The first DVD I've ever bought

Six years of hard labor (really hard labor!) and all I'm going to get for it is a lousy T-shirt. :-) Not really. I'm going to get a degree. I passed my defense today, apparently with flying colors.

Not much else to say for now; I'm hungry. All I've eaten today are a pear and a cup of yogurt. I'll have to fix that...

You can tell I'm American, by the way. I decided to "reward" myself by buying something. If there are any redeeming qualities to this act, it was the film Bernadette, about St. Bernadette Soubirous, one of my favorite saints. (Not to be confused with The Song of Bernadette, which I like okay, but not so much.)

Why is she one of my favorite saints? Let's put it this way: I have always been very successful at learning things, but I struggle with faith, prayer, and charity. Bernadette struggled to learn things; she was considered stupid by many of her peers and superiors, and by herself:

I'll never learn anything. You'll have to shove the book into my head!

[H]er sympathetic companions felt sorry that she had trouble finishing her homework. Let it go, I'll finish it for you, suggested one of these understanding friends. ...No, the good sister will know and she'll scold me, she answered. [Bernadette was 16 at the time.]

—Bernadette Speaks: a Life of St. Bernadette in her Own Words

(pgs. 141,173)

I admire her more than any intellectual, because of her simple, honest, and good-hearted faith; her obsession with the truth, and her own struggles with holiness.

I hope she's praying for Terri Schiavo. It looks now as if it will take a miracle to save her.


Pray for us, St. Bernadette.