Geeky Catholic Dad

WARNING: Do not read this post until after you have seen Star Wars: The Last Jedi . If you haven't seen it, go away and come back later. Okay, have you seen it yet? Good. I know when you walked out of the theater you had one burning question: "What did Matt think?" Well, I'm glad you asked.

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/ wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/74/ Bartolomé_Esteban_Perez_ Murillo_003.jpg/240px- Bartolomé_Esteban_Perez_ Murillo_003.jpg Don't you just hate it when people condescend to you? What if I told you that sometimes, it's okay to be condescending? And that God Himself condescends to us?

After telling you all about my explosive accident last month , I'd like to update everyone on the status of my recovery. I'm pleased to report that after three and a half weeks of being cooped up at home, with twice-daily bandage changes, I was cleared to return to work earlier this week.

This is the story of how I was hit by an explosion, and came out of it alive, with nothing more than some second degree burns.

No real relationship or marriage looks like Buttercup's and Westley's, right? Do fairy tale love stories give us unrealistic expectations? Or can we take a different sort of lesson from these depictions of love? I wrote a post last week - Have Fun Storming the Castle - about how the storytelling in The Princess Bride as a whole can shed some light on life and the afterlife. This week, I'd like to focus more specifically on Buttercup and Westley. Marriage "Mawwiage is what bwings us togevah today." Throughout the Bible, the relationship between a husband and wife is often used as a symbol - or "type" - of God's relationship with His people, and Christ's relationship with His Church. (Engraved on the inside of my wedding ring is the abbreviation "EPH 5:25," to remind me of the Bible verse from Paul's letter to the Ephesians: "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.") Ever s...

Stories with happy endings aren't realistic. The real world doesn't work that way. So what value can a fairy tale like The Princess Bride possibly offer? A lot, actually. Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up:

There comes a time in a man's life where he starts seriously thinking about the future. He ceases to think only about his own wants and needs, and begins to consider more important things. Instead of worrying about trivial matters, like which Star Wars movie he's going to watch that night, he shifts his focus to other people. I remember this happening to me when I was in college. I asked myself a very important question: "How am I going to introduce Star Wars to my kids?" You laugh, but there are a myriad of issues to consider there. At what age is your youngling old enough to watch the films? Which film do you start with? Do you go in order of release, starting with the original? Or in chronological order, starting with The Phantom Menace ? (When I was in college, there were only two trilogies to think about, but now there is a new - and incomplete - trilogy being made, and stand-alone films coming out in between the saga films.) What if you're too forceful (n...

Let me just start out by answering some questions you might be asking yourself. No, you're not the only one who read the title of this post and tried to fit it into the meter of the song "Mr. Blue Sky." And no, it doesn't quite fit; there are a few too many syllables. Okay, with that out of the way, this review carries a huge spoiler warning, so you won't want to read past this paragraph. In fact, I'm not sure if "review" is the most accurate term. The purpose of this post isn't to inform the reader so they can decide whether or not to go see the movie, but rather to discuss what we already saw. If you're looking for my recommendation, it's this: you should go see this movie. You don't need to have seen any of the other Marvel movies to watch this one, but it helps if you've seen the first Guardians of the Galaxy (obviously). The humor is a bit crude for the younglings, so you might want to leave them at home. (Although I don...

Like many Star Wars fans, I tuned into the live stream of the Star Wars: The Last Jedi panel at Star Wars Celebration. I mostly just listened while I worked, so I'm sure I missed a lot of details about what they were talking about. But when the Rian Johnson, the film's director, said he had something to show everyone, my ears perked up. "We have a teaser-" ( There it is! I though. They're going to show the trailer! ) "-poster," he said, and then revealed the image above. But after a few minutes of pretending they weren't going to show a trailer, they relented to the audience's demands. "Of course we have a trailer!" Johnson exclaimed, as the whole place went wild.

I will conclude my trilogy of Firefly -related posts with a board game review of Firefly: The Game. After I started getting into tabletop games (see my post Adventures in Tabletop Gaming ), I started listening to a board game podcast called Meeple Nation (find out more at their website ). One of the board games they mentioned frequently, and featured on one of their episodes, was Firefly: The Game. As a huge fan of all things Firefly (see my reviews of Firefly and Serenity ), and a growing fan of board games, this game sounded right up my alley. I added it to my Amazon wish list, but didn't think I would necessarily buy it any time soon. One day, I saw it being sold for less than half the retail price, so I quickly ordered a copy. I'm glad I did.

Source: Wikimedia Commons The gospel reading for this past Sunday is the account of the resurrection of Lazarus, from John's Gospel. Once again, I had a chance to assist with RCIA (see my previous post for an explanation of what that is), which allowed me to reflect more on the Mass readings than I usually do. This passage has all kinds of significance for Christians, as it emphasizes the dogma of the resurrection of the body "on the last day." But it also has a special meaning for me as someone who has lost children, because of Martha's statement: "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died."

Source: Wikimedia Commons A few weeks ago, during an RCIA preparation class, we were discussing the Biblical account of the fall of Adam and Eve. A catechumen - we'll call him Steve - asked me, "Isn't God responsible for everything that happened? He put the tree there." This is an excellent question, not because it represents a flaw in the Christian worldview (spoiler alert: it doesn't), but because it invites us to take a closer look at the nature of free will, and at God's Divine Providence.

Back at the end of February, I published a post about the TV show Firefly - a space western that was tragically canceled before its time. As I mentioned in the post, the strength and loyalty of the show's fandom was such that Universal Studios green-lit a movie to continue the story, and that movie was called Serenity . In today's post, I'll take a look at that movie.

I was introduced to a lot of new things in college. Oh sure, I gained a new appreciation for my faith, and I learned how electricity worked, and I met my future bride. But I'm not going to write about those things today. Thanks to a Netflix account and some fellow geeky engineering students, I discovered a show called Firefly . Between the show, the movie Serenity , and a Firefly board game my wife and I have greatly enjoyed, there's too much for me to write about to fit it all in one post. Today's post will focus chiefly on the television series, and I'll cover the other material in subsequent posts.

As many of you probably know, Charles Robert - our fourth child - was born a few weeks ago. He is our second living child. Between Timothy (our oldest) and Charles, we had two miscarriages. We lost Lucy at 11 weeks and Elliot at almost 17 weeks. Because of this, and because of the circumstances of Timothy's birth (see Timothy's Story here), this pregnancy and delivery was very different than our first.

Dear Elliot, Happy birthday. Your mommy and I miss you so much. One year ago, I saw you for the first time. I remember seeing your perfect little fingers and toes, and your beautiful eyes. But you had already gone to heaven to be with Jesus.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post about my introduction to the Rocky series, and I discussed Rocky and Rocky II . Today I'd like to continue the story with Rocky III .

One of the reasons I started writing about my grief was because it helped me to process things. But I also wanted to share my thoughts and feelings on the matter with other grieving fathers and mothers, so that they might know that they are not alone. In order to further help these fathers and mothers, I have created a page on this site called "Miscarriage Resources." You can find it in the navigation bar at the top of the site. (For those viewing on your smartphone, just click the grey bar that says "Home," and you'll see a list of pages, including the new "Miscarriage Resources" page.)

I recently watched all of the Rocky movies - and 2015's  Creed - on Amazon Prime. It was only my second time seeing Rocky , and my first time seeing the rest of them. So admittedly, I am late to the party here. These movies are fantastic, and after seeing them I just had to write about them. I was originally going to write about all seven films, but once I got started, I ended up writing a lot more on each movie than I'd planned. So we'll just keep it to Rocky  and Rocky II . This post will have spoilers, but I figure that's not a huge deal, because these movies are over 30 years old.