Although pop culture darling Michael J. Fox is no longer acting, he's just as relevant as ever. The actor, best known for his role as Marty McFly in the Back to the Future film trilogy, was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1991 and has since devoted his life to helping fund research and find a cure.
Over the years, Michael has been candid about his life through several memoirs and documentaries. He's even spoken about the role of faith in his family life and his battle with Parkinson's disease. Keep scrolling to learn more.
SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES
What is Michael J. Fox's religion?
Michael J. Fox hasn't been known to be religious. In his 2009 memoir, titled Always Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist, he considered himself a lapsed Catholic. However, his marriage to former co-star Tracy Pollan has gotten him involved with Reform Judaism. He and Tracy raised all four of their children Jewish.
"It's fair to say I have staked a claim in Judaism," Michael wrote in his memoir. "I've married a Jewish girl, and we are raising our children in the Jewish culture and, moreover, in the Jewish faith — our three oldest have been bar and bat mizvahed." He also said that he regularly attends a synagogue in Manhattan.
SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES
(L-R) Schuyler Fox, Aquinnah Fox, Michael J. Fox, Tracy Pollan, Sam Fox, and Esmé Fox
In December 2007, the former Spin City star was recognized by the Union for Reform Judaism for his work on behalf of Parkinson's disease research and stem cell research. Union President Rabbi Eric H. Yoffie praised Michael's efforts, stating it encapsulated "the highest ideals of Judaism," per 18 Doors.
While accepting the award, Michael recalled a time when he was helping his twin daughters, Aquinnah and Schuyler, with their Torah homework. The trio then came across a section about David's fight with Goliath and how he refused a sword and armor for the battle.
He then made an analogy between that and the misinformation about stem cell research: "I think David understood something fundamental about the deepest ideals of repairing the world. The armor, the weapons, the swords, they're just a distraction — and distraction is not what wins the battle. You just need the truth."
Midnight in Paris is a 2011 fantasy comedy film written and directed by Woody Allen. Set in Paris, the film follows Gil Pender (Owen Wilson), a screenwriter and aspiring novelist, who is forced to confront the shortcomings of his relationship with his materialistic fiancée (Rachel McAdams) and their divergent goals, which become increasingly exaggerated as he travels back in time to the 1920s each night at midnight.[3]
In 2010, disillusioned screenwriter Gil Pender and his fiancée, Inez, vacation in Paris with Inez's wealthy parents. Gil, struggling to finish his debut novel about a man who works in a nostalgia shop, finds himself drawn to the artistic history of Paris, especially the Lost Generation of the 1920s, and has ambitions to move there, which Inez dismisses. By chance, they meet Inez's friend, Paul, and his wife, Carol. Paul speaks with great authority but questionable accuracy on French history, annoying Gil but impressing Inez.
Intoxicated after a night of wine tasting, Gil decides to walk back to their hotel, while Inez goes with Paul and Carol by taxi. At midnight, a 1920s car pulls up beside Gil and delivers him to a party for Jean Cocteau, attended by other people of the 1920s Paris art scene. Zelda Fitzgerald, bored, encourages her husband Scott and Gil to leave with her. They head to a cafe where they run into Ernest Hemingway and Juan Belmonte. After Zelda and Scott leave, Gil and Hemingway discuss writing, and Hemingway offers to show Gil's novel to Gertrude Stein. As Gil leaves to fetch his manuscript, he returns to 2010; the cafe is now a laundromat.
The next night, Gil tries to repeat the experience with Inez, but she leaves before midnight. Returning to the 1920s, Gil accompanies Hemingway to visit Gertrude Stein, who critiques Pablo Picasso's new painting of his lover Adriana. Gil becomes drawn to Adriana, a costume designer who also had affairs with Amedeo Modigliani and Georges Braque. Having heard the first line of Gil's novel, Adriana praises it and admits she has always longed for the past.
Gil continues to time travel the following nights. Inez grows jaded with Paris and Gil's constant disappearing, while her father grows suspicious and hires a private detective to follow him. Adriana leaves Picasso and continues to bond with Gil, who is conflicted by his attraction to her. Gil explains his situation to Salvador Dalí, Man Ray, and Luis Buñuel; as surrealists, they do not question his claim of coming from the future. Gil later suggests the plot of "The Exterminating Angel" to Buñuel.
While Inez and her parents travel to Mont Saint Michel, Gil meets Gabrielle, an antique dealer and fellow admirer of the Lost Generation. He later finds Adriana's diary at a book stall, which reveals that she was in love with Gil and dreamed of being gifted earrings before making love to him. To seduce Adriana, Gil tries to steal a pair of Inez's earrings but is thwarted by her early return to the hotel room.
Gil buys new earrings and returns to the past. After he gives Adriana the earrings, a horse-drawn carriage arrives, transporting them to the Belle Époque, an era Adriana considers Paris's Golden Age, they go to the Moulin Rouge where they meet Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Paul Gauguin, and Edgar Degas, who all agree that Paris's best era was the Renaissance. Adriana is offered a job designing ballet costumes; thrilled, she proposes to Gil that they stay, but he, observing the unhappiness of Adriana and the other artists, realizes that chasing nostalgia is fruitless because the present is always "a little unsatisfying." Adriana decides to stay, and they part ways.
Gil rewrites the first two chapters of his novel. He retrieves his draft from Stein, who praises his rewrite. Still, he says that on reading the new chapters, Hemingway does not believe that the protagonist does not realize that his fiancée, based on Inez, is having an affair with the character based on Paul. Gil returns to 2010 and confronts Inez, who admits to sleeping with Paul but disregards it as a meaningless fling. Gil breaks up with her and decides to move to Paris. The detective following him takes a "wrong turn" and ends up being chased by the palace guards of Louis XVI just before a revolution breaks out. While walking by the Seine at midnight, Gil encounters Gabrielle. As it begins to rain, he offers to walk her home and learns that they share a love for Paris in the rain.
Governor General David Johnston (right) with actor Michael J.Fox at Rideau Hall on May 27, 2011 during an Order of Canada ceremony.
PATRICK DOYLE / THE CANADIAN PRESS
OTTAWA—Actor Michael J. Fox is now an officer of the Order of Canada.
The Edmonton-born actor and activist is among 43 people who received their medals from Gov. Gen. David Johnston at a Rideau Hall ceremony.
Others include rock legend Robbie Robertson, hockey commentator Howie Meeker, Acadian filmmaker Phil Comeau, former cabinet minister Anne McLellan and Trudeau biographer Stephen Clarkson.
Fox was honoured for his efforts on behalf of those suffering from Parkinson’s disease, as well as his television and film work.
Fox, diagnosed with Parkinson’s two decades ago, called the award a great honour.
He chuckled that he felt like an imposter when he glanced around at his fellow inductees.
“I don’t begin for a second to put myself in the league of any of these people,” he said. “When I listen to what they’ve done, that’s Canadian to me. It’s a seriousness and a sense of humour, it’s a lot of contradictions.”
He said Canada always makes him think “of vast spaces and tight communities.”
“We think of ourselves huddled against the elements and helping each other. It’s very moving to be part of it.”
During your holidays in Carnac, discover the town’s religious heritage: its six chapels will take you on a journey through the centuries.
CHAPEL OF St Michel
The Chapel of Saint Michel de Carnac was rebuilt around 1813 and again in 1925 on the same plans as the original chapel dating from 1664. It is located on the highest point of the town, the tumulus hill. Below is St Michel devotional fountain. Women whose husbands were at sea, used to sweep the chapel in the direction they wanted to see the wind blow. Then they would to pray at the fountain and drink the water. St Michel’s saints day is in September. There is an orientation table at the high point of the hill.
Climb to the top of the tumulus and admire the breathtaking views of the ocean and islands.
CHAPEL OF St Colomban
The Chapel of Saint Colomban, built in the flamboyant Gothic style, dates from the end of the sixteenth century. It is consecrated to the Irish monk Saint Columba, the patron saint of fools. To the east of the village, with its granite houses, is the fountain of Saint Colomban, which has two drinking pools. The wash house was a meeting place for the village women. South of the village, by the sea, are two chimneys, the remains of a forge.
The chapel is open all year round from 10 am to 6 pm. Entrance is free.
CHAPEL OF Kergroix
The Kergroix chapel dates back to the 16th century, although it was rebuilt in 1951. The Forgiveness of Our Lady of the Cross is celebrated in September. The chapel is open to the public all summer.
CHAPEL OF la Madeleine
The site of the chapel was once a leper colony. The present chapel was rebuilt in 1976. It is open and tended by local people in the summer. The most important service takes place in July. Next to the chapel, you will discover the fountain, the source of which is said to cure fever and skin diseases.
Continue your walk towards the Chapel of Hahon and the Chapel of Coet, both to the North of Carnac.
Vezelay and Saint Maximin, an incredible “war” for the relics of Mary Magdalene
Mary Magdalene did not immediately have a great aura in the history of the Church. It was not until the 7th and 8th centuries that she began to be favored in monastic circles, where the accent was placed on repentance and forgiveness by welcoming sinners there. The life of the saint – a sinner who became an ascetic – then merges with the traditions concerning the life of Mary the Egyptian. She was a prostitute of the six century who would have done penance in the desert, on the other side of the Mediterranean. In the 11th century, the monasteries, under the influence of the order of Cluny, took on social and economic importance. There is also a tremendous cult around all kinds of relics brought back from the Holy Land or purchased in Constantinople. Having relics of great saints is important at this time. It is because there are relics that pilgrimages are organized and pilgrimages pay off. In Vézelay at the beginning of the 11th century the monastery was in full decline. Wishing to promote his abbey, Abbot Geoffroy (1037-1052), friend of the pope, ambitious and close to princes “discovered” (“invented” is the term of use) and exhibited the relics of Mary Magdalene. Pilgrims flock.
Relic of Mary Magdalene, Vezelay basilica
In 1050 Mary Magdalene officially became the patron saint of Vezelay abbey.
Over the 11th and 12th centuries, the abbey, many times enlarged and rebuilt, was transformed into a magnificent sanctuary, with splendid Romanesque portals. It was an important stopover on the way to Compostela. The city took advantage of the influx of pilgrims. In the 12th century, its population amounted to 10,000 inhabitants, a considerable number for the time. Vézelay then became a center of great importance for the West. Under the protection of the powerful dukes of Burgundy, in 1146, Saint Benedict preached the second crusade there. King Louis VII, Queen Eleanor and a crowd of nobles, prelates and people gathered on the hill. In 1190, Richard Coeur-de-Lion and Philippe-Auguste met there at the start of the third crusade. In 1217, François d’Assise chose the hill of Vézelay to found the first Franciscan establishment on French soil.
Saint Bernard preaching the 2nd Crusade, in Vézelay, in 1146, Émile Signol – Public domain
How the relics of Mary Magdalene arrived in Vézelay ?
Natural curiosity, but unsatisfactory answers. We accepted the idea that it was Gérard de Roussillon who would have organized the transfer of the relics during the foundation of the abbey, relics that we would have gone to look for in Saint-Maximin where we knew that the saint had her burial. . The bishop of Autun launched a prohibition against the pilgrimage. We then asked for the arbitration of the Pope. Pascal II, who by a bull given in 1103, broke the prohibition of the bishop and invited all the French to make the pilgrimage of Vézelay. The pilgrimage then took off, these were the great hours of Vézelay. However, doubt persisted, not about the burial of Mary Magdalene in Provence, but about the transfer of her relics to Vézelay and their authenticity. We didn’t have much to show as relics in Vézelay, where we talked about them a lot without ever really presenting them in public.
“Presentable” and “indisputable” relics were needed. It was then that in 1265, relics were exhumed in Vézelay, kept in a box which would have been deposited in the crypt in 920 more than three centuries earlier. A certificate of authenticity in the box proves this!. “…under the high altar, a metal chest, long square, which contained some relics wrapped in two veils of silk, with a certain quantity woman’s hair”. There was also a letter from a King Charles certifying that “in this coffer is contained the body of the blessed Mary Magdalene”. (Act drawn up by Gui de Mello, bishop of Auxerre and Pierre, bishop of Panéade.) Saint Louis officially recognized the relics and went to Vézelay for their elevation in 1267.
Vezelay basilicaSt Maximin basilica
Nevertheless, the doubt still persisted. Twelve years later, in 1279, Charles II, Prince of Salerno, nephew of Saint Louis, who had come to Saint-Maximin on pilgrimage and had carried out a solid investigation, was convinced that the tomb of Mary Magdalene was in the crypt. where Saint Maximin had once buried her. He organized excavations which led to the discovery of several sarcophagi. In the so-called “Sidoine’s sarcophagus” was discovered the body of Mary Magdalene with an inscription on a wooden tablet on which appeared simply: “Here lies the body of Saint Mary Magdalene.”
And finally, for the Abbey of Vézelay, the miracle will not take place.
Indeed, Pope Boniface VIII definitively put an end to this “battle” between the 2 cities when he recognized the authenticity of the relics discovered by Charles II at Saint Maximin. Vézelay will have to submit to the spiritual authority of the Pope. At the end of the 13th century, it is the beginning of the decline of the pilgrimage of Vézelay.The reliquary in the crypt of Vezelay contains a piece of her rib bone, given by the Dominican monks of St Maximin.
الفقرة السابقة
Parish, Church
Relic of Mary Magdalene, Vezelay basilica
Saint Bernard preaching the 2nd Crusade, in Vézelay, in 1146, Émile Signol – Public domain
Vezelay basilica
St Maximin basilica
