May 4th, 2006
I came across a BoingBoing post about the so-called Devil’s Interval, a musical form suppressed by the Church in the Middle Ages.
The post also talks about a new heavy metal documentary which ties the Devil’s Interval, a specific kind of musical interval that spans three whole tones, with the history of heavy metal.
See the BBC’s report called The Devil’s Music (with mp3 examples), and if it floats your boat, the metal history site (with documentary trailer) “Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey”.
Oh, and for the record, I’m pretty sure Xeni was just joking when she said, “When you play Wagner backwards, it goes, ‘I LOVE SATAN’”. But nevertheless if that’s what you want to hear…
Posted in catholic, music | 2 Comments »
September 16th, 2005
I don’t think there are satanic messages in Rock music but apparently the Catholic Church officially does. Vatican’s Rome university, the Athenaeum Pontificium Regina Apostolorum is now offering exorcism training.
The 10-week course includes sessions in exorcism rites, how to talk to the Devil, the tricks he uses to fight back and signs of the occult hidden in rock music and video games.
Video games too? I need to expand my website.
Update: Plastic has an interesting writeup on this article.
Posted in backmasking, catholic | No Comments »
April 5th, 2004
What a movie! Magdalene Sisters takes place in the 1960’s in Ireland. It’s about the Catholic practice of taking unwedded women who were accused of being sexual active in some way or other and placing them in a kind of laundry slave labour camp. Based on a true story, the last of these asylums was finally shut down in 1996.
The IMDB description:
Ireland in the sixties: Four women are given into the custody of the magdalene sisterhoood asylum to correct their more or less sinful behavior: Crispina and Rose have given birth to a pre-marriage child, Margaret got raped by her cousin and the orphan Bernadette had been repeatedly caught flirting with the boys. All have to work in a laundry under the strict supervision of the nuns, who break their wills through sadistic punishments. Some of the inmates develop countermeasures, while others perish under the treatment.
This is one of those movies that you hate to watch because it’s such a miserble fate that has befallen these women. It was a huge relief to see (and while not wanting to ruin the show for you I think it’s worth saying) that in the end at least 3 out of the 4 main characters make it out of that place and return to living a somewhat normal life. Very intense show not one that I would recommend to most people, but it’s definitely a good independant/Irish production.
Posted in catholic, movie, review | No Comments »
February 14th, 2004
Valentine’s Day, it turns out, was not invented by Hallmark to sell cards. It is named for one of three saints recognized by the Catholic Church, and the reasons he is attached to the concept of romance are somewhat murky. Nonetheless, he was one of the more popular saints in Europe during the Middle Ages.
Now I’m off to see my Valentine, Anna-Maria, in Edmonton.
I probably won’t post again until after reading week (9 days from today).
Posted in catholic, holidays | No Comments »
