The "Gospel" of Fairy Tales

My husband and I went to the opera last Sunday -- not a complicated opera, but a simple opera. We saw Hansel and Gretel in the English version at Shenandoah Conservatory. What a delight! And, as I watched, I thought how right G.K. Chesterton was in his essay on Fairyland where he describes the mistaken notion of poets to think the fairies operate with a freedom that is really license to do exactly as they please. Chesterton vehemently disagrees:

I think the poets have made a mistake: because the world of the fairy-tales is a brighter and more varied world than ours, they have fancied it less moral; really it is brighter and more varied because it is more moral.

Reading Fiction Broadens Our Experience of Life!

I have a friend who says she never reads fiction. She considers it a waste of time. That's unfathomable to me! My response is to recall a fictional conversation between Anne Shirley and Marilla in the novel Anne of Green Gables beautifully depicted in the movie where Anne is played by Megan Follows and Marilla by Colleen Dewhurst. Anne asks Marilla if she can call her Aunt Marilla. Marilla says no, just call her Marilla since she doesn't believe in people using names that are not their own. "You could imagine you're my aunt," Ann suggests. Marilla replies, "No I could not." "Don't you ever imagine things differently from what they are?" Ann asks. "No!" is Marilla's short reply. With a sigh and a little headshake Ann takes Marilla's hand lamenting, "Oh Marilla, how much you miss." 

"Have Courage and Be Kind!"

"Where there is kindness there is goodness and where there is goodness there is magic!" And this film is filled with goodness and magic. 

Christmas week is a time to focus on all things good and kind, bright and beautiful. I've been wanting to watch Cinderella again for a long time - not the animated version or the weird 2021 abomination. (I've only seen the trailer and that was more than enough!) No, I'm talking about the absolutely breathtaking and beautiful 2015 Cinderella directed by Kenneth Branagh who proved himself as more than an actor.

Sunday Meditation: On Living in a Mad, Mad World that Desperately Needs the Truth!

Catch sinners with the golden goose of truth.

For behold, the days shall come, wherein they will say: Blessed are the barren, and the 
wombs that have not borne, and the paps that have not given suck. [Luke 23:29]

Well....I'm back from retreat, back to the real world that has become an exaggerated version of the Twilight Zone.

I could say I'm back to the real bizzaro world where Bruce Jenner wants to adopt a baby so he can pretend to be a mommy and women who can be mommies are getting sterilized because they're mad about Roe v. Wade being overturned. It's a head shaker, but on the bright side, a sterilized liberal won't scandalize a poor, innocent child.

Some grammarian will no doubt tell me I'm wrong to use the word "mad" and say the women are "angry." But I use that word "mad" very deliberately. We are living in a mad, i.e. insane, world. 

A Lenten Thought for Saturday from the Gospel of St. John and Fairy Tales

I'm reading the gospels during Lent in no particular order. I started with Luke and began St. John yesterday. Actually, St. John is always a good gospel to start with since, like any good book, his opening sentence reads, "In the beginning...." That reminds me of fairy tales. You know, "Once upon a time...." Since fairy tales present moral truths in an endearing way, I can readily see them as companions to the gospels, especially when you are teaching moral truths to children.

The kind sister shared her lunch with an old woman in the forest.

"Have Courage and Be Kind."

“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.”   Albert Einstein

There is a wonderful review of Cinderella at The Catholic Thing. I'm eager to see it and take along several grandchildren as well. In a collapsing world, it is lovely to think of a film that, according to critic Daniel McInerny, defends what is good and beautiful and looks to be fun as well:

The Wonder of Fairy Tales: Read Them to Your Children

I'm thinking about fairy tales this morning because of a novel I'm reading by an author recommended in Fr. John Hardon's Catholic Lifetime Reading Plan. The heroine is called Beauty and the story reminds me somewhat of Beauty and the Beast since there is a beastly man in it.

But I digress. Have you ever noticed how moral fairy tales are?