“The Latin Mass is so pure, it’s so reverent, I just feel more spiritual when I worship this way,” said Drew Sill, 30. “And I like the fact that the Latin Mass is the same in every culture in the world. It brings us all together in community.”

Awesome Drew, just awesome!

Technorati Tags: Catholic, Latin, Memphis

Original content Copyright 2007 Marc Smith
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Police say King George, a 150-pound Great Dane, accidentally knocked a .22-caliber pistol off his owner’s end table around 2:30 a.m. Wednesday. The gun went off, hitting his 21-year-old owner in the back, MyFOXMemphis.com reports.

OK…Reality just warped into something I can’t begin to describe.

Not only that, but Frayser has a Wikipedia entry.

Technorati Tags: Memphis, news, dog, redneck

Original content Copyright 2007 Marc Smith
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The Antenna Club’s fan page can be found here.

To put the description in basic terms, the Antenna Club was a live alternative music venue. I know I saw many more infamous than this, but the shows for All (which was a band that picked up the pieces after Milo left The Decendents) and Pigface are the ones I remember most. I also remember an all local band show on Halloween of 1987. Sobering Consequences headlined.

To be honest, the place was a dump. The restroom, aside form being alive stunk up the whole place. But it was “our” dump. Plus we had the Piggly Wiggly parking lot next door that we could “hang out in” when there wasn’t a show. There was also a wall on one side of a parking lot down the street that would always get graffitied. It was a cool place. Of all the similar venue clubs I’d been to in my youth in other cities, “home” was the best. Nobody had anything as cool as the Antenna.

The Mall Of Memphis fan page can be found here

Really I started hanging out at the MOM (Mall of Memphis) well before I started high school classes. We moved into a house just around the corner when I was seven or eight. We moved away when I was fourteen. It was close enough to ride our bikes. I spent many weekends and summer times there.

I didn’t really spend much high school time there. I do remember this one time. A group of had ridden up there with my friend Mike Blumenthal in his car. Well, somehow someone lifted his keys from him and drove the car around to the other side of the mall without him noticing. It was so funny because at first he was freaked out, but then he got a little excited at the fact that he might be getting new car. His car was a piece of junk Chevy Caprice. It was in really bad shape. He was actually disappointed when they guided him around to where they had moved the car. I was of course not in on it. I was with Mike the whole time, so they didn’t have a chance to let me in on the joke. So in a way the joke was kind of on me as well. I seem to recall be a little put out by the experience. I had to get up early in the morning or something. Looking back on it though, it as pretty funny.

So if you have memories of the Antenna Club or the Mall of Memphis, leave them in the comments. I’d love to hear from you!

Technorati Tags: 80′s, eighties, malls, Memphis, punk, web

You can go to this Flickr page to see the whole thing. No photoshop type stuff is gong on here either. It is pure MAC OS X screen capture.

It also makes me wonder why since it is coming from Kentucky and is already in Memphis (not to mention the fact that it can time travel), why should I not expect it for five more days. HUMPH!

Technorati Tags: humor, amazon

Police say it was tip that led them to a car that may have been used in the burglary of the Catholic Center the weekend before last. Police charged Jacques Mosby, 30, and Theresa Simmons, 34, with nine counts of burglary and one count of theft over $10,000.

Good to see this kind of thing have closure. I sincerely hop the bet for the thieves. Remember that it was a thief who Christ said to, “Truly I say to you today you will be with me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:43)

Please pray for a softening of the heart of these three criminals. That they may accept Christ.

Technorati Tags: Catholic, christian, Memphis, news

Eternal rest grant unto them O Lord,
And let perpetual Light shine upon them.
May their souls
And the souls of all the faithful departed
Through the mercy of God
Rest in peace.
Amen.

Technorati Tags: catholic, memphis

In addition, the intruders desecrated the Blessed Sacrament, which Catholics believe is the body and blood of Jesus. It is kept locked in a small chapel at the center and once profaned, according to church law, the chapel must be reconsecrated before being used again.

As the paper says, we believe that Christ is truly present in the Eucharist. The Catechism of the Catholic Church put it beautifully int he following from paragraph 1375:

It is by the conversion of the bread and wine into Christ’s body and blood that Christ becomes present in this sacrament. The Church Fathers strongly affirmed the faith of the Church in the efficacy of the Word of Christ and of the action of the Holy Spirit to bring about this conversion. Thus St. John Chrysostom declares:

It is not man that causes the things offered to become the Body and Blood of Christ, but he who was crucified for us, Christ himself. The priest, in the role of Christ, pronounces these words, but their power and grace are God’s. This is my body, he says. This word transforms the things offered.

And St. Ambrose says about this conversion:

Be convinced that this is not what nature has formed, but what the blessing has consecrated. The power of the blessing prevails over that of nature, because by the blessing nature itself is changed. . . . Could not Christ’s word, which can make from nothing what did not exist, change existing things into what they were not before? It is no less a feat to give things their original nature than to change their nature.

I would ask everyone to pray for the perpetrators, that they have a conversion of heart and genuinely repent their actions.

Technorati Tags: Catholic, Memphis, news

Eternal rest grant unto them O Lord,
And let perpetual Light shine upon them.
May their souls
And the souls of all the faithful departed
Through the mercy of God
Rest in peace.
Amen.

Technorati Tags: memphis, prayer request

Here the history of Memphis is presented. From the Chickasaw to the great New Madrid earthquake of 1811 on to the land’s purchase by John Overton and Andrew Jackson, followed by incorporation and Civil War occupation. Picking up with the yellow fever followed by the surrender of the city charter and the tenure of the former city as a taxing district of Shelby County and the state of Tennessee. We continue Memphis history into the days of Crump and the progressive era when the city would be made to conform to order. Memphis history is rich with time, music and commerce. From the blues of Beale Street to Elvis Presley and Sun Records the City of Memphis been enriched by transporation, cotton, mules and hardware; bridge openings to celebrate and the sorrows of the 1968 Sanitation Strike which culminated in the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Memphis has persevered through pain and has been anything but dull. This is our story…

Technorati Tags: history, memphis, interesting, web

For instance, I had never heard about the Murder of Barbara Jean Smith. Also, I have always heard the name E.H. Crump, but I didn’t really know much about him until reading his story on this site. Go see what you can find….

Memphishistory.com

“The American Plague: The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, the Epidemic that Shaped Our History” (Molly Caldwell Crosby)

“Historic Photos of Memphis” (Gina Cordell, Patrick O’daniel)

In my highschool days and quite a few of the years that followed, I was a part of the “punk rock” scene back in Memphis. This mostly involved going to shows at the Antenna club and trying real hard to look just like everyone else who was trying real hard not to look like anyone else, or something like that.

Sometime in 1992 Channel 5 News in Memphis did a special on the youth sub culture in Memphis. Well, it looks like someone took that and put it on Google Video. Here it is. See Joe Birch do the intros and Greeley Kyle do the story. I actually knew a lot of the these people. I wonder what happened to some of them, others I have a pretty good idea.
-6379917167248484605

Hat tip to Rachel And The City for first posting it.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Isn’t she beautiful.  Samantha is the daughter of Corrie and Brad.  Viki, who is Corrie’s mother is also my cousin.  I want to extend my congrats to Corrie, Brad and Viki on wonderful event.  My eyes are wet.  My Heart is warm.  I love you all!

Dad with the new baby girl.

Go read the whole amazing story at Kathy’s blog.

I can say I don’t remember having any trouble like with the Union Planters website….

On March 6, Professor June Entman warned her first-year law students by e-mail to bring pens and paper to take notes in class.

“My main concern was they were focusing on trying to transcribe every word that was I saying, rather than thinking and analyzing,” Entman said Monday. “The computers interfere with making eye contact. You’ve got this picket fence between you and the students.”

I tend to agree. When typing, your focus is on what you’re typing. When taking handwritten notes, your focus is still on what you are taking notes on. It makes perfect sense to me. Besides, doing a simple Google search for “laptop courtroom” will find plenty of articles where judges have banned laptops in their courtrooms. I can also that criminal courthouses might ban laptops for perfectly legitimate security concerns. How would these lawyers handle a criminal case if they weren’t able to use their laptop in the courthouse?

“If we continue without laptops, I’m out of here. I’m gone; I won’t be able to keep up,” said student Cory Winsett, who said his hand-written notes are incomplete and less organized.

Well, I don’t have any cookies to give you Mr. Winsett, perhaps you should get out and go into a different line off work that doesn’t require the use of a ball point pen.

At least these law students weren’t dumb enough to try to “Whoop that trick” though…..

[USATODAY.com - Law professor bans laptops in class, over student protest]

Hat tip to:
[moleskinerie: Law professor bans laptops in class]
For the heads up….

Last night, the bishop announced that in addition to yesterday being the 35th anniversary of our diocese, it was also the 39th anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood, but that wasn’t the big news.

The big news was not just one announcement, but three:

1. The Jubilee Schools endowment had reached $44 million. With the interest earned on the endowment, they will be able to meet the budgetary requirements of the Jubilee schools indefinitely. The Catholic Diocese of Memphis’ urban schools will be able to change the culture of our city for a long time to come.

2. Memphis Catholic High School (my alma mater, class of 1984), will be renovated from top to bottom. I don’t know what that means or how much money is involved, but I say “Thank you, Jesus!” The school building itself is very much in need of an overhaul. Also as regards Memphis Catholic High School, the bishop announced that the school has entered into work/study partnerships with some 25 corporations around town, allowing students to earn valuable job experience, increasing the impact our Catholic schools will have on the culture of our city’s center.

3. Finally, the bishop announced that a new Jubilee school will be built. The land has not been purchased yet, but the school will be located at Resurrection Church in the Hickory Hill area of Memphis.

All of these announcements met with great approval from the people who had joined the bishop at the cathedral for evening prayer last night. Cool stuff, right?

This is really great news. The new Jubilee school are doing a great service for the city as a whole. It’s one of the wonderful things about Memphis (I hope me talking good about Memphis doesn’t shock anyone). For those of you that don’t know, the Jubilee schools are parish schools that have long been closed. Most of them are in poor neighborhoods that have a dwindling Catholic population. Now, I don’t know for sure where the money came from, but the Diocese received money that was earmarked specifically for re-opening some/all of the parish schools in memphis that had been closed. Now it looks like the endowment has reached a point where it’s self sustaining. If I am reading this correctly, the money for these schools is at a point where the schools are actually run using the interest from the money. That means they should be able to stay open indefinitely, assume there are not any economic disasters in the future. I am very happy to hear this news as I graduated from one of these schools that has been reopened. That parish is where i converted to the Church in 1981. I graduated from the 8th grad there in 1984. I’m glad to know that it’s back open and providing a valuable service to the whole community. Note that the children attending these schools are for the most part not Catholic. They are local kids who would otherwise not be able to afford anything more than a public education from the Memphis City Schools.

The news about Catholic High is also wonderful news. I know it was in need of refurbishment. It was probably in need of it way back in ’84 when Dennis graduated, so it’s good that it’s being done.

I’d like to congratulate the Diocese of Memphis and Bishop Steib for this great accomplishment. It’s really a wonderful thing that the Catholic Schools are doing in Memphis.

[vita mea: Announcement from the Bishop]

Technorati Tags:
Catholic,
news,
Memphis

NASHVILLE, Tenn. Nashville could end up with 100 homicides in 2005 — nearly double the previous year’s mark and one of the city’s deadliest years on record.
The total will reach 100 if police determine a woman whose body was found burned under a pile of debris Tuesday was a homicide victim.

That would make last year the third deadliest since countywide record keeping began in 1963 and approaches the record high of 112 in 1997.

In 2004, 58 homicides were recorded.

The homicide total excludes justifiable homicide or killings that were ruled self-defense.

One of the reasons I moved from Memphis to Nashville is the crime. I shouldn’t have to explain that. But for the uninitiated, Memphis has a bad crime problem. I don’t say that after looking at numbers or anything. I say that after living there. Nashville on the other hand seem to be much better, if we could only keep the politicians from Memphis out of the city.

I swear though. I did not bring it with me….

I also wonder about this anyway. Why is it being reported on the website for a TV station in Memphis?

[WREG-TV Memphis - Nashville homicides spike in 2005]

Technorati Tags:
news,
Nashville,
Memphis