Author: Avellina Balestri

  • To the Queen

    BY AVELLINA BALESTRI Heavy is the head and strong the heart of she who wears the crown. Lady, lioness, our Queen. Read more

  • Pilgrimage to a Small Island: A Britophile’s Memoir

    On the plane, I cannot bring myself to look out the window before taking off. It’s too much, almost like claustrophobia of some sort, but not the fear I felt on the first flight over. It’s just pain now… and turning, looking for people to be there who I’m leaving behind. Read more

  • A Gilded Cage: A Harry Potter Story

    BY LASTCRAZYHORN “I am no one sir. I have no one. I don’t have anywhere to go, and the only thing I can do to remove myself from the equation.” Read more

  • Accents and Sophistication: A Poldark Story

    By BellChell17 Word Count: 921 Rating: G Summary: A comedic domestic sketch of Ross and Demelza Poldark (Set during season two, before episode seven.) Ross had just come home from the mine and settled in his seat to talk to Demelza while she was cooking dinner. The topic of holding the smuggled goods for Trencrom… Read more

  • Soldier’s Heart: A Sense & Sensibility Fanfiction

    But no one seemed to think much of it, for Colonel Christopher Brandon was simply a part of the respectable furniture to them. He knew most men commended his rank and record, but most women thought him a bore, the bland colonel who had seen too much of the wars. Read more

  • Paschal Mystery: The Death of God and the Paradox of Salvation

    All sin, in a sense, “wounds” God, causes rifts in our relationship with Him. We pierce Him through the heart, and each other through our hearts, constantly. It has real consequences, and real restitution must be made before reconciliation can take place. Read more

  • You Know Nothing: A Game of Thrones Fanfiction

    I have borne the brunt of battles which were never my own, I have taken leadership when no true heroes were left to be found, I have stood up through the longest night of winter and survived. I am the last lord of the direwolves, the last kin of ghosts. Read more

  • God’s Good Chaos: A Reflection on the Problem of Evil

    The problem of Evil is one of most staggering dilemmas for the human mind. If we define it as such, then we acknowledge a spiritual component, and yet if we do that, we also acknowledge a greater power which allows for the existence of this evil, or more specifically, anything in this world which is… Read more

  • Adam, Christ, and Evolution: Seeking Meaning in Our Primordial Past

    The very fact that we are able to say “Thou” to God means that we are able to disobey and reject Him, to turn away from the “Eden” of spiritual union with Him and choose our own path of disorder. Read more

  • Salaam, Maryam

    BY ADEEL AHMED “It is the will of your Lord that you should bring forth a pure boy, who will be a light of truth to all existence.”  Read more

  • 6 Reasons Why ‘Die Hard’ Is a Christmas Movie

    BY KATE O’HARE “There are two kinds of people: Those who think ‘Die Hard’ is a Christmas movie; and those who are wrong.” Read more

  • Limping Pilgrims

    BY SARAH BINGHAM These limping pilgrims, weary, wounded, maimed, even. Yet heading homeward, leaning on sticks and each other. Read more

  • Journey and Destination: A Theological Reflection on Pilgrimage

    BY SARAH BINGHAM Historically, the focus of pilgrimage has always been about the place to which one was travelling. Read more

  • Ever England

    BY LAWRENCE “MACK” HALL Faith does not pass with ephemeral time: Brave Hurricanes and Spits still claw and climb. Read more

  • Eternity Begun: A Meditation on St. Elizabeth of the Trinity

    BY SEAN EARNER But with Elizabeth the dogmas became a part of a positive, ecstatic discourse of worship of the threefold divine life. Read more

  • The Bog

    BY M.C. BIRO “They are not people,” Desva said, “they are but the old desires of flesh and darkness that run rampant beyond these walls.” Read more

  • Day of Wrath: Sweeney Todd and the Search for Salvation

    BY AVELLINA BALESTRI Rich and poor alike are part of the same chain of being which the disillusioned barber believes should be cut.  Read more

  • Italia

    Empire of the Heart and Land of the Eternal, you shake me to the core with your fire-fused mountains and crumbling foundations, fierce as your passion for living untamed. Read more

  • The Late Sir David Amess

    BY AVELLINA BALESTRI They say he was a gentleman and a gentle man, the Queen’s good servant and a child of the Church. Read more

  • Between Life and Death: A Hunchback of Notre Dame Story

    BY SCORPIOAN “There! ‘Tis the gibbet! Look, since it is for what thou wisheth. I assure thee, it bringeth certain death.” Read more