Afternoon Links — 1.17.11

“Fifty years after the break in relations, while Cuba is still ruled by a male, white, militaristic, totalitarian gerontocracy, Barack Obama is the president of the United States and Hillary Clinton the secretary of state,” writes a Yale professor who left Cuba at 17 in Exiled by Ike, Saved by America . “Which of my two countries is the revolutionary one?”

Baseball superstar Hank Aaron helped desegregate the south . 1963, an amazing year for him on the field, “signified a political awakening for Aaron; once considered reserved, he became drawn to the positions of writer James Baldwin and, like many African-Americans, taken by the civil rights positions of both King and Malcolm X. These were not airy, theoretical considerations; they contained real-life implications for a man navigating the best path for achieving equality for African-Americans. In interviews, Aaron rejected ballplayer clichés and began to speak with a sharper political tone. A year earlier, the Milwaukee Braves had been sold to Chicago businessman Bill Bartholomay. Almost immediately, rumors circulated that the team would soon relocate to Atlanta — and Aaron had no interest in ever returning to the Deep South, where he was born.”

Some documents on the new “Ordinariate” for Anglicans becoming Catholics: the Holy See’s announcement and Cardinal Levada’s statement (he is Joseph Ratzinger’s successor as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which is overseeing the Ordinariate), and the English bishops’ statement and  Archbishop Vincent Nichols’ homily at the ordination of its first three priests. As the English bishops put it, “the Ordinariate is being established essentially for groups of former Anglican faithful and their clergy who wish to maintain as members of the Catholic Church, within the canonically approved and structured ecclesial life of the Ordinariate, those aspects of their Anglican spiritual, liturgical and pastoral tradition which are recognised as authentic by the Catholic Church.”

Helen Alvare, Ryan Anderson, and others disprove the usual slander against the pro-life movement .

And finally, the Carolina Chocolate Drops perform “Memphis Shakedown” on an unexpected instrument .