Night in the city, burnt brick color. There was a guy, a Cuban guy, who used to deliberately walk into the street and block traffic, waving his arms, acting crazy. Most thought him harmless. That night I tried to drive down the street, and he wandered in my way, hollering. But then there was a second guy, more malicious, looming. He leaped up on the windshield of the car with a shovel and started raining down strikes. My son in the passenger seat, afraid. Mind you, I didn't want to run these guys over, but when that happened, it was out the door. I put the pedal down. The guy on the windshield went flying. The other guy, there was a bump and another bump, and we rode off into the night.

I guess it's a commonplace expression, but my uncle joked that every town in Italy had the same basic schema: una chiesa, una piazza, una fontana.

But this touches at something in the built environment that many communities otherwise lack.

The basic layout is focused on the church, the spiritual heart of a community, its sacred center. It's not that your civil authority is not present, just that it's not at the core of the place, and the core is whatever is central, in this case in physical space. Bordering on that is the piazza, the public space, the place of business, to see and be seen, to interact—the social heart of the community. Thirdly, is the fountain, usually located in conjunction with the church and the piazza. This is not only beautiful, but functional, a testament to this essential service that keeps people alive and going.

Just as Nature expresses the will of God, so every device in the human environment—those technologies both intellectual and physical—expresses the intent of the people who institute them. In the above model, the residences, the industry, the commerce...all these are outgrowths, then, from that fundamental arrangement. Now look at the modern built environment, by comparison...

I dreamed the wife and I were going on a trip, traversing the endless passageways and stations where I often find myself in dreams. This one was particularly tangible, almost lucid—I remember reaching down for two passports.

We ended up not traveling far: a small, stump of a home on a hill next to a traffic circle that emptied into the GWB, and beyond that, Manhattan. It was surprisingly bucolic and quiet, despite the proximity to the bridge. As the afternoon light slanted in through the shades, I went next door to a small, brick residence and inquired as to the local history, who owned the homes, etc. An older lady, smiling, told me all about it, but I recall scant details, as I knew she was a Lamia (so I told myself, in the dream) and eventually escaped and returned to the house.

I dreamed we were having a football (soccer) game in the parlor. It was a small house, shades of green. Among the players randomly assembled from our street and environs was famed English footballer Cole Palmer. He tripped over my foot and came crashing down on the floor, suffering a hideous bicep injury, and was carted away to the hospital. Thus the game ended. 

In certain quarters—Origen, Athanasius, Evagrius, John Damascene—there are intimations that demons both envy and loathe the material, insofar as they are spiritual and lack material bodies, and perhaps in spite of the foreknowledge that the God of Heaven and Earth would "empty himself" and incarnate.

Such a model has a number of interesting corollaries. Nature and the material are created fundamentally good, although presently subject to entropy and death; demons will seek to corrupt the material wherever possible, in particular human beings' response to it, whether by exalting the material (see also consumerist culture) or by causing revulsion to the material (we see this is certain religious contexts). As the exorcists emphasize, demons' limited purchase on matter means they frequently rely on incarnate agents, especially human beings, to perform their will and enact physical and spiritual evil, through behavior and perpetuation of disordering ideas. They rely, then, on persuasion, which requires the participation of a person's will; over time, this can devolve into oppression and ultimately full-on possession, much as an individual's participation over time with the Divine can progressively lead to henosis and theosis. This is not something that happens inadvertently, for the most part—it expressly depends on intent.

This model also underscores the importance of Mary and her humanity, as she is the path whereby the God of hosts, the pleroma of the myriad divine powers, becomes expressed in the material world--that is, whereby his will is accomplished on Earth as it is Heaven (as above, so below). It also suggests the need for our own engagement with the material, in the form of action, both behaviors infused with divine love but also in ritual action, through participation in the mysteries.