as 2500 BC. In Jane’s time, they would tie strips of material rather like wide scarves around their chest as an undergarment. 

I know that Jester wants to see his family again. Will he ever leave and try to find them?

-From Dingo, USA

Because Jester's family are travelling players, he gets word from them occasionally from traders and other travelers passing through the Kingdom. He hopes that one day he will be able to show them his own skills in the hope that they will be proud of him, and also to reassure them that the hard decision they made years ago for his betterment was well placed. 

Hello! I was wondering whether you will create any progressive, chronological episodes instead of a different story each time? And I really love the show, I just discovered it last week!

-From Melody, CANADA

We have written some episodes like that. It remains to be seen if they will work within the series format as chronological episodes. Some territories where Jane airs will shuffle the episodes so much that it can be confusing. But I would love to see if we can achieve it! 

I read that Jane wears leggings to annoy her mother, but shouldn't her skirt be longer? During her time, it was considered immodest for anyone, even men, to show their knees (unless they were very young children).

-From L-Michelle, 14, Woodstock, Georgia, USA

Jane refuses to wear dresses so that her mother will take her decision to train as a knight seriously. She wears leather leggings because that was a standard knight garment, just as bike riders wear leathers today for protection from scuffs and scrapes if they fall off their bikes. Jane isn't really wearing a short skirt over the leather leggings though, it's a fabric lining behind the waist armor she wears round her hips so it moves like a pleated skirt. I think Jane wears this so that she can look a bit feminine - a small token to appease her mother! 

Do you illustrate your own books? I love the drawings in your books; they are so colorful and expressive. I love to draw dragons...not the scary and evil kind but those like your lizard-lipped Dragon. How would I go about becoming an illustrator?

-From Rachael Jane 15, Celina, Ohio, USA

I do illustrate my own books. I illustrated the Jane and the Dragon books over twenty years ago now. I like to use coloring pencils and pick out the edges and highlights in brown ink. To become an illustrator, the most important thing is to get lots of practice, especially drawing faces. I found the best time to practice was when my family were watching TV. I could watch them and sketch away as they went from happy, to sad, to frightened all in the space of one program! 

First: Thank you for the wonderful show! I really enjoy it and appreciate all the work you and the people at Weta put into it. Second, I have recently acquired a copy of the illuminated manuscript "Jane and the Dragon" and it has brought up a question. If Jane's armor is special, as you have said in a previous answer, how did Jester get a hold of it?

-From Mara, USA

Yes, indeed, there is a long history behind the armor that Jester gives to Jane. How he came to own it, and the true nature of that armor and its link to Dragon, are all part of the long chain of discoveries that Jane and Dragon make as they uncover the truth about dragons and their own destinies. But I can’t give away those secrets here...sorry! 

I love your show! My mum and I watch it all the time! But I have a question to ask. So, if dragon's fiery breath can melt a dragonblade, how can it be forged in dragonfire? It makes no sense to me!

-From Annelise, 9, Concord, New Hampshire, USA

Any metal has to be heated to the point that it goes soft if it's going to be beaten and worked into the shape of a blade. Metalsmiths heat blades in hot open braziers to soften them to be worked with a hammer and anvil.  A dragonblade needs the extra heat of dragon fire to soften it enough so it can be beaten into shape. But if too much heat is applied, the blade will melt completely, just as other metals will if too much heat is applied. The trick is to get it hot enough to be soft, but not so hot that it melts! 

I've been watching some of the more recent episodes, and Gunther seems to be softening up a bit. Will the poor lad ever go against his father and just stand up for what is right instead of just simply complying to his dad's wishes?

-From Kenzie, 15, USA

You are quite right, he is growing as an independent young man able to stand up to his father, but just a little. Gunther defies his father completely in one episode when Dragon is threatened with expulsion from the kingdom. It's the first time that we see the knight's code of ethics winning out in Gunther's heart over his fear and his sense of duty to his father. 

Does it ever rain in the show or is it always sunny and beautiful?

-From Alissandra, 15, Albany, Oregon, USA

It certainly does rain! Have you seen the episode where Jane falls off her horse during a thunderstorm? The whole castle staff have to take shelter in the Throne Room where Jester tries to keep their spirits up with brilliant jokes. Gunther reckoned it would be less painful back outside in the driving rain. 

Are there any other games Jane and her friends play besides Bandyball and Rock, Parchment, and Sword?

-From Ryan, 13, La Puente, California, USA

Some of the games and sports we play today were popular in Jane's time. Individual sports like archery, wrestling and hammer throwing were designed to develop fighting skills and fitness and were mostly played by boys and men. Team sports like bandyball, which was an early form of hockey, were played by everyone, as was a simple version of soccer called gameball. Cricket started a little after Jane’s time and was called stoolball because two milkmaid stools were used as the wickets. And a form of bowls called skittles was popular as were two early forms of golf called paganica and suigan. 

How far do you plan to take this series? Will you keep on writing new stories about Jane and Dragon until they fulfill their destinies together?

-From Aly, 13, Houston, Texas, USA

Jane and the Dragon is doing very well all around the world with a wonderful and passionate following. If the series remains popular and the TV stations keep on playing it, then we hope to be able to go on making new episodes for a long time to come. I also plan to tell more of those adventures through books so that the everyone can see how both Jane and Dragon's destinies work out! 

[anastpaul]

Saint of the Day – 15 October – St Teresa of Jesus/of Avila (1515-1582) Virgin, Mystic, Ecstatic, Reformer, Apostle of Prayer, Writer, Doctor of the Church.    Born Teresa Sanchez Cepeda Davila y Ahumada  at Avila, Old Castile, 28 March 1515 –  died at Alba de Tormes, 4 October 1582 of natural causes in the arms of her secretary and close friend Blessed Anne of Saint Bartholomew.  Her relics are preserved at Alba – her heart shows signs of Transverberation (piercing of the heart), and is displayed, too.   Her Body is incorrupt.  Patronages: • sick people; against bodily ills or sickness • against headaches • against the death of parents • lace makers or lace workers • people in need of grace • people in religious orders • people ridiculed for their piety • World Youth Day 2011 • Amos, Canada, diocese of • Avellaneda-Lanús, Argentina, diocese of • Berzano di Tortona, Italy • Pozega, Croatia • Spain.   Attributes –   Habit of the Discalced Carmelites, Book and Quill, arrow-pierced heart.   St Teresa was Beatified on 24 April 1614 by Pope Paul V and Canonised on 12 March 1622, only forty years after her death, by Pope Gregory XV.   Tradition associate Saint Teresa with the Infant Jesus of Prague with claims of former ownership and devotion.   On 27 September 1970 St Teresa, was named a Doctor of the Church by Pope Paul VI.   Her books, which include her autobiography (The Life of Teresa of Jesus) and her seminal work El Castillo Interior (trans.: The Interior Castle), are an integral part of Spanish Renaissance literature as well as Christian mysticism and Christian meditation practices.   She also wrote Camino de Perfección (trans.: The Way of Perfection).

The third child of Don Alonso Sanchez de Cepeda by his second wife, Doña Beatriz Davila y Ahumada, who died when the Teresa was in her fourteenth year, Teresa was brought up by her saintly father, a lover of serious books and a tender and pious mother.   After her death and the marriage of her eldest sister, Teresa was sent for her to the Augustinian nuns at Avila but owing to illness she left at the end of eighteen months and for some years remained with her father and occasionally with other relatives, notably an uncle who made her acquainted with the Letters of St Jerome, which determined her to adopt the religious life, not so much through any attraction towards it, as through a desire of choosing the safest course.   Unable to obtain her father’s consent she left his house unknown to him to enter the Carmelite Convent of the Incarnation at Avila, which then counted 140 nuns.   The wrench from her family caused her a pain which she ever afterwards compared to that of death. However, her father at once yielded and Teresa took the habit.

Teresa lived in an age of exploration as well as political, social and religious upheaval.   It was the 16th century, a time of turmoil and reform.   She was born before the Protestant Reformation and died almost 20 years after the closing of the Council of Trent.

The gift of God to Teresa in and through which she became holy and left her mark on the Church and the world is threefold:   she was a woman;   she was a contemplative;   she was an active reformer.

As a woman, Teresa stood on her own two feet, even in the man’s world of her time.   She was “her own woman,” entering the Carmelites despite strong opposition from her father.   She is a person wrapped not so much in silence as in mystery.   Beautiful, talented, outgoing, adaptable, affectionate, courageous, enthusiastic, she was totally human.   Like Jesus, she was a mystery of paradoxes:  wise, yet practical;  intelligent, yet much in tune with her experience;  a mystic, yet an energetic reformer;  a holy woman, a womanly woman.

On St Peter’s Day in 1559, Teresa became firmly convinced that Jesus Christ presented Himself to her in bodily form, though invisible.   These visions lasted almost uninterrupted for more than two years.   In another vision, a seraph drove the fiery point of a golden lance repeatedly through her heart, causing an ineffable spiritual-bodily pain.

I saw in his hand a long spear of gold and at the point there seemed to be a little fire.   He appeared to me to be thrusting it at times into my heart and to pierce my very entrails;   when he drew it out, he seemed to draw them out also and to leave me all on fire with a great love of God.   The pain was so great, that it made me moan;  and yet so surpassing was the sweetness of this excessive pain, that I could not wish to be rid of it…

This vision was the inspiration for one of Bernini’s most famous works, the Ecstasy of Saint Teresa at Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome.

The memory of this episode served as an inspiration throughout the rest of her life and motivated her lifelong imitation of the life and suffering of Jesus, epitomised in the motto usually associated with her:  Lord, either let me suffer or let me die.

Teresa was a woman “for God,” a woman of prayer, discipline and compassion.   Her heart belonged to God.   Her ongoing conversion was an arduous lifelong struggle, involving ongoing purification and suffering.   She was misunderstood, misjudged and opposed in her efforts at reform.   Yet she struggled on, courageous and faithful;  she struggled with her own mediocrity, her illness, her opposition.   And in the midst of all this she clung to God in life and in prayer.   Her writings on prayer and contemplation are drawn from her experience:  powerful, practical and graceful.   She was a woman of prayer;  a woman for God.

Teresa was a woman “for others.”   Though a contemplative, she spent much of her time and energy seeking to reform herself and the Carmelites, to lead them back to the full observance of the primitive Rule.   She founded over a half-dozen new monasteries.   She traveled, wrote, fought—always to renew, to reform.   In her self, in her prayer, in her life, in her efforts to reform, in all the people she touched, she was a woman for others, a woman who inspired and gave life.

Her final illness overtook her on one of her journeys from Burgos to Alba de Tormes.   She died in 1582, just as Catholic nations were making the switch from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar, which required the removal of 5–14 October from the calendar.   She died either before midnight of 4 October or early in the morning of 15 October which is celebrated as her feast day.   Her last words were:  “My Lord, it is time to move on. Well then, may your will be done. O my Lord and my Spouse, the hour that I have longed for has come.  It is time to meet one another.”

Her writings, especially the Way of Perfection and The Interior Castle, have helped generations of believers.   She and St Catherine of Siena were the first women so honoured as Doctors of the Church.

Interesting fact – her Spiritual Director was St Francis Borgia whose Feast Day we celebrated on 10 October.

(via AnaStpaul – Breathing Catholic)

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

10th April >> Fr. Martin’s Gospel Reflections / Homilies on John 18:1 - 19:42 for Good Friday: ‘It is accomplished’.

Good Friday

Gospel (Europe, Africa, New Zealand, Australia & Canada)

John 18:1-19:42

The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ

Key: N. Narrator. ✠ Jesus. O. Other single speaker. C. Crowd, or more than one speaker.

N. Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kedron valley. There was a garden there, and he went into it with his disciples. Judas the traitor knew the place well, since Jesus had often met his disciples there, and he brought the cohort to this place together with a detachment of guards sent by the chief priests and the Pharisees, all with lanterns and torches and weapons. Knowing everything that was going to happen to him, Jesus then came forward and said,

✠ Who are you looking for?

N. They answered,

C. Jesus the Nazarene.

N. He said,

✠ I am he.

N. Now Judas the traitor was standing among them. When Jesus said, ‘I am he’, they moved back and fell to the ground. He asked them a second time,

✠ Who are you looking for?

N. They said,

C. Jesus the Nazarene.

N. Jesus replied,

✠ I have told you that I am he. If I am the one you are looking for, let these others go.

N. This was to fulfil the words he had spoken, ‘Not one of those you gave me have I lost.’

Simon Peter, who carried a sword, drew it and wounded the high priest’s servant, cutting off his right ear. The servant’s name was Malchus. Jesus said to Peter,

✠ Put your sword back in its scabbard; am I not to drink the cup that the Father has given me?

N. The cohort and its captain and the Jewish guards seized Jesus and bound him. They took him first to Annas, because Annas was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest that year. It was Caiaphas who had suggested to the Jews, ‘It is better for one man to die for the people.’

Simon Peter, with another disciple, followed Jesus. This disciple, who was known to the high priest, went with Jesus into the high priest’s palace, but Peter stayed outside the door. So the other disciple, the one known to the high priest, went out, spoke to the woman who was keeping the door and brought Peter in. The maid on duty at the door said to Peter,

O. Aren’t you another of that man’s disciples?

N. He answered,

O. I am not.

N. Now it was cold, and the servants and guards had lit a charcoal fire and were standing there warming themselves; so Peter stood there too, warming himself with the others.

The high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching. Jesus answered,

✠ I have spoken openly for all the world to hear; I have always taught in the synagogue and in the Temple where all the Jews meet together: I have said nothing in secret. But why ask me? Ask my hearers what I taught: they know what I said.

N. At these words, one of the guards standing by gave Jesus a slap in the face, saying,

O. Is that the way to answer the high priest?

N. Jesus replied,

✠ If there is something wrong in what I said, point it out; but if there is no offence in it, why do you strike me?

N. Then Annas sent him, still bound, to Caiaphas the high priest.

As Simon Peter stood there warming himself, someone said to him,

O. Aren’t you another of his disciples?

N. He denied it, saying,

O. I am not.

N. One of the high priest’s servants, a relation of the man whose ear Peter had cut off, said,

O. Didn’t I see you in the garden with him?

N. Again Peter denied it; and at once a cock crew.

They then led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the Praetorium. It was now morning. They did not go into the Praetorium themselves or they would be defiled and unable to eat the passover. So Pilate came outside to them and said,

O. What charge do you bring against this man?

N. They replied,

C. If he were not a criminal, we should not be handing him over to you.

N. Pilate said,

O. Take him yourselves, and try him by your own Law.

N. The Jews answered,

C. We are not allowed to put a man to death.

N. This was to fulfil the words Jesus had spoken indicating the way he was going to die.

So Pilate went back into the Praetorium and called Jesus to him, and asked,

O. Are you the king of the Jews?

N. Jesus replied,

✠ Do you ask this of your own accord, or have others spoken to you about me?

N. Pilate answered,

O. Am I a Jew? It is your own people and the chief priests who have handed you over to me: what have you done?

N. Jesus replied,

✠ Mine is not a kingdom of this world; if my kingdom were of this world, my men would have fought to prevent my being surrendered to the Jews. But my kingdom is not of this kind.

N. Pilate said,

O. So you are a king, then?

N. Jesus answered,

✠ It is you who say it. Yes, I am a king. I was born for this, I came into the world for this: to bear witness to the truth; and all who are on the side of truth listen to my voice.

N. Pilate said,

O. Truth? What is that?

N. and with that he went out again to the Jews and said,

O. I find no case against him. But according to a custom of yours I should release one prisoner at the Passover; would you like me, then, to release the king of the Jews?

N. At this they shouted:

C. Not this man, but Barabbas.

N. Barabbas was a brigand.

Pilate then had Jesus taken away and scourged; and after this, the soldiers twisted some thorns into a crown and put it on his head, and dressed him in a purple robe. They kept coming up to him and saying,

C. Hail, king of the Jews!

N. and they slapped him in the face.

Pilate came outside again and said to them,

O. Look, I am going to bring him out to you to let you see that I find no case.

N. Jesus then came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said,

O. Here is the man.

N. When they saw him the chief priests and the guards shouted,

C. Crucify him! Crucify him!

N. Pilate said,

O. Take him yourselves and crucify him: I can find no case against him.

N. The Jews replied,

C. We have a Law, and according to that Law he ought to die, because he has claimed to be the Son of God.

N. When Pilate heard them say this his fears increased. Re-entering the Praetorium, he said to Jesus

O. Where do you come from?

N. But Jesus made no answer. Pilate then said to him,

O. Are you refusing to speak to me? Surely you know I have power to release you and I have power to crucify you?

N. Jesus replied,

✠ You would have no power over me if it had not been given you from above; that is why the one who handed me over to you has the greater guilt.

N. From that moment Pilate was anxious to set him free, but the Jews shouted,

C. If you set him free you are no friend of Caesar’s; anyone who makes himself king is defying Caesar.

N. Hearing these words, Pilate had Jesus brought out, and seated himself on the chair of judgement at a place called the Pavement, in Hebrew Gabbatha. It was Passover Preparation Day, about the sixth hour. Pilate said to the Jews,

O. Here is your king.

N. They said,

C. Take him away, take him away! Crucify him!

N. Pilate said,

O. Do you want me to crucify your king?

N. The chief priests answered,

C. We have no king except Caesar.

N. So in the end Pilate handed him over to them to be crucified.

They then took charge of Jesus, and carrying his own cross he went out of the city to the place of the skull or, as it was called in Hebrew, Golgotha, where they crucified him with two others, one on either side with Jesus in the middle. Pilate wrote out a notice and had it fixed to the cross; it ran: ‘Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews.’ This notice was read by many of the Jews, because the place where Jesus was crucified was not far from the city, and the writing was in Hebrew, Latin and Greek. So the Jewish chief priests said to Pilate,

C. You should not write ‘King of the Jews,’ but ‘This man said: “I am King of the Jews.”’

N. Pilate answered,

O. What I have written, I have written.

N. When the soldiers had finished crucifying Jesus they took his clothing and divided it into four shares, one for each soldier. His undergarment was seamless, woven in one piece from neck to hem; so they said to one another,

C. Instead of tearing it, let’s throw dice to decide who is to have it.

N. In this way the words of scripture were fulfilled:

They shared out my clothing among them.

They cast lots for my clothes.

This is exactly what the soldiers did.

Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary of Magdala. Seeing his mother and the disciple he loved standing near her, Jesus said to his mother,

✠ Woman, this is your son.

N. Then to the disciple he said,

✠ This is your mother.

N. And from that moment the disciple made a place for her in his home.

After this, Jesus knew that everything had now been completed, and to fulfil the scripture perfectly he said:

✠ I am thirsty.

N. A jar full of vinegar stood there, so putting a sponge soaked in the vinegar on a hyssop stick they held it up to his mouth. After Jesus had taken the vinegar he said,

✠ It is accomplished;

N. and bowing his head he gave up his spirit.

Here all kneel and pause for a short time.

It was Preparation Day, and to prevent the bodies remaining on the cross during the sabbath – since that sabbath was a day of special solemnity – the Jews asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken away. Consequently the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with him and then of the other. When they came to Jesus, they found he was already dead, and so instead of breaking his legs one of the soldiers pierced his side with a lance; and immediately there came out blood and water. This is the evidence of one who saw it – trustworthy evidence, and he knows he speaks the truth – and he gives it so that you may believe as well. Because all this happened to fulfil the words of scripture:

Not one bone of his will be broken;

and again, in another place scripture says:

They will look on the one whom they have pierced.

After this, Joseph of Arimathaea, who was a disciple of Jesus – though a secret one because he was afraid of the Jews – asked Pilate to let him remove the body of Jesus. Pilate gave permission, so they came and took it away. Nicodemus came as well – the same one who had first come to Jesus at night-time – and he brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds. They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, following the Jewish burial custom. At the place where he had been crucified there was a garden, and in this garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been buried. Since it was the Jewish Day of Preparation and the tomb was near at hand, they laid Jesus there.

Gospel (USA)

John 18:1—19:42

The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus went out with his disciples across the Kidron valley to where there was a garden, into which he and his disciples entered. Judas his betrayer also knew the place, because Jesus had often met there with his disciples. So Judas got a band of soldiers and guards from the chief priests and the Pharisees and went there with lanterns, torches, and weapons. Jesus, knowing everything that was going to happen to him, went out and said to them, “Whom are you looking for?” They answered him, “Jesus the Nazorean.” He said to them, “I AM.” Judas his betrayer was also with them. When he said to them, “I AM,” they turned away and fell to the ground. So he again asked them, “Whom are you looking for?” They said, “Jesus the Nazorean.” Jesus answered, “I told you that I AM. So if you are looking for me, let these men go.” This was to fulfill what he had said, “I have not lost any of those you gave me.” Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it, struck the high priest’s slave, and cut off his right ear. The slave’s name was Malchus. Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into its scabbard. Shall I not drink the cup that the Father gave me?”

So the band of soldiers, the tribune, and the Jewish guards seized Jesus, bound him, and brought him to Annas first. He was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest that year. It was Caiaphas who had counseled the Jews that it was better that one man should die rather than the people.

Simon Peter and another disciple followed Jesus. Now the other disciple was known to the high priest, and he entered the courtyard of the high priest with Jesus. But Peter stood at the gate outside. So the other disciple, the acquaintance of the high priest, went out and spoke to the gatekeeper and brought Peter in. Then the maid who was the gatekeeper said to Peter, “You are not one of this man’s disciples, are you?” He said, “I am not.” Now the slaves and the guards were standing around a charcoal fire that they had made, because it was cold, and were warming themselves. Peter was also standing there keeping warm.

The high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and about his doctrine. Jesus answered him, “I have spoken publicly to the world. I have always taught in a synagogue or in the temple area where all the Jews gather, and in secret I have said nothing. Why ask me? Ask those who heard me what I said to them. They know what I said.” When he had said this, one of the temple guards standing there struck Jesus and said, “Is this the way you answer the high priest?” Jesus answered him, “If I have spoken wrongly, testify to the wrong; but if I have spoken rightly, why do you strike me?” Then Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.

Now Simon Peter was standing there keeping warm. And they said to him, “You are not one of his disciples, are you?” He denied it and said, “I am not.” One of the slaves of the high priest, a relative of the one whose ear Peter had cut off, said, “Didn’t I see you in the garden with him?” Again Peter denied it. And immediately the cock crowed.

Then they brought Jesus from Caiaphas to the praetorium. It was morning. And they themselves did not enter the praetorium, in order not to be defiled so that they could eat the Passover. So Pilate came out to them and said, “What charge do you bring against this man?” They answered and said to him, “If he were not a criminal, we would not have handed him over to you.” At this, Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves, and judge him according to your law.” The Jews answered him, “We do not have the right to execute anyone,” in order that the word of Jesus might be fulfilled that he said indicating the kind of death he would die. So Pilate went back into the praetorium and summoned Jesus and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus answered, “Do you say this on your own or have others told you about me?” Pilate answered, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests handed you over to me. What have you done?” Jesus answered, “My kingdom does not belong to this world. If my kingdom did belong to this world, my attendants would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not here.” So Pilate said to him, “Then you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say I am a king. For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate said to him, “What is truth?”

When he had said this, he again went out to the Jews and said to them, “I find no guilt in him. But you have a custom that I release one prisoner to you at Passover. Do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?” They cried out again, “Not this one but Barabbas!” Now Barabbas was a revolutionary.

Then Pilate took Jesus and had him scourged. And the soldiers wove a crown out of thorns and placed it on his head, and clothed him in a purple cloak, and they came to him and said, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they struck him repeatedly. Once more Pilate went out and said to them, “Look, I am bringing him out to you, so that you may know that I find no guilt in him.” So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple cloak. And he said to them, “Behold, the man!” When the chief priests and the guards saw him they cried out, “Crucify him, crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and crucify him. I find no guilt in him.” The Jews answered, “We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.” Now when Pilate heard this statement, he became even more afraid, and went back into the praetorium and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” Jesus did not answer him. So Pilate said to him, “Do you not speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you and I have power to crucify you?” Jesus answered him, “You would have no power over me if it had not been given to you from above. For this reason the one who handed me over to you has the greater sin.” Consequently, Pilate tried to release him; but the Jews cried out, “If you release him, you are not a Friend of Caesar. Everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar.”

When Pilate heard these words he brought Jesus out and seated him on the judge’s bench in the place called Stone Pavement, in Hebrew, Gabbatha. It was preparation day for Passover, and it was about noon. And he said to the Jews, “Behold, your king!” They cried out, “Take him away, take him away! Crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your king?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar.” Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.

So they took Jesus, and, carrying the cross himself, he went out to what is called the Place of the Skull, in Hebrew, Golgotha. There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, with Jesus in the middle. Pilate also had an inscription written and put on the cross. It read, “Jesus the Nazorean, the King of the Jews.” Now many of the Jews read this inscription, because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek. So the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, “Do not write ‘The King of the Jews,’ but that he said, ‘I am the King of the Jews.’” Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”

When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and divided them into four shares, a share for each soldier. They also took his tunic, but the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from the top down. So they said to one another, “Let’s not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it will be,” in order that the passage of Scripture might be fulfilled that says:

They divided my garments among them,

and for my vesture they cast lots.

This is what the soldiers did. Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary of Magdala. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.

After this, aware that everything was now finished, in order that the Scripture might be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I thirst.” There was a vessel filled with common wine. So they put a sponge soaked in wine on a sprig of hyssop and put it up to his mouth. When Jesus had taken the wine, he said, “It is finished.” And bowing his head, he handed over the spirit.

Here all kneel and pause for a short time.

Now since it was preparation day, in order that the bodies might not remain on the cross on the sabbath, for the sabbath day of that week was a solemn one, the Jews asked Pilate that their legs be broken and that they be taken down. So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and then of the other one who was crucified with Jesus. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs, but one soldier thrust his lance into his side, and immediately blood and water flowed out. An eyewitness has testified, and his testimony is true; he knows that he is speaking the truth, so that you also may come to believe. For this happened so that the Scripture passage might be fulfilled:

Not a bone of it will be broken.

And again another passage says:

They will look upon him whom they have pierced.

After this, Joseph of Arimathea, secretly a disciple of Jesus for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate if he could remove the body of Jesus. And Pilate permitted it. So he came and took his body. Nicodemus, the one who had first come to him at night, also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes weighing about one hundred pounds. They took the body of Jesus and bound it with burial cloths along with the spices, according to the Jewish burial custom. Now in the place where he had been crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb, in which no one had yet been buried. So they laid Jesus there because of the Jewish preparation day; for the tomb was close by.

Reflection (1)

(i) Good Friday

This is the only day of the year when we gather in numbers in the church at 3.00 pm. We do so to commemorate the Lord’s passion and death because, according to the evangelists, Jesus died at three in the afternoon. It is also the only day in the year when we do not celebrate Mass. We are in a more sombre mood than Mass would allow for. We had no entrance hymn this afternoon. The priests walked into the church in silence and prostrated themselves before the bare altar in silence. There is something sparse and unadorned about our liturgy. The centre piece of our liturgy is the veneration of the cross. Our focus is on the wood of the cross, on which hung the Saviour of the world.

Yet, for all the sombre quality of our liturgy, we do not gather in sadness, and we do not focus on the physical sufferings of Jesus. When the evangelists told the story of the passion and death of Jesus, they did not dwell on the awfulness of the actual crucifixion. They did not need to. Everyone at that time knew very well what crucifixion entailed. The evangelists were much more concerned with bringing out the deeper meaning of that last journey of Jesus. In the light of Easter the early church came to understand that the final journey of Jesus was indeed a good news story. We too look at the passion and death of Jesus in the light of Easter. Indeed, it is because Jesus was raised from the dead that the Friday on which Jesus was crucified came to be known as Good Friday. As followers of the risen Lord, among whom the risen Lord lives and works, we always see the cross of Jesus bathed in the light of Easter. Some of the earliest artistic depictions of the crucifixion were of a triumphant Christ reigning from the cross, spreading out his arms as the one who has conquered sin and death and calling on all of us to share in his victory.

We have just read the account of the passion and death of Jesus according to John. It is his account more than any other which baths the passion and death of Jesus in the light of Easter. The fourth evangelist speaks of Jesus as being lifted up, which suggests not only his being lifted up on the cross but his being lifted up in glory. In John’s gospel when Judas leaves the room of the last supper to betray Jesus, Jesus immediately declares, ‘Now the Son of Man has been glorified’. The crucified of Jesus for this evangelist is also his glorification, the hour when he reveals his glory, when he reveals the glory of God, the powerful presence of God. This evangelist recognized very clearly that when Jesus was at this weakest on the cross, God was at his most powerful. God was powerfully at work in and through the weakness of Jesus. Indeed, in this fourth gospel, Jesus says of himself, ‘When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself’. In the course of his public ministry Jesus drew to himself people from Galilee and from Jerusalem. However, he declares there that when he is lifted up on the cross he will draw all people to himself, people of every generation and from every language and culture. Why would Jesus draw more people to himself at the hour of his greatest physical weakness than during the time when he was a vigorous young man? As the early church came to recognize, Jesus revealed God more powerfully on the cross than when he walked the hills of Galilee. It was above all on the cross that Jesus revealed God to be unconditional love. In those great words of the fourth evangelist, ‘God so loved the world that he gave his only Son’. We gather here on this Good Friday afternoon because each of us has already been touched in some way by the God of Love revealed in the death and resurrection of Jesus.

We know from our experience that the best of human love is creative and life-giving; it is healing and renewing. That is even truer of God’s love, which is why the medieval artists depicted the cross as a source of life which nourishes all creation. This is the image that the fourth evangelist gives us of the crucifixion of Jesus. From the pierced side of Jesus there poured out blood and water. Earlier in the gospel Jesus had offered the Samaritan woman ‘living water’ and promised that if anyone received this living water it would become in them a spring of water, welling up to eternal life. He was speaking to her of the living water of God’s Spirit, of the Spirit of God’s love. From the cross, the Lord offers that living water to all of us; he says to all of us, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me’. That is why we venerate the cross. We are spiritually thirsty and we want to keep drinking from the source of the living water of God’s love, a love which is stronger than sin and stronger than death.

Fr. Martin Hogan, Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin, D03 AO62, Ireland.

Email: sjtbclontarf@eircom.net or  revmartinhogan@gmail.com

Parish Website: www.stjohnsclontarf.ie  Please join us via our webcam.

Twitter: @SJtBClontarfRC.

Facebook: St John the Baptist RC Parish, Clontarf.

Tumblr: Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin.

[cutsliceddiced]

New top story from Time: The Story of an Extravagant Christmas Dinner Near the North Pole in 1881

When you think of early expeditions to the Polar North, images of hardship, deprivation, frostbite and death usually come to mind. These were the realities of the 19th Century attempts to the deadly region, where steering ships through the harsh, ice-bound labyrinth resulted in average crew losses of 50 percent. Some never came home, as with Sir John Franklin’s famous 1845 voyage seeking the fabled Northwest Passage, in which he and his entire crew of 129 vanished. But there was one lesser-known expedition—The Greely Expedition—during which (at least in the beginning), the men enjoyed warm shelter, sumptuous, opulent meals, singing and revelry and holiday celebration at the far end of the earth.

In 1881, an ambitious Lieutenant and acting U.S. Signal Corps Officer named Adolphus W. Greely led an unprecedented journey to the Arctic. Formally called The Lady Franklin Bay Expedition (named for Franklin���s dutiful wife Lady Jane Franklin, who for years hounded the British Admiralty to search for her missing husband and his men), it has come to be known as The Greely Expedition.

The mission was threefold: They were to collect scientific data for the first International Polar Year; they were to search for and hopefully rescue the men of the lost USS Jeannette, which had disappeared two years earlier; and last, Greely secretly intended to venture into the unexplored Lincoln Sea and become the first to reach the North Pole. Should he fall short, he would try to attain Farthest North, an explorer’s holy grail of the highest northern latitude, which had been held by the British for three hundred years.

If he succeeded, he would return a national, even global hero.

In early August of 1881, Greely and twenty-four explorer-scientists landed at Discovery Harbor, on the far north-eastern edge of what was then known as Grinnell Land, now known as Ellesmere Island, Canada. The crew hurriedly unloaded the steamship Proteus. They off-loaded enough pre-cut timber to build a spacious, double-walled longhouse sixty-five feet long, twenty-one feet wide, and fourteen feet tall. It would have a kitchen, two stoves, comfortable quarters for the officers and bunkrooms for the men.

Greely set the men to work around the clock in four-hour shifts, made possible by the perpetual sunlight. There was no time to waste: by mid-October, the skies would darken, and the sun would not return again for 130 days. Temperatures would plunge to minus 75-degrees Fahrenheit.

Within two-weeks, the structure, dubbed Fort Conger, was nearly complete. Located 250-miles north of the last known Eskimo settlement and 1,000 miles north of the Arctic Circle, Greely and his men were now the most northerly colony of human inhabitants in the world.

They had enough food for a three-year stay, with nearly thirty thousand rations of various meats—including pork and pemmican (a high- calorie mixture of dried meat, melted fat, and often berries), bacon, ham, and mutton—as well as canned salmon, cod, and crabmeat. Greely had brought along some forty thousand rations of beans and rice, plus two thousand pounds of potatoes packed in five-pound cans, and mixed vegetables in two-pound cans, including pickles, onions, and beets. There were preserved peaches, molasses and syrup, canned pork and beef, as well as foods thought to thwart scurvy: immense quantities of dried fruits, damsons and other plums, and cranberry sauce.* They also brought many casks of rum, whose restorative properties were considered more necessity than luxury.

In mid-October the sun set, giving way to “the long night,” the polar effect of perpetual twilight. But although the polar winter was devoid of sun, it was not devoid of light. Every two weeks the men were transfixed by the appearance of the magical northern lights, or aurora borealis, a phenomenon of bright and sometimes dancing lights that result from collisions between gaseous particles in the Earth’s atmosphere with charged particles released from the sun’s atmosphere. Greely noted displays that were “grand and magnificent in the extreme,” including “lances of white light, having perhaps a faint tinge of golden or citron color, which appeared as moving shafts or spears,” and one that looked like “a pillar of glowing fire, from horizon to horizon through the zenith, showing at times a decidedly rosy tint, and later a Nile-green color.” Sometimes while watching this spectacle, men would see the ghostly outline of polar bears traversing the shore and the ice foot, and Greely was reminded of recent wolf attacks. The men would need to be always alert, for danger lurked everywhere.

To help stave off “cabin fever” or “polar madness”—which could drive men into deep melancholy and even suicide—Greely organized elaborate holiday celebrations. The first Thanksgiving at Fort Conger proved memorable indeed. After being mostly fort-bound for weeks, Greely organized a series of races, contests, and competitions. All the men participated in one way or another, either as contestants, judges, or coaches. Illuminated all day by a series of auroral streamers of fluctuating brilliance, the men competed in snowshoe races, footraces, sled-dog races, and finally, a shooting competition.

The first Thanksgiving menu was extravagant, as follows: “Oyster soup, salmon, ham, eider ducks, devilled crab, lobster-salad, asparagus, green corn, several kinds of cake and ice-cream, dates, figs, and nuts.” Greely and the other officers sipped Sauternes from his private supply, and he gave “a moderate amount of rum . . . to the men in the evening, which contributed much to the merriment of the day.” During the meal, prizes were distributed to the winners of the day’s events, and the evening concluded with concertina and violin music and singing.

Preparations for the Christmas feast began days before the twenty-fifth. As the cooks labored in the kitchen, clanking pans and using all the burners, oven ranges, and hot water boilers, officers took the lead in decorating, hanging military standards (guidons) and other flags, as well as any and all colorful cloth that could be hung or draped festively.

The menu—given their unique status as the most northerly inhabitants in the world—was a wonder and a delight, consisting of eight courses and including the following concoctions: “Mock-turtle soup, salmon, fricasseed guillemot, spiced musk-ox tongue, crab-salad, roast beef, eider-ducks, tenderloin of musk-ox, potatoes, asparagus, green corn, green peas, cocoanut-pie, jelly-cake, plum-pudding with wine-sauce, several kinds of ice-cream, grapes, cherries, pineapples, dates, figs, nuts, candies, coffee, chocolate.” Mrs. Greely had sent along a case of her plum pudding. It was served generously with a wine sauce and was a resounding success, in part because it was accompanied by cigars as well as candies and chocolates from Huyler’s, the most famous confectioner in New York City.

The warmth and levity inside the fort were juxtaposed with the stark danger of the world just outside the walls of their sturdy shelter. During the month of December, the mean temperature was minus 32-degrees, with a low of minus 52-degrees. As they rubbed their bellies, bloated from the lavish multi-course meal, the men had no way of knowing that soon, they would all be clinging for their lives on an iceberg floating aimlessly in the sea, their rations reduced to a few ounces per man per day. But for now, the men feasted on dessert “seconds,” huffed on their cigars, swilled their Sauterne and rum drinks, and thought contentedly of home.

Adapted from Buddy Levy’s Labyrinth of Ice: The Triumphant and Tragic Greely Expedition (published by St. Martin’s Press).

* At the time, though scurvy was known as a dietary deficiency, it was not completely understood. It was known that citrus fruits like lemons and limes appeared to combat the disease, so mariners began taking them on extended voyages (resulting in the origin of British expression “Limeys”). It was not until the 1930s that the Hungarian-born Albert Szent-Györgyi isolated vitamin C, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1937.

  via https://cutslicedanddiced.wordpress.com/2018/01/24/how-to-prevent-food-from-going-to-waste

[steenpaal]

Walter Clarence Thornton - Wikipedia

Walter Clarence Thornton

A portrait photo of Walter Thornton

Born(1903-04-03)April 3, 1903 DiedMay 14, 1990(1990-05-14) (aged 87) Resting placeRiverside National CemeteryNationalityAmericanOccupationModeling AgentYears active1929–1955Spouse(s)Judy Dolan (m.1934–1955) Candelaria Navarro (m.1960–1990)Children7

Walter Clarence Thornton (April 3, 1903 – May 14, 1990) was an American model agent best known for founding the Walter Thornton Model Agency in 1929 and his World War II era pin-up girls. Walter Thornton rose to success from being an orphan and a butcher cart driver.[1] He was a Miss America Judge in 1935.[2] His company represented adults as well as children and many of his clients achieved fame and success. He retired from the agency in 1958 and spent the rest of his life in Ajijic, Mexico.[3]

Walter Thornton Modeling Agency

After working as a model and posing for artists such as Arthur William Brown he gained connections in the modeling business and he started his own modeling agency, located in the Chrysler Building, in 1929.[4][5] As the Walter Thornton Modeling Agency grew, it was considered one of "Big Three", the largest model agencies in the United States, along with its competitors, John Robert Powers and Harry Conover.[6] His agency worked with famous models such as: Lizabeth Scott, Susan Hayward, Grace Kelly, Lauren Bacall, Hazel Brooks, Lucille Wilds, and Eleanor Cahill.[7][8][9][10][11][12] Walter Thornton supplied models to Alex Raymond for his comic book, Flash Gordon. A special autobiographical issue depicts Alex Raymond sketching panels using Walter Thornton model Patricia Quinn as a reference.[13] Starting in the mid-50's and continuing after Walter moved to Mexico, Walter Thornton modelling schools and agencies were opened in Canada.[14]

Pin-up girls

Walter Thornton's agency favored "wholesome girl-back-home type" models as opposed to his competition who tended to hire models that fell into the "glamorous show-girl type". pin-up girl. Many of his agency's pin-up girl photos were sent to G.I.s under General Powell during World War II.[15] The popularity of Thornton's pin-up girls led to charting singles such "Get a Pin-Up Girl!" by Don Wolf, "Pin-Up Polka" by Al Gamse and Irving Fields, and "The Walter Thornton Rumba" also by Gamse and Fields.[16]

Just Kids Photos

Walter Thornton ran a stock photo publication of children. Peggy Ann Garner was included in this publication and went on to win an award for her acting.[17]

Legal trouble

A series of legal issues and negative publicity starting in 1954 culminated in Walter Thornton's retirement from his modeling agency. Walter Thornton was arrested and charged with grand larceny, petit larceny, and conspiracy on January 26, 1954.[18][19] Walter Thornton said in a news article that the District Attorney who was prosecuting him, Quinn, didn't have a case and furthermore was just stirring up publicity to cover for his own legal problems.[20] Walter Thornton also had his modelling license suspended for sending clients to a photography office that he owned without disclosure.[21] The case was dismissed on June 3, 1954, by judge Peter T. Farreli of Queens county court in Jamaica, New York.[22] Thornton filed a lawsuit for $3,000,000 in damages against the Hearst Corporation on May 21, 1955 claiming he was libeled.[23]

Personal life

House built and lived in by Walter Clarence Thornton in Ajijic, Mexico

Thornton married one of his models, Judy Dolan, in 1934 and had one daughter, Daryl.[24] They separated when Walter moved to Mexico.

After retirement

In Ajijic, Mexico, Walter Thornton remarried to Candelaria Navarro and had six children with her: Walter Jr., Roberta Virginia, Adriana Anabel, Nancy Louella, Richard Orlando, Ethel Ivette.[25] He built a house decorated with mosaic tiles where he raised his children and lived until his health failed.[26] He died of a stroke in 1990.[27]

References

^ Dale Carnegie, From Editorial Page, The Pittsburgh Press, December 26, 1940

^ "Miss Philadelphia Fourth in 2d Test", Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, September 5, 1935

^ "Walter Thornton, Agent for Models, Dies of Stroke at 88", The New York Times, May 16, 1990

^ Dale Carnegie, From Editorial Page, The Pittsburgh Press, December 26, 1940

^ Eileen Evans-Smith, "Person to Person: Every Girl a Model?", Ottawa Citizen, Nov 13, 1962

^ "The Modeling Business", LIFE, Mar 25, 1946

^ 1944 Walter Thornton Model Agency calendar, Lizabeth Scott Model of the month

^ Kim R. Holston, Susan Hayward: Her Films and Her Life, p. 8, September 24, 2002

^ Wendy Leigh, True Grace: The Life and Times of an American Princess, p. 36, Jun 10, 2008

^ Terry Rowan, World War II Goes to the Movies & Television Guide Volume I A-K, p. 39, 2012

^ "Broadway's Answer to Hollywood", The Free Lance-Star, April 4, 1941

^ "Dream Girl", The Milwaukee Sentinel, December 31, 1939

^ "Modern Jules Verne", Flash Gordon #10, 1942

^ Eileen Evans-Smith, "Person to Person: Every Girl a Model?", Ottawa Citizen, November 13, 1962

^ Paul Dickson, War Slang: American Fighting Words, p. 198, Aug 1, 2014

^ "Music As Written", Billboard, Feb 26, 1949

^ "Walter Thornton, Agent for Models, Dies of Stroke at 88", The New York Times, May 16, 1990

^ "Merchant of Venus Head on Fraud Charges", Barrier Miner, January 27, 1954

^ "Thornton is Free in Model 'Racket'", The New York Times, June 03, 1954

^ "1000% Publicity", TIME, p. 86, February 8, 1954

^ "25 Models Aid Agency to Regain License", The New York Times, December 11, 1934

^ "Thornton is Free in Model 'Racket'", The New York Times, June 03, 1954

^ "Walter Thornton Sues For $3,000,000", Editor & Publisher, May 21, 1955

^ Betty Clark, "Model Wife Says Anyone Can Keep Spouse Charmed", St. Petersburg Times, Jun 3, 1945

^ "Walter Thornton, Agent for Models, Dies of Stroke at 88", The New York Times, May 16, 1990

^ Morris Reichley, "Arabian Nights", El Ojo del Lago

^ "Walter Thornton, Agent for Models, Dies of Stroke at 88", The New York Times, May 16, 1990

[statebeggar70-blog]

The 1900 Charles de Cordova House - 312 West 105th Street

Once development got going on the Upper West Side, it steamrolled.  Beginning in the 1880s developers filled entire block fronts in a single sweep with harmonious homes designed by a single architect.

The West Side residences, designed mostly in expressive historic revival styles were replete with turrets, gargoyles, dog-legged stoops and stained glass windows.  They bore no resemblance to the Parisian-inspired palaces of the Upper East Side.

Except, perhaps, on West 105th Street.

Developer-builder John C. Umberfield joined in the building boom by purchasing the block front of 105th Street between the newly-completed Riverside Drive and West End Avenue.  He commissioned the architectural firm of Janes & Leo to design a striking row of high-end residences that would stretch from No. 302 to 320.   The firm had just completed The Alimar around the corner at No. 925 West End Avenue, an exuberant high class apartment building in the Beaux Arts style.

For Umberfield’s string of homes, the firm would turn to the style again, creating a row of French-influenced mansions much more akin to their across-the-park cousins than their brick-and-stone West Side neighbors.  Construction began in 1899 and the row was completed a year later.  The homes were all highly similar, but discreetly individual.  The mansions were grouped in twos with each pair being nearly identical.  By arranging the row this way, the architects accomplished a harmonious flow and a sense of balance.

The row was designed as three pairs, No 312 being second from left.

The completed residences were offered for sale in 1900 for between $42,500 and $50,000--just over $1 million today.  Umberfield sold No. 312 to Charles de Cordova in April 1901.

Born in London in 1854, de Cordova was the sole proprietor of De Cordova Sons & Co., a tea brokerage company.  The Trade Journal's All About Tea called the firm a "leader in the American tea trade."

Charles de Cordova in his later years.  from All About Tea, 1935.

De Cordova was, indeed, a leader in his business.  In 1895 he had pushed for a "tea law" and was greatly credited for the passing of the 1897 Tea Importation Act which banned the importing of tea contaminated by pesticides, metals, and the like.  In 1918 his shipment of Japanese tea on the S. S. Tsushima Maru was the first tea shipment to pass through the Panama Canal.

A respected member of social and business clubs, De Cordova proved his novel decorating skills shortly after buying the 105th Street mansion.  The Virginia newspaper the Richmond Planet reported on June 1, 1901 "A new idea in table decorations was evolved by Charles De Cordova in a dinner given by the New York Athletic club to P. R. Todd, recently elected to a vice presidency of the New York, New Haven & Hartford railroad.  In the center of the table was a large bank of roses, around the edge of which was constructed a miniature railroad, on which a locomotive, baggage car and passenger coach, operated by electricity, whirled about the table at a speed of about 50 miles an hour."

Focus turned from business to social interests in the Spring of 1906.  The mansion was the scene of the wedding of de Cordovas' only child, Fanny, to Dr. John W. Sanborn of Boston.  The ceremony took place on April 18, 1906.

The family routinely summered in either Stockbridge, Massachusetts or Lakewood, New Jersey.  They took a break from the New York winter in 1907 by traveling to Kingston, Jamaica.   Their vacation amid palm trees and tropical breezes was horribly and tragically disrupted when a massive earthquake hit the island on the afternoon of Monday, January 14.  

Every building in Jamaica was damaged and, as had been the case less than a year earlier in San Francisco, fires erupted throughout the city.  An estimated 10,000 people died.  The Washington Times reported on January 17 "not less than $10,000,000 of her property [is] absolutely wiped out."  The newspaper listed among the injured Charles de Cordova and among the dead, his brother Edward.

Charles's wife, the former Ella Nichols, involved herself in several organizations, including the Women's Guild of St. Luke's Church and the School of Domestic Art and Sciences, of which she was treasurer.  

The couple left the West 105th Street house in 1925.  They moved into the Belnord apartments on West 86th Street.  The couple had been married 45 years at the time; but their domestic bliss was about to come to an end.  Throughout their marriage Charles had turned over his "surplus earnings" to Ella to use for living expenses and to invest.  While living on 105th Street his average income was about $245,000 by today's standards.

On August 22, 1929 the aging Charles sought an injunction against Ella, who was 72, to restrain her from disposing of their life savings.  Charles asserted in court that their son-in-law, Dr. Sanborn, had "maliciously influenced" Ella to move all the securities into her own name; presumably with the goal of getting control.  De Cordova lamented that Sanborn had destroyed the happiness of his home "and the comradeship of his wife for forty-eight years" and that he had "been stripped of all his savings of these years and is left, at the age of 75, with a broken home and less than $11,000 in securities which he happened to have in his own custody."  The ugly court battle continued for weeks.

In the meantime, Robert Davison Petty had purchased No. 312 from the de Cordovas in 1925 for $31,000, about $433,000 today.  Petty had been appointed dean of the New York Law School the year before; prompting his resignation as Assistant District Attorney.  Born on a farm in Washington Township, New Jersey, it was a farming accident which resulted in his conspicuous change in career paths.

As a young man he was cutting down a field of corn when the scythe slipped and severely cut his knee cap.  The injury prevented any further physical labor.  While he convalesced he decided he would like to become an attorney.  In 1883 he graduated fifth in his class at Princeton University.  Two years later he graduated form the Columbia Law School and would later become that school's Professor of Law.

Petty's wife was the former Florence Service.  The couple had seven children--Alice, Robert, Mary, Elizabeth, John, Katharine, and Richard--four of whom lived in the West 105th Street house with their parents.

On the night of June 2, 1932 Petty personally awarded degrees to 124 graduates at the commencement ceremonies of the New York Law School.  Upon returning home the 72-year-old chatted with his son-in-law, Ray Bouton, about his youth and said he would like to go back to the farm some day to live out his remaining years.

The following morning he did not come down to breakfast at the normal time, but the family assumed that he overslept after the strenuous night.  At noon daughter Elizabeth went up to waken him.  She discovered he had died in his sleep.  His funeral was held in the house the following Monday.

On December 10, 1937 son Richard Servis Petty married Marcille Littlefield in the West End Presbyterian Church.  Richard had followed in his father's footsteps and was also a lawyer.  The marriage did not reduce the population of No. 312, but increased it.  The New York Times noted "Mr. and Mrs. Petty will live at 312 West 105th Street after a trip to Canada."

Daughter Katharine's wedding seven months later was held in the family home.  Katharine, like her siblings, had enjoyed a privileged upbringing.  She attended the Ethical Culture School, graduated from the Horace Mann School for Girls and Miss Hunter's School.  She married Alvah Howard Lance on July 16, 1938.

No. 312 West 105th Street sold was sold on August 20, 1945.  Florence would survive until February 8, 1960, having outlived not only her husband, but daughters Katharine and Elizabeth.

The house had became home to Jewish doctor from Hungary, Laci Klein and his wife, Ansci, who had recently escaped from almost certain death in his homeland.  Once here, according to Judy Cohen in her Song of the Silent Bell, as Klein's siblings escaped the Nazis regime, he provided them a place to live.  Ansci's family was tragically lost to the Holocaust.  In 1952, upon becoming naturalized citizens, the Kleins changed their surname to Kay.  They remained at No. 312 until early in 1956.

Laci and Ancsi Klein in front of 312 West 105th Street.  from Song of the Silent Bell by Judy Cohen

In 1962 the former mansion was converted to a doctor's office in the ground floor, and eight apartments in the upper floors.  

photographs by the author

Source: http://daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com/2018/12/the-1900-charles-de-cordova-house-312.html

[ruminativerabbi]

Forgiveness

It was back in the summer of 1986 that NYPD Officer Steven McDonald, then only twenty-nine years old and with only two years of service behind him, was shot three times by Shavod Jones, a boy of fifteen. Jones had been hanging around the Harlem Lake Boathouse near the northern end of Central Park with two friends when Officer McDonald, thinking the boys looked suspicious, approached them and initiated a conversation. Jones responded by pulling out a .22-caliber revolver and opening fire, squeezing off four shots. One shot missed entirely. Of the other three, though, one hit McDonald in the head just over his eye, one hit his throat (and later made it impossible for him to speak normally), and one shattered his spine, paralyzing him from the neck down. The stricken officer was immediately rushed to Bellevue Hospital, where he underwent hours of complicated surgery. He survived, but was left to live out his days as a quadriplegic able to breathe solely with the assistance of a ventilator. All three boys were arrested on the spot by other policemen patrolling the park.

New York was a dangerous place back then. There were, for example, 1907 murders in the city that year, as opposed to a mere 609 in 2015. I was already gone—we were away for nineteen years beginning in 1983, living in Israel, Germany, Canada, and southern California—but I recall all too well just how inured we had all become to the level of mayhem that seemed almost natural to the urban environment by the mid-80s. But even given the level of violence to which New Yorkers had become used—you may recall the line from Rent: “I’m a New Yorker—fear’s my life!”—Officer McDonald’s story was still horrific.  But his story was not only not over as evening fell on that awful day. It was actually just beginning.

The world kept spinning. The story faded from the headlines. The McDonald family found a way to cope, to move forward. Patricia McDonald, today the mayor of Malverne but then a pregnant newlywed facing a future that even a few months earlier would have been unimaginable, gave birth to a boy whom they named Conor Patrick.  Cardinal John Joseph O’Connor, the then archbishop of New York, presided at the boy’s baptism in the Catholic Chapel at Bellevue. That the archbishop of New York would personally preside over the baptism of a child born to a police officer grievously wounded in the line of duty was not that surprising, nor was his willingness to conduct the ceremony in a hospital. But what was extraordinary was Officer McDonald’s statement, which he read aloud following the ceremony and in which he publicly forgave the boy who shot him. “I’m sometimes angry at the teenage boy who shot me,” he said, “but more often I feel sorry for him...I forgive him and hope that he can find peace and purpose in his life.”

I remember reading those words back then. (To see the article about the baptism that appeared in the Daily News the following day, click here.) And I remember wondering what kind of man would have it in his heart to forgive someone who had brazenly and unhesitatingly attempted to murder him. It is certainly not without importance that Shavod Jones was just fifteen in 1986, but I didn’t have the sense that Officer McDonald forgave Shavod Jones specifically because of his age….

Steven McDonald died at North Shore University Hospital just last week after suffering a fatal heart attack. Strangely, his death came just a few days after Dylann Roof was sentenced to death after being found guilty of charges stemming from the cold-blooded murder of nine people in the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in federal court in Charleston. And there too the specter of forgiveness loomed over the proceedings, at least as I myself watched them unfold.

Not all, but some of the relatives of the Charleston victims followed Officer McDonald’s lead and publicly forgave their loved one’s murderer. Nadine Collier, a daughter of victim Ethel Lance, spoke in court early on in the proceedings and publicly forgave her mother’s murderer using the same unambiguous language Officer McDonald did. So did the Reverend Sharon Risher, another of Ethel Lance’s daughters. Felicia Sanders, whose son Tywanza also died that day in Charleston, went on record formally forgiving Roof and publicly praying that God judge him mercifully. The sister of another victim, DePayne Middleton-Doctor, said simply, referring to her family, that “We have no room for hating, so we have to forgive. I pray to God for your soul.”

Shelter Rockers all know how important Simon Wiesenthal’s The Sunflower has been for me personally, both as a remarkable work of post-Shoah philosophy and as a moral guide, and I’d like to bring that story to bear in my effort to understand Officer McDonald’s behavior and the behavior of the relatives of the Charleston Nine mentioned just above.

For readers new to Wiesenthal’s book, its backstory will be very unexpected and challenging. In 1943, Wiesenthal, then thirty-five, was a prisoner of the Nazis assigned to a work detail near Lviv, once called Lvov, today the largest city in Western Ukraine but then the third largest city in Poland. The plot is a bit complicated, but the essential detail is that Wiesenthal ended up working in a hospital, where he agreed to a nurse’s request that he visit with a twenty-one-year-old S.S. officer named Karl who was dying of his wounds. Karl’s story tells is beyond horrific, even by Shoah standards, and involved his participation in the brutal murder of Jews in a Russian village in a way that resists description in normal language: to use words like bestial or barbaric to describe the Germans’ actions would be to say almost nothing at all. And then Karl, having confessed to his role in the slaughter, gets to the point: “The pains in my body are terrible, but worse still is my conscience . . . I cannot die . . . without coming clean . . . In the last hours of my life you are with me. I do not know who you are. I only know that you are a Jew and that is enough . . . In the long nights while I have been waiting for death, time and time again I have longed to talk about it to a Jew and beg forgiveness from him. Only I didn't know whether there were any Jews left . . . I know that what I am asking is almost too much for you, but without your answer I cannot die in peace.” Wiesenthal listened, then stood up and left the room without saying a word. When he returned the next day, Karl had already died.

The Sunflower is a collection of essays long and short by all sorts of interesting people—including Primo Levi, the Dalai Lama, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Desmond Tutu, Albert Speer, and forty-eight others—answering Wiesenthal’s question, “Ought I have forgiven him?” The contributors are a varied lot, and their answers vary accordingly. No one, as I recall, dares castigate Wiesenthal for his silence, but some nonetheless write passionately in favor of forgiving. Others feel he did exactly the right thing, that only silence could possibly have constituted a rational response to Karl’s request. The Christian responses are mixed, as are the other non-Jewish ones. (One of the most interesting is the one by Dith Pran, author of The Killing Fields and himself a survivor of mass murder on the level of genocide in Cambodia, and he thinks that Wiesenthal should have provided the forgiveness Karl needed to die in peace.) The Jewish responses are also mixed, but not in the same way: some express a reluctance to decide at all, but the overwhelming majority write that it would have been morally wrong, even reprehensible, to forgive…and precisely because Wiesenthal himself wasn’t one of Karl’s victims and so lacked the standing—or the moral right—to forgive a murderer on his victims’ behalf.

Applying that line of reasoning to the relatives of the Charleston Nine who spoke publicly of forgiving their loved ones’ murderer works if what they meant was that they personally felt aggressed against and were thus prepared to forgive the perpetrator for what he had done to them, not what he had done to his victims. I can accept that. But Officer McDonald’s gesture was of a different nature entirely. Here was a man who himself was the victim of the pent-up rage and unbridled violence of his assailant. Unlike Wiesenthal and also unlike the relatives of the dead in Charleston, then, he truly was entitled to forgive. And his act, therefore, was all the more remarkable.

Was it real? If the judge at Shavod Jones’ trial had turned to Officer McDonald and said, “Well, if you forgive him, then so do I. The defendant is guilty as charged, but free to go,” would McDonald have been dismayed or pleased? (This is a fantasy question—judges cannot “just” let people convicted of attempted murder go free because their would-be victims agree to it.) Asking it that way is perhaps unfair…but, even more so, it’s to miss the point. Officer McDonald understood that greater than the burden of quadriplegia would be the burden of spending a lifetime weighed down by anger and the thirst for revenge, and so he looked at his boy-assailant and, instead of wishing him dead, wished him peace. It’s that willingness to forgive that I found and still find so remarkable and, to speak personally, so mysterious.

Shavod Jones was released from jail in 1995 at age twenty-five after eight years of incarceration. Four days later, he was dead from head injuries sustained when he and a friend lost control of the motorcycle they were riding recklessly down a street in East Harlem. So that was the end of Jones’ story, but Steven McDonald, who was promoted after being shot to the rank of first-grade detective, spent the rest of his life promoting the cause of reconciliation. He spoke often about the way his Catholic faith sustained him, and how he felt proud to be symbol to others of the ability to forgive. He even traveled to Northern Ireland at the height of the unrest there to promote the cause of reconciliation between Catholics and Protestants, making that trip in the company the Reverend Mychal Judge, the chaplain of the New York City Fire Department who was killed while ministering to others on 9/11.

The Torah forbids the faithful from holding grudges or refusing to reconcile when someone who has wronged us comes to ask for forgiveness. Rambam uses the very harsh term akhzari (“cruel”) to describe someone who refuses to forgive the sincere penitent who comes to seek forgiveness, and that surely is the model we should seek to emulate. But Officer Steven McDonald went far beyond the requirement of the law and offered his assailant forgiveness not as a response to the latter’s wish to atone, but as a spur to encourage him to seek atonement for a terrible crime. In my mind, that was the act of a truly noble man possessed of the ability not merely to allow reconciliation but actively to seek it out. That is beyond the letter of the law, to be sure. But embracing the moral basis for a law even if doing so requires going far beyond what the law actually requires is the mark, I think, of a truly noble spirit. And so I take note of Officer McDonald’s passing with great sadness and invite you all to join in the prayer that he rest in peace, and that his memory, and the fine example he set, be a source of blessing to his family and to his friends, and also to us all.