Good Question

If you were brought to trial on the charge of being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you? -- Peter Kreeft, You Can Understand the Bible, 216

A Star Trek Film by Any Other Name....

Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before... except maybe 11 times (the 6 films with the original series cast, the 4 Next Generation films, and the reboot).

According to Jeffrey Overstreet, the next Star Trek film will go by the name Star Trek Into Darkness, making it the first Trek film without a subtitle or Roman numeral.

MLP: FiM Season One DVD on Sale!

I only recently became aware of this news from one of the many Brony Facebook groups I'm in, but Amazon.com put up preorders for a season one DVD of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. The episodes were previously only available in the U.S. on ITunes (all episodes) or in a 5-episode sample bit on DVD. As you probably suspect, the S1 DVD comes with my highest recommendation.

Another Reason I Watch MLP: Friendship is Magic

For the rest, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever modest, whatsoever just, whatsoever holy, whatsoever lovely, whatsoever of good fame, if there be any virtue, if any praise of discipline: think on these things (Phil 4:8). 

Julie Davies on Catholic Bloggers

Unfortunately, I couldn't make it to Texas last week for the Catholic Writers Guild conference and the Catholic New Media conference. I did hear, however, that Julie Davies of Happy Catholic blog gave an excellent address at CNMC recommending certain guidelines for Catholic bloggers to follow. Considering that we bloggers are part of the public face of the Church, as Davies reminds us, we should heed her advice and always keep in mind the Lord's commandment: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:31). If our blogging doesn't point to Christ, in what sense are our Catholic blogs different from other blogs?

What is Friendship? Some Criteria from Aristotle

Obviously after two seasons, the Mane Six had plenty of time to bond after their rather rushed friendship-making in the first two episodes

According to Joshua W. Schulz's article "Kierkegaard's Tragic and Comic Lovers" in the Spring 2012 ACPQ, Aristotle considers a relationship to be a friendship only if it meets the following five conditions:

1. Each person recognizes some excellence in the other person.

2. Each person wishes well (some good) to the other person, for the other's sake, in respect of the excellence recognized in (1).

3. Both (1) and (2) are reciprocally known.

4. The relationship has developed over a sufficient period of time.

5. The friends have become familiar with each other, i.e., have been found lovable and trustworthy.

As I've written before, friendship requires a mutuality of love, of wishing and doing well by another, in addition to an equality of virtue (a common recognition and pursuit of the good), as can be seen in conditions 1-3. However, friendship requires some time for potential friends to get to know each other, for familiarity. As Aristotle says, a friend "lives with another and has the same tastes, or shares the same sorrows and joys with his friend" (NE, IX, 4). To know another person's character, whether their tastes match yours, is not usually something you can do with mere acquaintances you run into at school, work, or Facebook (where physical proximity usually doesn't enter the picture). Potential friends are in it for the long haul in order to build loyalty and trust.

Update: Of course, as Kevin Rossiter of the Facebook Thomistic Discussion Group reminds me, friendships of virtue contain elements from the other two kinds of friendship, utility and pleasure. Therefore, in the "perfect" friendship of virtue, friends are good (virtuous), useful and pleasant to be around.         

Friendship and Discord

States, it seems, are maintained by friendship; and legislators are more zealous about it than about justice. This is evident from the similarity between friendship and concord; but legislators most of all wish to encourage concord and to expel discord as an enemy of the state. If people are friends there is no need of justice, but just men do need friendship. Likewise what is just seems to be especially favorable to friendship. -- Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1155

If you want harmony in your state, it's a good idea to get rid of this guy...