Today is the Feast of the Conversion of Paul, Apostle. Today also is the Eighth and Final Day of the annual Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, with the overall theme for 2012 is “We will all be changed by the Victory of our Lord Jesus Christ” (cf. 1 Cor 15:51-58); for today, we highlight United in the Reign of Christ, And today is the birthday of our former friend Tim here in town, who has alienated himself from everyone in town (1956).
The story of Paul’s conversion from the virulently anti-Christian Saul to the Apostle Paul is told no less than five times in the New Testament; on the road to Damascus to persecute the Christians there, Saul was blinded by a light from heaven, fell to the ground, and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” When Saul asked, “Who are you, Lord?” the answer came back, ”I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.” He regained his sight upon being baptised, changed his name to Paul, and became the Apostle to the Gentiles. The Christian theological implication of the Conversion of Paul is that it witnesses the absolution of sin that is offered by faith and grace through belief in Jesus Christ. The magnitude of Paul’s transgressions, such as his attempts to completely eradicate Christianity, indicate that any sinner may be forgiven, no matter how terrible his sins, except for the Unforgivable sin against the Holy Spirit. Today also is the Eighth and Final Day of the annual Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. For today, we highlight United in the Reign of Christ, and we pray, “Almighty God, Ruler of All, teach us to contemplate the mystery of Your glory. Grant that we may accept Your gifts with humility and respect each person’s dignity. May Your Holy Spirit strengthen us for the spiritual battles which lie ahead, so that united in Christ we may reign with Him in glory. Grant this through Him who humbled Himself and was exalted, who lives with You and the Holy Spirit, forever and ever. Amen.” Today is also the birthday of our former friend Tim; he has, unfortunately, alienated everyone in town (to the point that he was pointedly not invited to the wedding of our son) (1956).
Not surprisingly after our long day yesterday (even though I did take a four-hour nap between 1:00 am and 11:00 pm), I did not wake up until 10:30 am today. My first order of business was to read the morning paper; I was surprised to see that our LSU Women’s Basketball team beat East Tennessee State 71 – 68 in overtime, as the last text alert from ESPN that I got last night told me that our Lady Tigers had lost the game. I then got online, did my Trivia games, printed out the 2011 application from my National Parks Travelers Club to apply for the appropriate certificate for all the parks I visited (and got stamps for) in 2011 (I have to submit my application by February 29), did my Devotional Reading and said the First Day of my Novena to St. Blaise, and addressed and mailed birthday cards out to Callie’s mother Lisa here in town and to my friend Linda in West Virginia.
At 1:15 pm I headed out into town; my first stop was at the thrift store, where I left off a Hefty bag of jeans and jeans shorts. After I got my Powerball and Louisiana Lotto lottery tickets for tonight’s drawing at the Hit-n-Run convenience store, I ate lunch and read at McDonald’s. I then went to Wal-Mart, where I got the stuff that Richard had put on a store list for me. I got home a little after 2:30 pm, did a couple of Advance Daily Update Drafts through next Thursday, then occupied myself with reading until I had finished By the Sword: A History of Gladiators, Musketeers, Samurai, Swashbucklers, and Olympic Champions by Richard Cohen. After Richard and I watched Jeopardy! I did my book review for this weblog and for my Goodreads and Facebook accounts for By the Sword: A History of Gladiators, Musketeers, Samurai, Swashbucklers, and Olympic Champions by Richard Cohen. I then started reading Just My Type: A Book About Fonts by Simon Garfield and fixed myself some toast, while a very large and nasty thunderstorm system started to move slowly through our area. Blackjack had come in earlier; when the lightening and thunder started she insisted on going outside and immediately went under the house. I then got on the computer to work on today’s Daily Update (saving every few minutes, as the storms are still coming through), and I printed out a claims form for our medical plan flexible spending account. As the storms seem to be abating, I think it’s safe for me to take a bath and to start reading The Book: A History of The Bible by Christopher de Hamel, and then to read some stories in The Complete Short Stories of Mark Twain Edited by Charles Neider before I go to sleep.
Tomorrow I will try to get up relatively early to do my laundry; I will also at some point during the day get my salad supplies and make lunch salads for the early park of my upcoming work week.
Today’s Parting Quote comes to us from Philip Johnson, American architect. Born in 1906 in Cleveland, Ohio, he studied at Harvard University as an undergraduate, where he focused on history and philosophy, particularly the work of the Pre-Socratic philosophers. Johnson interrupted his education with several extended trips to Europe; these trips became the pivotal moment of his education, as he visited Chartres, the Parthenon, and many other ancient monuments, becoming increasingly fascinated with architecture. In 1928 Johnson met with architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who was at the time designing the German Pavilion for the Barcelona exhibition of 1929. The meeting was a revelation for Johnson and formed the basis for a lifelong relationship of both collaboration and competition. He returned from Germany as a proselytizer for the new architecture. Touring Europe more comprehensively with his friends Alfred H. Barr, Jr. and Henry-Russell Hitchcock to examine firsthand recent trends in architecture, the three assembled their discoveries as the landmark show “The International Style: Architecture Since 1922″ at the Museum of Modern Art, in 1932. The show was profoundly influential and is seen as the introduction of modern architecture to the American public. It introduced such pivotal architects as Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, and Mies van der Rohe. The exhibition was also notable for a controversy: architect Frank Lloyd Wright withdrew his entries in pique that he was not more prominently featured. Johnson continued to work as a proponent of modern architecture, using the Museum of Modern Art as a bully pulpit. He arranged for Le Corbusier’s first visit to the United States in 1935, then worked to bring Mies and Marcel Breuer to the US as emigres. During the Great Depression he resigned his post at MoMA to try his hand at journalism and agrarian populist politics. His enthusiasm centered on the critique of the liberal welfare state, whose “failure” seemed to be much in evidence during the 1930s. As a correspondent Johnson observed the Nuremberg Rallies in Germany and covered the invasion of Poland in 1939. The invasion proved the breaking point in Johnson’s interest in journalism or politics, as he returned to enlist in the US Army. After a couple of self-admittedly undistinguished years in uniform, he returned to the Harvard Graduate School of Design to finally pursue his ultimate career of architect. Johnson’s early influence as a practicing architect was his use of glass; his masterpiece was the Glass House (1949) he designed as his own residence in New Canaan, Connecticut, a profoundly influential work. The building is an essay in minimal structure, geometry, proportion, and the effects of transparency and reflection. After completing several houses in the idiom of Mies and Breuer, he joined Mies van der Rohe as the New York associate architect for the 39-story Seagram Building (1956). Johnson was pivotal in steering the commission towards Mies, working with Phyllis Lambert, the daughter of the CEO of Seagram. This collaboration of architects and client resulted in the bronze-and-glass tower on Park Avenue. Completing the Seagram Building with Mies also decisively marked a shift in his career. After this accomplishment, Johnson’s practice enlarged as projects came in from the public realm—such as coordinating the master plan of Lincoln Center and designing that complex’s New York State Theater. Meanwhile, Johnson began to grow bored with the orthodoxies of the International Style he had championed; although startling when constructed, the glass and steel tower (indeed many idioms of the modern movement) had by the 1960s become commonplace the world over. He eventually rejected much of the metallic appearance of earlier International Style buildings, and began designing spectacular, crystalline structures uniformly sheathed in glass. From 1967 to 1991 Johnson collaborated with John Burgee. This was by far his most productive period — certainly by the measure of scale — he became known at this time as builder of iconic office towers, including Minneapolis’s IDS Tower. That building’s distinctive stepbacks (called “zogs” by the architect) created an appearance that has since become one of Minneapolis’s trademarks and the crown jewel of its skyline. In 1980, the Crystal Cathedral was completed for Rev. Robert A. Schuller’s famed megachurch, which became a Southern California landmark. The AT&T Building in Manhattan, now the Sony Building, was completed in 1984 and was immediately controversial for its neo-Georgian pediment (Chippendale top). At the time, it was seen as provocation on a grand scale: crowning a Manhattan skyscraper with a shape echoing a historical wardrobe top defied every precept of the modernist aesthetic: historical pattern had been effectively outlawed among architects for years. In retrospect other critics have seen the AT&T Building as the first Postmodernist statement, necessary in the context of modernism’s aesthetic cul-de-sac. In 1987, Johnson was awarded an honorary doctoral degree from the University of Houston (died 2005): “All architecture is shelter, all great architecture is the design of space that contains, cuddles, exalts, or stimulates the persons in that space.”
