thoughtsignals

Yesterday my copy of Justin Catanoso’s “My Cousin the Saint: A Search for Faith, Family and Miracles” arrived from Amazon. Normally, this is not the kind of book I would read. I happily left the Catholic Church a long time ago. But Justin is a former editor of mine, and I’ve read many of his previous pieces on his cousin, and more importantly heard stories first hand about the Saint and about how he wrote the book. I’ve only had time to read the very beginning, a miracle story that opens the book, but I found myself touched by the story and the writing.

Jeri Rowe has a piece about a Greensboro writer still going strong at 92 — that is something to aspire to.

Link.

Arthur C. Clarke, prolific writer, scuba diver, space enthusiast and inventor of the communications satellite, has died in Sri Lanka at the age of 90.

Link.

Madeleine L’Engle is dead. Another great one passes.

Link.

Here’s something different. Hustler publisher Larry Flynt has published a rememberance of Jerry Falwell in the L.A. Times:

It was the first time since the infamous 1988 trial that the reverend and I had been in the same room together, and the thought of even breathing the same air with him made me sick. I disagreed with Falwell (who died last week) on absolutely everything he preached, and he looked at me as symbolic of all the social ills that a society can possibly have. But I’d do anything to sell the book and the film, and Falwell would do anything to preach, so King’s audience of 8 million viewers was all the incentive either of us needed to bring us together.

Link.

That’s what Christopher Hitchens says in an interview with New York magazine:

I know something which is known to few but is not a secret. Karl Rove is not a believer, and he doesn’t shout it from the rooftops, but when asked, he answers quite honestly. I think the way he puts it is, “I’m not fortunate enough to be a person of faith.”

Assuming it’s true … I never would have guessed that.

Link.

G.D. Gearino, a columnist and longtime N&Oer is leaving that newspaper for self-employment. Newspapering is best left for younger folks, he says, and newspapering is getting tougher.

For a long time, newspaper owners had a sweet gig: Money rolled in and their papers had a voice-of-God authority. These days, the money is harder to come by, and that authority is under siege. I still believe newspapers are important, but the job of adapting to the new information age needs to be done by people wiser than I.

So he’s freelancing, apparently, working on another novel and writing a daily online column here.