After talking to people at the Annual Chesterton Conference I found I was rather jealous of those who belonged to a local G.K. Chesterton society. I so enjoyed this conference that the idea of monthly meetings discussing GKC sounded very pleasant indeed.
The Jacksonville metropolitan area has a population of 1,631,488 and is the fourth largest in Florida according to Wikipedia. So wow their really should be enough interested people to start one. Even if only 9.1% of the population of the Diocese is Catholic. I know there are non-Catholic who like GKC, but as is evident by the convention attendees it seems they don’t stay non-Catholics.
I was asked about if I belonged to a local group, and when I replied that there wasn’t one – I got the ole “Well start one yourself”. This quite annoys me. I would rather gripe about not having one, than to work towards creating one. There is good reason that my time in the Navy and subsequent has leaned heavily towards non-supervisory positions. Working mostly on my own, although having no problem working with others. Just don’t make me the supervisor.
Still I would really loved if there was a “North Florida G.K. Chesterton Society”. So I did some limited googling to see if there were any kind of discussions of GKC locally. Found only one on a parish site about the fact that his cause might go forward.
So I am writing this post as a placeholder for anybody else doing such googling and interested in such an endeavor. If so contact me so we can get this off the ground. I will do what I can to make this happen.
Bishop Robert Barron wrote:
“I’m convinced G.K. Chesterton is a saint, and should be formally recognized as one. I ask for his intercession often…But why is now the right time for his cause to move forward? First, I think, because as the world becomes increasingly secular—especially the West—Chesterton offers a healthy engagement with skepticism. He never smeared his opponents, never exchanged fire for fire, never used vulgarity. He loved his intellectual opponents and counted atheists among his closest friends (e.g., Shaw). We’ve lost the art of charitable religious argument, of ‘speaking the truth in love’ (Eph. 4:15), and Chesterton can help us recover it.”
Bishop Barron also believes—as do many of us—that Chesterton represents a model of lay spirituality.
So really I should be asking GKC to intercede to make this happen. Plus if I showed any leadership qualities it could count as his first miracle.
