Any time Robbo.

LOL!!! But is THIS really Father M. or some CIA guy pretending to be Father M.? And if it is really Father M., is this related to the E-mess??? We stand by waiting on pins and needles for more details!!!

And now, are the rest of us under investigation because of your field trip? Man, this could get messy!

Once when I was riding my motorcycle down to Presidio, I missed my turnoff to River Road. I made a careful u-turn in front of US Customs, only nobody noticed. They only saw me going away and thought I had run around the check point.

I stopped for gas a couple of minutes later, and heard "Freeze!" just as I was starting to fuel up. I turned around to see a Presidio town cop with his gun drawn and pointed at me!!! I just about pissed myself.

The Customs agents got there a few minutes later, and I explained what had happened. The supervisor just shook his head and said, "You know, we're at an orange alert status today." They let me go.

That I was riding a $20K Beemer and not a Harley definately helped my case, I think.

Fight it Robbo...Father M. is going to make you shoot a manequin and start calling yourself "Jason Bourne."

The waterboarding in the baptismal font is especially rough, I hear.

Robbo, if you're making the big jump, I'm truly happy for you -- and for us. I do think it is where you belong. And, like Reagan with the Democrats, I think you can truly say that you didn't leave the Episcopal church -- the Episcopal Church left you.

Chesterton, as always, seems appropriate:

"The Catholic Church is the only thing which saves a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age."

Although, as I was telling my wife tonight, my joy about this potential development is tempered by a great deal of sadness, because I think the Anglican church as it was in the turn of the previous century was a great civilizing force in the world. I do not doubt that it saved many souls, for it believed 98% of what my church believed. I would rather know that the Catholic church had allies in the the fight against the moral relativism and apostasy of our age; and I always thought of the Lutherans and the Anglicans as being allies against a common foe -- or should I say "the Common Foe", for as Paul tells us in Ephesians 6:12, we know what we fight. That so many people are rallying around Rome these days heartens me in one sense, but also worries me in another -- for in the common fight, as Elrond says in the movie, our "list of allies grows thin." To be in Rome is to be in a mighty fortress; but to be in Rome is also to be against the world.

But I cannot worry about the world, or about churches, for I am but a footsoldier. I can only worry about my friends. Come to Rome and you will not be disappointed; though as manby have said, it's a lot bigger on the insider than on the outside, and you'll still have to find a home within it. In many ways, crossing the Tiber is just a beginning. And in other ways, you'll wonder if it is indeed the Tiber you've crossed, or if it is the Rubicon.

Steve-o,
You have us mixed up with the Unitarians. We're the ones with the albino monk hit squad they are the mid erasers...