Category: Spirituality
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A German/Danish Film – “The Land of Mine” – Proves Great Movies Are Still Being Made
Deal W. Hudson March 6, 2017 I grow weary of hearing people say, “They don’t make good movies anymore.” Good, even great, films are released each year, but are shown in only a few movie theaters in the US. Those who complain must be paying attention only to what’s showing at the local cinema. There’s…
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A Son’s Love for His Mother Becomes a Musical Masterpiece
Deal W. Hudson May 8, 2017 Some years ago, while visiting Los Angeles, I met a charming young man named Stephen Edwards. He told me he was a composer, and given our common love of music, and golf, we stayed in touch. As the years passed, I watched as Steve became one of Hollywood’s highly prized…
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The Whitman Option: “Bathe me O God in thee”
Deal W. Hudson May 14, 2017 Over thirty years ago, I left the Southern Baptists and was confirmed as a Roman Catholic. There were many reasons for my conversion but among the most important was their suspicion and fear of culture. I was taught God spoke only through the “Bible,” properly interpreted of course, and…
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The Loneliness of Lincoln and Trump
Deal W. Hudson January 12, 2018 Ken Burn’s documentary masterpiece, “The Civil War,” premiered in September 1990. Its depiction of the isolation of Abraham Lincoln is strikingly similar to that of President Trump. As hauntingly narrated by David McCullough, Burn’s “Civil War” traces the rise of Lincoln from his 1847 election to Congress to his…
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A Novel About Giving the Gift of Music
Deal W. Hudson January 14, 2018 There’s a new and delightful novel, The Music Shop by Rachel Joyce, which I’m kicking myself for not having written first. The setting is a music shop whose owner, Frank, refuses to sell anything but vinyl LPs in the face of the Compact Disc whose introduction in the mid-80s quickly shrank…
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The Simple Reason Why We Should Hope Hell Exists
Deal W. Hudson March 31, 2018 You’ve heard that Pope Francis may not believe in the existence of Hell, but all Catholics should hope he is wrong. Why? The simple reason is this: Take away Hell, and you have taken away human freedom, dignity, and the imago Dei (Genesis 1.27). It’s relatively simple, also, to understand why…
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A Baptist Minister Becomes Catholic
This is my appearance on “The Journey Home,” an EWTN program hosted by Marcus Grodi, a marvelous fellow, by the way. The description of my appearance on the network website was as follows: As a child, Deal attended a Presbyterian Church at his mother’s promptings. In high school, after being witnessed to by a Southern…
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The Exorcist Author Learns Death Is a Lie
Published April 29, 2015 at The Christian Review A Book Review: William Peter Blatty, Finding Peter: A True Story of the Hand of Providence and Evidence of Life after Death Regnery Publishing, March 30, 2015 256 pages, $27.99 Honesty is rare, and when it’s found in a book such as this the effect is quite…
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Et in Jesum Christum: A Memoir by Julian Green
Editor’s note: In 1995 I wrote to Julian Green in Paris. Green was 95 years old and was considered, and still is, one the greatest French writers of the modern age. His many novels, memoirs, dairies, and books of reflection on saints and cities kept him in the public eye from his first novel at…
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Reading Myself Into the Church
Deal W. Hudson Reading, said Saint Josemaría Escrivá, has made many a saint. In my own case it has merely made a convert, but has led me more deeply into the mystery that is the Church. Thomas Merton, we recall from his autobiography, Seven Storey Mountain, was started on his road to the Church by…
Deal W. Hudson 