My fellow bibliophiles! This must be the beginning of a grand new era… and it is something that I’ve been anxiously awaiting since the time I heard a rumor, two years ago, of its development.

Sony has just released its Reader. This device, which is roughly the size of a paperback (7″x5″x0.5″), utilizes a newly developed electronic-ink technology — In essence, instead of glowing cells in CRT or LCD monitors, the electronic ink contains microcapsules that turn black, white or two shades of gray. The result is text that appears at nearly the same resolution as on the printed page, which is a gigantic improvement over previous technologies. Furthermore, it is high-contrast, able to be read in direct sunlight and at any angle, and it requires no power to maintain the image. Text can be enlarged up to 200% for those who forgot their reading glasses. And best of all: You can store hundreds of books in its internal (or removable) memory, and hundreds of titles are available for download online.

It’s not perfect yet. First, it’s monochrome, which is no doubt a temporary limitation. It is capable of displaying principally its proprietary book format, TXT, RTF, HTML, RSS feeds, JPG and PDFs (as well as playing mp3 audio files) — but I’d like to see support of other important formats, such as Word, PowerPoint and Excel. Now, I’m not saying that it needs to be a full-fledged computer, but it’d be nice to review various documents on-the-go, and these are, for better or for worse, the current industry standard for documents. I would also insist that there be some kind of highlighting feature, a notepad/sketchbook for diagramming thoughts while reading and a search function.

The price? Somewhere around $300. Don’t be scared just yet — this is the first generation of a wonderful new technology. (Remember that the first VHS video recorders cost upwards of $800!)

An electronic reader won’t replace the wonderful feeling of snuggling-up with a good book; but it will broaden the horizon in terms of usability and portability of one’s library when on-the-go. And that’s a great thing.

Thirty reasons to love ebooks are listed here.

From Lectio Divina On-Line, a branch of The Carmelite Web Site:

During the first months of his pontificate, Benedict XVI has many times underlined the importance of the Holy Scripture in the daily life of the faithful. Beyond living the Eucharist, the spiritual reading of the Word of God, especially through Lectio Divina, is becoming one of the central themes of his pastoral ministry.

At his midday Angelus with several thousand people gathered in St. Peter’s Square, the Pope said that Lectio Divina “consists of meditating fully on a biblical text, reading and reading it again, ‘ruminating on it’ in a certain sense” and “squeezing all its ‘juice’ so that it nourishes meditation and contemplation and, like sap, is able to irrigate real life.”

With these encouraging words of the Holy Father we invite you to participate with us in the fifth year of the Lectio Divina On-line. The Lectio Divine will be presented every week and it is based on the reading of the Sunday Gospel. It offers biblical texts and reflections for meditation and prayer.

Maranatha! Come Lord Jesus! You too come to this meeting with the Word of God, and if possible, do not come alone, but forward this message to your friends.

Related stories: The Monk’s Ladder: Renewed emphasis on Lectio Divina.

Watching EWTN’s “The Carpenter’s Workshop” (from Steve Wood, of dads.org), I was reminded of my old scouting years as a youth. I decided to look up Boys Life Magazine, to which I for many years subscribed. I ventured a guess and typed www.boyslife.com and was shocked when my browser loaded a pornographic web site!

On a second try, I got the correct URL: www.boyslife.org.

How many well-intentioned Scouts must have tried to log-on to the Boys Life web site and taken this same wrong turn? How many were seduced by it and clicked “Enter”?

Pornography itself is a problem rampant in the world… but it’s a particularly egregious and scathing wrong when it targets the youth in this way. For shame!!

Learn more about protecting your family from the perils on the internet and in the media at Dads.org.