The July-August issue of the Polish language magazine Polski Partner is available for free, on-line. Click on the “Free Online” button in the upper right hand corner of their website. Archive issues are also available. The magazine covers news from Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York, and features articles on everything from fitness to history to cooking. Enjoy!
Cogo News is a new online news and commentary service covering Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) in the English language. Cogo provides short, succinct articles reviewing the key editorial, commentary and opinion pieces in major regional news outlets. Beyond news coverage, Cogo encourages dialogue and creative writing in and about CEE. Cogo encourages contributions of articles, analyses, short stories, photos, poems, comments, and essays.
See the Cogo article Fry reads Miłosz
Stephen Fry narrates a free new audiobook celebrating the extraordinary work of the legendary Polish poet Czesław Miłosz. Available with the Times Literary Supplement on 12th August 2011, and free streaming available online here and here.
Celebrating the life and works of one of Poland’s foremost literary icons, Stephen Fry narrates a new audiobook of selected poems by Miłosz, marking the centenary of his birth.
Stephen Fry commented on his involvement in the project: “It gave me enormous pleasure to read these poems, which I count as amongst the best written in any language since the war. It would give me even more pleasure if I thought that this recording might bring Miłosz and his dazzling mixture of honesty, insight and pure poetic instinct to a wider, English-speaking readership…”
PreachingToday has launched a new website to inspire sermon preparation. PreachingToday is a web ministry of Christianity Today International. This new website has been designed to give preachers more tools to inspire their creativity and improve their sermon preparation. As you know, sermn preparation is vital in the PNCC since the hearing of, and teaching on the Word of God is a sacrament.
The new PreachingToday site includes better search features that help preachers sort and filter thousands of top-quality illustrations, sermons, and ideas faster and more effectively.
Brian Larson, editor of PreachingToday, says: “Our purpose as a website is to inspire preachers and our redesign enables us to accomplish that goal better than before. Our illustrations are fresh and drawn primarily from contemporary culture, and our articles will inspire our readers to be better preachers.”
Proper preparation takes up many hours of most pastors’ weeks. Because of the sacramental nature of preaching in the PNCC, pastors must be well prepared and preach at a very high level every week, offering engaging messages that will direct their congregation to draw closer to God.
PreachingToday is a subscription resource. Pastors can join for free for 30 days.
…and some humor
On the issue preaching, a friend sent this to me:
My pastor friend told me his church installed sanitary, hot-air hand dryers in the rest rooms. After about two weeks, I dropped by to see him and noticed workmen taking them out.
I asked him why. The pastor confessed that they worked fine but said when he went in the men’s room after the previous Sunday’s service, he found a scribbled note above one of the hand dryers that read, “For a sample of this week’s sermon, push button.”
Not surprisingly, the dryers were out, paper towel dispensers were back in.
I have always found the Young Fogey’s posts that refer to “scarring Protestants” enjoyable (ok, downright funny – see here and here for examples). In tribute, I found a couple that will scare both Roman Catholics and Protestants:
From Fr. Calvo at Holy Name Parish in Deerfield, MA for those fearful of “schismatics” who promote old guys in aprons
From the Buffalo News in Where relics of saints abound for those fearful of Catholic devotion and the bones and clothes of the saints:
In the evenings, when the Seneca Niagara Casino’s neon sign seems to pour like a waterfall and cars line up by the front-door valet, the stone church next door attracts its own admirers with its lighted spires and large, sparkling display of bone chips from old saints.
One night last week — before today’s Catholic All Saints Day — a parishioner sat in the pew near the relics to explain why he comes alone to pray when he feels aggravated by people in his life. Here in the quiet it is nice to feel close to St. Francis of Assisi, the saint known for relationship struggles with his father.
“It’s an outlet,” said Chuck Vacanti, with matter-of-fact cheer.
The cache of 1,144 religious relics — mostly mounted and framed bone fragments the size of pencil tips, or threads from saints’ clothes — is one of the largest in the United States, according to the Rev. Michael Burzynski, who has collected them since he was a young man in graduate school. In the decade he has led St. Mary of the Cataract, they have added intrigue — and maybe luck to the 1847 church with its unusual juxtaposition to the nearby casino…
Check out this YouTube page for a whole bunch of CONVO 2010 videos, including this most excellent, Be a Priest in the PNCC video. The video was shot at the closing beach party and bonfire.
Thanks to my sister for sending me these…
Found this at Interia:
The “short monk” at about 1:10 to 1:12 is a hoot.
It’s different if you marry a Polish girl
The first man married a woman from ENGLAND. He told her that she was to do the dishes and house cleaning. It took a couple of days, but on the third day, he came home to see a clean house and dishes washed and put away.
The second man married a woman from GERMANY. He gave his wife orders that she was to do all the cleaning, dishes and the cooking. The first day he didn’t see any results, but the next day he saw it was better. By the third day, he saw his house was clean, the dishes were done and there was a huge dinner on the table.
The third man married a girl from POLAND. He ordered her to keep the house cleaned, dishes washed, lawn mowed, laundry washed, and hot meals on the table for every meal. He said the first day he didn’t see anything, the second day he didn’t see anything but, by the third day, some of the swelling had gone down and he could see a little out of his left eye, and his arm was healed enough that he could fix himself a sandwich and load the dishwasher. He still has some difficulty peeing.
Two priests died at the same time and met Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates. St. Peter said, “I’d like to get you guys in now, but our computer is down. You’ll have to go back to Earth for about a week, but you can’t go back as priests. So what else would you like to be?”
The first priest says, “I’ve always wanted to be an eagle, soaring above the Rocky Mountains..”
“So be it,” says St. Peter, and off flies the first priest.
The second priest mulls this over for a moment and asks, “Will any of this week ‘count,’ St. Peter?”
“No, I told you the computer’s down. There’s no way we can keep track of what you’re doing.”
“In that case,” says the second priest, “I’ve always wanted to be a stud.”
“So be it,” says St. Peter, and the second priest disappears.
A week goes by, the computer is fixed, and the Lord tells St. Peter to recall the two priests. “Will you have any trouble locating them?” He asks.
“The first one should be easy,” says St. Peter. “He’s somewhere over the Rockies, flying with the eagles.
But the second one could prove to be more difficult.”
“Why?” asketh the Lord.
“He’s on a snow tire, somewhere in BUFFALO..
From the BBC: English lessons for ‘Polish’ dog
A dog caused confusion in an animal home when he failed to respond to basic commands – until staff realised he could only understand Polish.
Staff at the RSPCA centre in Oldham, Greater Manchester, originally thought Cent the collie was deaf.
But when they looked into his history they realised he came from a Polish family and so did not “speak” English.
So staff brushed up on Polish commands and, four months on, they say Cent is now bilingual and ready for a new home.
“When he came in he wasn’t responding to the basic commands,” said care assistant Karen Heath.
“We couldn’t understand why at first but when we’ve looked at his records and his history he has come from a Polish family.
“So obviously we’ve gathered from that he doesn’t understand the English language, so therefore he won’t understand our basic commands.”
Staff turned to the internet for phrases Cent could recognise – although they are unsure of the pronunciation…
A consequence of the massive Polish emigration to England which is now returning to Poland due to better economic conditions back home.