Crazy Stable

This is an actual picture (in 3-D ultrasound) of an unborn person, captured in the same look that's been on my face this week. I've been rubbing my eyes in incredulity at the pace of "change." Is my best friend right? Is the new President dazzling and inspiring and lovable because evil hath power to assume a pleasing shape?

Say it ain't so. Who doesn't want to be swept away by the events and images of the past week?

But not everyone has reason to rejoice in our serious, dapper, noble new chief executive. So far, the news is not good for the unborn under his new administration: both those here at home awaiting harvesting for the pharmaceutical industry, and those in poor nations abroad.

And that's in the first week.

Yeah, I know: Mr. Obama ran as the most pro-abortion presidential candidate in memory. But for a guy who could introduce nuance and smarts and compassion into a polarized swamp like racial politics, was it too much to hope for that his mindlessly reflexive refusal to protect the human rights of the unborn might have sprung from expediency and be open to moderation?

So far, that would be a yes. This could get heartbreakingly ugly. Like, we might start wondering why Gitmo detainees have a more compelling hold on his conscience than unborn Americans...or unborn Kenyans or other UN clients. Please don't make us go there. Smart, historic dude, loving father, Harvard genius: Don't set a course for your administration toward moral idiocy.

Not the first week, anyway.

My anguished misgivings about our new President were suspended in the flood tide of history today as I sat alone in my living room, crying and cheering like an idiot. But then, tucked deep into his magnificent inaugural address, one statement gave me even greater cause for hope. Speaking of the foundational faith and determination of ordinary Americans, he said:

"It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate."

Okay, call me a delusional optimist, but I believe in answered prayers, and I know that I have not been alone in storming Heaven to open the eyes of this gifted and inspiring new leader (and loving father) to the sacredness of human life at every stage, before and after birth. During the campaign, he famously waffled that such determinations were "above his pay grade." Could it be possible that today, as his pay grade increases to that of leader of the free world, President Obama slipped in a reference, conscious or not, to the heroism of those who choose life for their unborn children? Do we dare to dream that he will reverse or at least modify his stated determination to tear away every remaining legal protection put in place for the unborn generations whose legacy he will shape?

As today's events bore witness, our nation is caught in a sweet moment when anything—anything good—seems possible. Can we hope for an administration that will support both women's health and rights and the right to life? Yes, we can. Let's keep praying.

P.S. Michelle, j'adore those celadon-green gloves, and the girls looked enchanting. In my current state of infatuation with the entire family, I feel like Frankie in A Member of the Wedding.

Images: Top: Thad Posey via msnbc.com; bottom left, Antonelli, Daily News; bottom right, AP.

"Perhaps the best way to appreciate the power of Catholic schools is to imagine the Church in the United States without them...

Will it be said of our generation that we presided over the demise of the most effective and important resource for evangelization in the history of the Church in the United States?

Will it be said of our generation that we lacked the resolve to preserve national treasures built upon the sacrifice of untold millions?

 Will it be said of our generation that we abandoned these powerful instruments of justice that provide educational opportunity and hope for families otherwise trapped in poverty?"

  Making God Known, Loved and Served: The Future of Catholic Primary and Secondary Schools in the United States. Notre Dame Task Force on Catholic Education Final Report; University of Notre Dame, December 2006

Ladies and Gentleman, here in the Brooklyn Diocese, which encompasses the mighty boroughs of both Brooklyn and Queens, that would be a "yes."

It's a "yes" even if you call it "Preserving the Vision."

Who knew the shepherds of Christ's flock would display such a flair for Orwellian Newspeak in a lame attempt to avoid distasteful controversy?

Oh, wait a minute...come to think of it...the guy who presided over this school system during the critical years of its decline was actually a master of it. (For a devastating example, set aside some spare time, don't eat first, and go here.) The legacy that followed him from Boston to Brooklyn was one of stunning moral torpor in regard to our children (coated with Teflon in regard to infamy, unlike his erstwhile boss, Cardinal Law). Is it any wonder that, while other dioceses around the country have saved their Catholic school systems through innovation and fresh ideas, ours continued to wither and shrink?

In contrast, his successor, a decent man by all accounts, seeks merely to shore up and consolidate the wreckage. It's a sadly limited vision compared to what Our Lord asked of the apostles, but I guess it beats being a facilitator emeritus of pure evil.

However, the Preservation of the Vision has just claimed my school and my daughter's in the name of a "vibrant future." St. Anastasia in Douglaston is toast, and Holy Name School is being merged with the school of an adjacent parish; the entire enterprise is, of course, being handled with the sort of Christ-like compassion and openness we have come to expect from the Kremlin the Diocesan Office.

When the guys in charge tell you how hard they tried to save them, just do me one favor: Don't believe a word of it.

Images: The Bells of St. Mary's; Associated Press

Update: On Friday, Jan. 23, I appeared on NPR's 'The Takeaway' to share these sentiments; I was indeed plied with sufficient coffee to compare the bishops unfavorably with the Blues Brothers in their commitment to Saving the Schools;  go here to listen (I don't know how long that podcast will be available).

Allow me to introduce you to a few of the Very Important Ornaments on the CrazyStable Christmas Tree. At left, the Skater Ball. This is the earliest ornament I can remember; it is probably older than I am (no cracks, please). The color is that of a blood-streaked egg yolk, which may account for why Cookie Monster is staring at it. This ball is my "Rosebud," my "Caddie, caddie," my madeleine. The sight of it every year transports me back to a time of absolute trust and dependence.

 
This is one of the Package Trim Angels (with a Fat Cat of recent acquisition lurking behind her). Back in the ancient times of my childhood, these were sold for about a dime, to embellish a bow; the wings are a delicate mesh stretched over wires, the harp is cardboard, and the whole affair is affixed to a pipe cleaner. Several of these little girls survived thanks to my mother's obsessional conservation instincts. They are goofy and dainty, and I love them because they managed to surmount their destiny as ephemera.

Ah, but nothing rocks my world every Christmas like tenderly unwrapping and hanging the Sparkly Little Houses. When I was little, I would stare at them in their pine groves lit by blinking colored lights, and my imagination would transform them into fabulous elfin castles in a forest kingdom.

Each year, when I lift the little houses out of tissue paper twists, their glitter looks a bit more sparse, and the glue on the pasteboard seams shows more clearly—and I love them even more. Like our actual house, they must look shabby and inconsequential to the casual observer.  Only the eyes of love can invest them with magic and loveliness.

And that is what I wish all my friends, family, and online neighbors this year: lives full of love, the kind of love that can renew enchantment and rekindle light in a world of cynicism and darkness. Best wishes and prayers for 2009.

So I step outside the house as the first snowstorm of the year hits Flatbush, and all hell is breaking loose in the street right in front of my next-door neighbor's house. A convoy of vehicles has swept in to plant street trees! The Bobcat digger here arrived on a flatbed truck; another truck bore a clutch of balled-and-burlapped trees; and the green dumpster down the street awaited the excavated shovelfuls of earth.

It was a blitzkrieg, all over in about 20 minutes after much shouting, gesticulating, and back-up beeping. A similar guerilla tree planting took place down the street last week; neighbors were stunned to discover a new tree sitting in a fresh surgical incision in their median strip. At right, a guy from the landscaping truck with the support poles for the sapling. Several of the Bobcats were zooming around, two heading for the next street over; it reminded me of a busy day on the ice planet Hoth.

The Bobcat lowered the rootball into place, and just one fellow maneuvered it into the hole.  I asked a superviser with a clipboard what species it was; she checked and I believe said it was a zelkova. The Japanese Zelkova (Zelkova serrata), according to the Arbor Day Foundation, is "a handsome tree with showy fall color, attractive exfoliating bark, and a symmetrical, vase-shaped growth habit. It makes a good street tree because of its dense shade, ability to grow in marginal soils and resistance to pests and pollution." (Yeah, we got those.) Our neighbors were told they got a honey locust, so at least we're not being locked into a monoculture of those blasted Callery pears.

I couldn't stick around long enough to see them fill in the hole, but when I returned later, the little tree was propped between its supports as if it had been there all its life. The funny thing is that several dedicated members of our block association have been bugging the city bureacracy for new trees for years...and now, just before Christmas, they arrive without warning!