September 12, 2013 Meeting of the WPA Chesterton Society

Greetings Friends of G.K.Chesterton,
After a summer that seemed to melt with out really getting hot, I hope that you will consider joining us on Thursday September 12, 2013 for our WPA Chesterton Society meeting. 

Now more than ever, it is time for understanding, appreciating and promoting the delightful wit and wisdom of G.K. Chesterton here in beautiful Western PA.

As usual, the meeting will be held in the Village of Middle Lancaster, at the Lancaster Township Community Center located on Kings Alley and Community Center Drive, in Butler County PA. Kings Ally is a right turn off of Rt. 19N, approx. 4.5 miles north of Zelienople, just past the Zion Lutheran Church. (The Community Center is a former one room school house, adjacent to the ball fields at Bauder Park.) The doors will open at 7:00pm for pot luck refreshments, with the discussion beginning at 7:30. The meeting will wrap up around 9:30pm. 

The four essays for discussion from the Defense of Sanity book are as follows:

#21 Cheese (pg. 103)     

#35 On Vulgarity (pg.183)       

#48 On the Instability of the State (pg. 246)

#60 Two Stubborn Pieces of Iron (pg. 330)

Please read as much of the readings as you can before the meeting, and consider bringing a contribution to the refreshment table.

By the way, there will be a virtual American Chesterton Society meeting at 8PM on the evening of September 2, 2013. You can click here to find more info and to follow the link to join the meeting. These webcast meetings, led by Dale Ahlquist, last about a half hour and are often interesting and informative. I encourage you to watch it  live when you can participate by posting questions or comments, or watch the recorded session on your computer at your convenience anytime later.

Also, mark your calendars for the Annual Rochester Chesterton Conference. This one day event will be held in Rochester NY at St. John Fisher College on Saturday September 21, 2013. I will share more information with you as soon as I get it.

Feel free to email me at wpachesterton@gmail.com if you have any questions about the readings or anything else.

Hope to see you on September 12th!

August 8, 2013 Meeting of the WPA Chesterton Society

Greetings Chestertonians,

Our August 8th meeting will consist of Chestertonian poetry selections that each attendee will select and bring to share with the group. Here is a link to an internet page where some of Chesterton's poetry is available to read and to print. If you are so inclined, there are also books of poetry by Gilbert and poems penned by his wife Francis available for sale on the internet, both new and used. The Ignatius Press Collected Works Vol. 10 (a group of 3 books) is available for sale from the American Chesterton Society bookstore with a discount offered to ACS members.

As usual, the meeting will be held in the Village of Middle Lancaster, at the Lancaster Township Community Center located on Kings Alley and Community Center Drive, in Butler County PA. Kings Ally is a right turn off of Rt. 19N, approx. 4.5 miles north of Zelienople, just past the Zion Lutheran Church. (The Community Center is a former one room school house, adjacent to the ball fields at Bauder Park.) The doors will open at 7:00pm for pot luck refreshments, with the discussion beginning at 7:30. The meeting will wrap up around 9:30pm. 


Any questions, please feel free to email wpachesterton@gmail.com

July 11, 2013 Meeting of the WPA Chesterton Society

Greetings Chestertonians,

At the July 11th, the Chesterton essays on Dickens that we will discuss will be:

Nicholas Nickleby
Old Curiosity Shop
David Copperfield
Our Mutual Friend

These essays are to be found in the book Criticisms and Appreciations of the Works of Charles Dickens by G.K.Chesterton. It is linked in it's entirety here. If you feel that a review of Dickens' books would help you with understanding the Chesterton essays, there are an abundance of resources on the web, including synopsis and film adaptations of the stories that can be viewed online.  Just a few examples are here and here and here. Much more can be found using your search engine.

As usual, the meeting will be held in the Village of Middle Lancaster, at the Lancaster Township Community Center located on Kings Alley and Community Center Drive, in Butler County PA. Kings Ally is a right turn off of Rt. 19N, approx. 4.5 miles north of Zelienople, just past the Zion Lutheran Church. (The Community Center is a former one room school house, adjacent to the ball fields at Bauder Park.) The doors will open at 7:00pm for pot luck refreshments, with the discussion beginning at 7:30. The meeting will wrap up around 9:30pm. 

Please read as much of the readings as you can before the meeting.


Feel free to email me at wpachesterton@gmail.com if you have any questions about the readings or anything else. See you soon!

June 13, 2013 Meeting of the WPA Chesterton Society

Greetings Chestertonians,

At our May meeting it was agreed that a little variety in the reading line up would be a welcome change as we head into the summer months. With this in mind, it was agreed that we will read and discuss some Father Brown stories in June, followed by some of Chesterton's literary criticism of Charles Dickens for July. August will be a poetry meeting, with most likely a return to the In Defense of Sanity essays in the fall. 

For June 13th, the Father Brown titles we will discuss are all included in the book The Complete Father Brown  and are linked below.
The Secret Garden
The Perishing of the Pendragons
The Worst Crime in the World

For July 11th, the Chesterton essays on Dickens that we will discuss will be:

Nicholas Nickleby
Old Curiosity Shop
David Copperfield
Our Mutual Friend

These essays are to be found in the book Criticisms and Appreciations of the Works of Charles Dickens by G.K.Chesterton. It is linked in it's entirety here. If you feel that a review of Dickens' books would help you with understanding the Chesterton essays, there are an abundance of resources on the web, including synopsis and film adaptations of the stories that can be viewed online.  Just a few examples are here and here and here. Much more can be found using your search engine.

As usual, the meeting will be held in the Village of Middle Lancaster, at the Lancaster Township Community Center located on Kings Alley and Community Center Drive, in Butler County PA. Kings Ally is a right turn off of Rt. 19N, approx. 4.5 miles north of Zelienople, just past the Zion Lutheran Church. (The Community Center is a former one room school house, adjacent to the ball fields at Bauder Park.) The doors will open at 7:00pm for pot luck refreshments, with the discussion beginning at 7:30. The meeting will wrap up around 9:30pm. 

Please read as much of the readings as you can before the meeting.


Feel free to email me at wpachesterton@gmail.com if you have any questions about the readings or anything else.

May 9, 2013 Meeting of the WPA Chesterton Society

Greetings all,

Please pardon my dereliction of duties in not sending out the meeting information sooner. 

We will meet tonight as usual despite the Ascension Holy Day. A good number of you have indicate that you will not be attending the meeting, however a hearty bunch have indicated that they will be coming.

The three essays for discussion from the Defense of Sanity book are as follows:

#34 The Drift from Domesticity (pg. 173) 

#51 Reflections on a Rotten Apple (pg. 260) 

#66 What is Right with the World (pg. 365)

The latest issue of the StAR has arrived for those of you who subscribed, and it is a beauty!

As usual, the meeting will be held in the Village of Middle Lancaster, at the Lancaster Township Community Center located on Kings Alley and Community Center Drive, in Butler County PA. Kings Ally is a right turn off of Rt. 19N, approx. 4.5 miles north of Zelienople, just past the Zion Lutheran Church. (The Community Center is a former one room school house, adjacent to the ball fields at Bauder Park.) The doors will open at 7:00pm for pot luck refreshments, with the discussion beginning at 7:30. The meeting will wrap up around 9:30pm. 

Please read as much of the readings as you can before the meeting.


Feel free to email me at wpachesterton@gmail.com if you have any questions about the readings or anything else.

April 11, 2013 Meeting of the WPA Chesterton Society

Easter Greetings Fellow WPA Chestertonians!

I have returned from Rome where my son and I went on a Lenten Pilgrimage in the footsteps of Chesterton with the American Chesterton Society. The experience excelled all expectations. More about this later... 

Much thanks to Mr. Harry Colin for taking the helm at our March meeting.

Our next meeting will be on this coming Thursday April 11, 2013. In addition to hearing some of the Chestertonian high points of the pilgrimage, including the Chestertonian connections of the newly appointed Pope Francis, we will continue discussing the essays compiled in the book In Defense of Sanity, edited by Dale Ahlquist, published by Ignatius Press in 2011.

The readings for April will include: 

#24 The Furrows (pg.115)-Originally published in Alarms and Discursions, 1910 

#25 The Meaning of Dreams (pg. 118)-Originally published in Lunacy and Letter, 1958

#41 A Plea for Prohibition (pg. 210)-Originally published in Sidelights, 1932

#44 Magic and the Fantasy of Fiction (pg. 225)-Originally published in Sidelights, 1932       

#58 About Beliefs  (pg. 316) Originally published in As I was Saying, 1936

All of the readings are included in the book In Defense of Sanity. They may also available to view/print on the internet at this link:
http://www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/index.html

Although there are 5 essays in the list for this month, most of them are not more than 4-5 pages long. In fact, if reading from In Defense of Sanity there are about 24 pages to read.

Please read the readings before the meeting, as this will greatly enhance our discussion.  On the other hand, please don't stay away from the meeting on account of not finishing the readings.

As usual, the meeting will be held in the Village of Middle Lancaster, at the Lancaster Township Community Center located on Kings Alley and Community Center Drive, in Butler County PA. Kings Ally is a right turn off of Rt. 19N, approx. 4.5 miles north of Zelienople, just past the Zion Lutheran Church. (The Community Center is a former one room school house, adjacent to the ball fields at Bauder Park.) The doors will open at 7:00pm for pot luck refreshments, with the discussion beginning at 7:30. The meeting will wrap up around 9:30pm. 

Please feel free to email me at wpachesterton@gmail.com if you have any questions about the readings or anything else.

March 14, 2013 Meeting of the WPA Chesterton Society

Greetings Fellow WPA Chestertonians!

Our next meeting will be on Thursday March 14, 2013. We will continue discussing the essays compiled in the book In Defense of Sanity , edited by Dale Ahlquist, published by Ignatius Press.

In light of the fact that I will be in Rome on a Lenten Pilgrimage with the American Chesterton Society on March 14, veteran group member and long time Chestertonian Harry Colin has graciously agreed to lead the discussion.

In keeping with the Lenten timing of the meeting the readings for March will include: 

"The Book of Job" (originally published in 1929 as an essay titled "The Introduction to the Book of Job")
"On Original Sin" (originally published in 1930 as a chapter in his book Come to Think of It ) 

To fill out the line up, Chesterton's essay "The Pickwick Papers" will be also included... Dickens being the master study of human nature that he is. This was originally published in 1911 as Chapter 3 of his book Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens.

All of the readings are included in the book In Defense of Sanity. They are also available to view/print on the internet at this link:
http://www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/index.html

As usual, the meeting will be held in the Village of Middle Lancaster, at the Lancaster Township Community Center located on Kings Alley and Community Center Drive, in Butler County PA. Kings Ally is a right turn off of Rt. 19N, approx. 4.5 miles north of Zelienople, just past the Zion Lutheran Church. (The Community Center is a former one room school house, adjacent to the ball fields at Bauder Park.) The doors will open at 7:00pm for pot luck refreshments, with the discussion beginning at 7:30. The meeting will wrap up around 9:30pm. 

Please feel free to email me at wpachesterton@gmail.com if you have any questions about the readings or anything else.