I saw as part of my Catholic blogger’s contract that I was remiss in posting on Amy Welborn’s move to a new blog and new format.
As a long time reader of her blog from back in the days when it was called In Between Naps (which started Sep 10, 2001) and then Open Book when she moved to Typepad I have mixed feelings. One thing for sure is I really admire her honesty in evaluating that her blog was getting in the way as an author and that even though she turned out some fine books, she felt she could have done better. Anybody that maintains a frequently updated blog knows exactly how much effort and a time drain it can be.
One of the great thing about her previous blog was not just the frequently updated news pertaining to the Catholic world, but the comment section and the responses from a wide variety of readers. When she choose to write commentary on these stories it was always worth reading. Now of course we have a wide variety of ways to get the latest Catholic news, we just won’t get the commentary and the large set of reader’s reactions as easily. Mark Shea has a lively comment section, but the type of stories he links to are not always the same as what Amy would post.
Though the positive thing is that the new blog will have good commentary on the subjects she chooses to write on and so will really be more of her writing instead of just being a sort of Catholic InstaPundit with links galore.
5 comments
I used to read Amy until I began using the offline RSS reader. She didn’t supply a full RSS feed, so I read many of the other fine Catholic blogs that were available. (Most recently yours because you told me about your full Atom feed ;))
How the Catholic blogosphere has changed since I started surfing it a couple years ago. Back then my mainstays were Dawn Eden, Mark Shea, Amy Welborne, and your site.
Dawn’s been pretty busy with her book and book tours.
I loved Amy’s site but understand why she would need to back off a bit. Too bad, life goes on.
I used to like Mark’s site, but he’s gotten very bombastic. The last straw for me was when he deleted a comment of mine and banned me because I said he was being unreasonable with regard to the way he discusses the torture issue — apparently, calling someone unreasonable is now a personal, ad hominem attack, and a bannable offense. So no more shea.
That means you’re the last of the originals for me! Keep up the great writing!
Calling Mark unreasonable means you’re a Torture Whore Making the Case for Fog for the Sake of Salvation By Leviathan Through Any Means Necessary, a Patron of Making a Culture That Despises Virginity and Also Despises Children, and Highly Suspect of Being a Gay Brownshirt on the March™. 😉
On Amy’s change of format. Good for her, bad for us. So it was the right move.
Todd
You’re spot on, Jeff. One of Amy’s great services to the online Catholic world was in opening conversations that would take place in her comment boxes. I wish she’d reconsider and just do something like: “Motu Proprio finally announced. Discuss.”
And Publius, thank you for that. I think ‘laughter’ was originally included as a charism of the Holy Spirit but was edited out in the early Middle Ages by a testy scribe who had been suffering from biliousness.
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