Lent 5: A Most Excellent Encounter between Philosopher-Poets

My dear friend and Divinity School classmate Dianne Bilyak recently interviewed all-arts star James Franco for the Massachusetts Review, and the results are not to be missed. She also interviewed poet Spencer Reece, whose poem "A Clerk's Tale" became the foundation for one of Franco's recent short films (disclosure: I have not yet read the Reece interview, but may have done so and edited this post before some folks get around to reading it). You can listen to audio or read text of the interviews.  Bilyak, a connoisseur of the blurry space between that which we call "secular" and that which we call "sacred," draws out the spiritual and theological themes of Franco's work as only she can. There's something to be said about the connection between faith and spirituality and theology and art, and these are some of the people I'd most want saying it.