We were talking about--
I went to a class today, a wonderful class.
Are any of you guys here?
Who I was with?
Hi.
Hi, everybody.
Hi.
It's good to see you again.
We were talking about the ordinary time.
This last book I wrote is called The Kingdom of Ordinary Time,
and it came from a number of ideas.
But when I was growing up, I grew up
in a very Roman Catholic-- lefty Catholic, but Catholic
nevertheless-- home.
Sort of Dan Berrigan Catholic.
And I loved reading the missal every Sunday
and seeing this period of time that was
coming called ordinary time.
And there was the swaths of time, you might remember,
between the High Holy seasons.
Ordinary time, first Sunday of ordinary time,
second Sunday of ordinary time.
So the Prologue to this book speaks to that.
"The rules, once again, applied.
One loaf equaled one loaf.
One fish equaled one fish.
The so-called Kings were dead.
And the woman who had been healed
grew tired of telling her story, and sometimes asked
her daughter to tell it.
People generally worshipped where
their parents had worshipped--
the men who had hijacked the airplane
prayed where the dead pilots had been sitting,
and the passengers prayed from their seats.
So many songs went up and out and into the thinning air.
People, listening and watching, nodded and wept,
and, leaving the theater, one turned to the other
and said, what do you want to do now?
And the other one said, I don't know.
What do you want to do?
It was the Coming of Ordinary Time.
First Sunday, second Sunday.
And then-- for who knows how long--
it was here."