Just thinking--Justly?

Engendered perhaps by T-Day...

A. "I'm not as thankful as I should be."

B. "I'm not as thankful as I could be."

There's an infinite divide between these two. "A." is a big tall infinite everlasting order. One must of course presume that: "God Is; and Is a Rewarder of those who diligently seek Him."  If not, then the statement becomes meaningless and all ethics and morals are showpieces to get what we want for ourselves.

"B."is more in the realm of the doable; as it is terminated by the death of the individual.  But is it ever done? The existentialist (non-Kierkegaardian one must hasten to add) would say at death that "IS" was enough.
How satisfying an answer this is--with its hyperautonomous not-accountable assumptions-- I must leave to others to judge. I myself consider it to be a vastly inflated overstatement of an extreme position that fails the reality test even before it proves to be cold comfort to souls committed to the dead of wintery spirituality, if one can call it that. (Another extreme position but quite popular at the moment--to be "spiritual" with no content whatsoever.)

So there will always be, on this plane, "coulda-shoulda-woulda," yet  still and always remaining in the realm of the theoretical. Hence its pernicious and gloomy nature, better suited for extended guilt trip than for Grace!

The "attitude of gratitude" is currently at low ebb in a culture that is quite worn around the edges, and takes its blessings quite for granted; hence loses them.  People often loudly wonder why such things happen.  The Bible has a thoroughgoing but always unpopular accounting for this, said, "many times, many ways..." Why even gravity alone woud be suffcient to explain a lot of it. Then there's entropy. But what we really tacitly and repeatedly reject is the accountability.  "Life is whatcha get away with."  Which of course requires a life of constant deception. 

We are not only not what we should be or could be, we are not even able to come up to our own standards--no matter how low!!!  It "woulda" take a miracle to get there. And it is not possible to live without standards. As Camus said, "suicide is the only serious philosopical question." If one confines one's self to abstractions that is most certainly true--but really not true for most of us. If we are absurdly inconsistent (to others who judge us, chiefly), that's one thing--but to deny order and law--or the reverse--is not physically possible; any more than "shoulda."

"It is what it is"?  And how would we know?

Fur Dennis

I have observed that my writings are, to u, either rated "G" or "R"...the G standing for "Groovy," (as in, "Bill has got his groove back lol")

or the "R" standing for "Rant"!!!=)))

I myself have a harder time distinguishing b/w the two--naturally, unable to be objective about what pops out of my child's mind.

I would suggest however that all my blatherings should be rated "PG" , that is, "Paternal Guidance" advised!

Above entitled "Dies Iris";  my first post of a picture. Yay!!!

LOSS LEADERS

“God has arranged matters so that we won’t die by seeing all the evil in their innermost selves.  He wants us, rather, to see it through the eyes of faith.” (His Eyes)

Watched another Holocaust (for which Luther was partially responsible) film and was again reminded of Hannah Arendt’s term of the “banality of evil.”  Meaning that anyone anytime anywhere can be induced to become a “good Nazi,”usually under some other name.

Long before I became aware of this designation, I was aware that any man could be a Hitler, if all that were within the individual was suddenly unleashed upon the world. And that’s only in regards to the surface matters that we think we know, not in regards to the deeper realms.  Who, after all, wants their thoughts and visions put up on a screen for even one other person to view, much less a larger audience?

I once thought dreams were a good indication of the state of the depth of evil in our hearts; but I now realize that these dream states are themselves heavily censored—for the same reason Luther mentions—so we can “sleep in!”

And of course “A” Huxley made good sense about “The Doors” (of Perception); that even sensory input has to be mostly filtered out—even if he was a nut about LSD.

(We can all contribute a bit of a partial insight—but the whole always escapes us—but good!!!)

 As to more and more proof that we are simply larger children with more elaborate and destructive tools in our hands, and power gone to our heads, I need not adduce any further evidence. “Folly is bound up in the heart of the child (read “adultery”) but the rod of discipline will drive it far from him.” But if said discipline is not made a part of oneself, we are perpetual slaves to the smallest nut or kernel of one’s self.

The sins of Solomon’s sons and of Solomon himself are adequate proof that Sol was only dealing with the  surface of reality, not about internalizing God; it took Christ himself to demonstrate the possibility of more Light from within, which nonetheless is still borrowed, at best, by the rest of us.  “Aye there’s the rub…perchance to dream…(all “nobility” aside!!)

Reality is largely defined by loss—and love much more so. They are, shall we say, “loss leaders”?

ARBEIT MACHT FRIDAY

-'nuff  said, eh?

The Him n All

"Last year at the New Orleans Jazz Fest Steve Martin sang a song that he called, 'the entire atheist hymnal' on one piece of paper. He called it, "Atheists Don't Have no Songs."

"Christians have their hymns and pages,
Hava Nagila's for the Jews,
 Baptists have the Rock of Ages,
Atheists just sing the blues.

Romantics play Claire de Lune,
Born Agains sing, 'He is Risen,'
But no one ever wrote a tune
for godless existentialism.

For atheists there'd no good news. They'll never sing a song of faith.
In their songs they have one rule: the "he" is always lowercase.

Some folks sing a Bach cantata,
Lutherans get Christmas trees,
Atheist songs add up to nada,
But they do have Sundays free.

Glen Kehrein 8/16/48--11/12/11

It's not easy to pen a tribute to someone you've never met, but whose life bordered mine 25 years ago, and influenced me more than I suspected.  Glen founded Circle Urban Ministries, in Austin/Chicago; right next to Oak Park and West Suburban Hospital where I interned.  I'v never been there either but Flo just visited for Glen's funeral.  Glen and his wife Lonnie were planning to retire in our area and had been coming to our church when colon cancer struck him down.  (When that happens to someone our age, it's by definition premature!)

Glen was very big on racial reconciliation and was an elder at Rock Church, a black/white congregation in Austin from which has emerged more community action than I can recount here. The pastor, Glen's close (pun) friend was Raleigh Washington, with whom Glen co-wrote the book, "Breaking Down Walls: A Model for Reconciliation in an Age of Racial Strife."

When I talked briefly with our pastor about Glen, Glen never made reference to any of these works in conversation even though he was given a "Doctorate of Peacekeeping" from Westminster College; one wouldn't suspect these things from just talking to him. I knew his name sounded familiar when it was on our prayer lists week after week, but I couldn't place it until Flo came back from the funeral and showed me the program.

I never read Glen's book; but the title always haunted me and challenged me.  And I did make efforts eventually when the opportunity arose--but tho my efforts ended tragically--Glen's live on.  He always emphasized "intentionality" in regards to racial reconciliation--but that involved full bore participation and availabiity of which I was never capable.(not just "good intentions, as Steve Lopez eventually learned--see below.)

I think for the intellectuallized soul, well, it's just hard to have "soul"; or to understand other people outside of all our categoricalized imperatives. What brings this to mind is the movie we saw last night, "The Soloist," which I strongly recommend esp. for idealistic people or people who put their trust in abstractions and hence use the stories of others to gain awards and fame or self a-steam as unto themselves. But as the movie implies, though grace is inherently resisted by most of us most of the time--there's nothing that can stop it in the end; regardless of the most daunting circumstances. (See Mtt 5:11)  So appearances  are almost always deceiving, because of our strong physical limitations plus our unwillingness to look deeper, spend more time with an individual,and put up with the inconveniences entailed in actuallly grappling with others' sometiemes incomprehensibe and foreign points of view--not to exhaust the list of all our disabilities and childish defense mechanisms. (It may even be that Freud could quickly put "rationalization" and "intellectualisation" on the list of precariously positioned defence mechanisms because of his observations of himself as much as of others. He was still by nature an up-tight quintessential white European, after all!)

"Glen served the Lord, his family, and the ministry faithfully. His quick wit, sense of humor, mentoring heart and compassion will be greatly missed."  He mentored others--now he will be mentored by the Worthy One. One can't say enough about the value of such  a life--or of any other life--yet ironically it is all too easy to say too much, by adding in our endless assumptions and their corollaries.  Better to leave it to others who actually and easily live such a life as his, in the same way a real rose exudes its fragrance. Take my wife...

sheeples

An independent confirmation of the independent origins of words, esp. neologisms.

Yesterday I was driving back home from an independent jog at Snyder's Grove, a local wooded nature preserve where I also ski during the winter. Perfect when the winds are high on the prayeree.

Less than a mile westward on the Troy Grove blacktop there's an old fashhioned homestead with "clean animals"  including a hillside of black- and white-faced sheep.  I was again impressed and comforted with this now uncommon sight, so I said to myself, "Hi, sheeples!"  I wrote this down immediately in my usual risky fashion, and intended to write more. As often happens though, when I consulted Ste. Google, it appears that this has been a word used rather regularly by some columnists.

The origin of it seems obscure, but not the intent--it's a derogatory term to refer to people like sheep rather than the reverse--although it could technically go the other way. But Orwell and many others have a long tradition of despising at least their definition of "sheeples"--more indicative of a satirical attitude than of all the term implies.

The fact of the matter is this doesn't really apply to all thoughtless followers. Are Islamicists sheeplike?  No one I have ever read terms them, "like lambs to the slaughter"  So while columunists are careful to use the sheeple term mostly in other contexts, it is really in essence a swipe at Jesus'  frequent use of sheep to describe His children. Very few people will take Christ or His words directly on.  But since Christ always referred to sheep and their offspring in an entirely positive way, one can progressively get in sideways digs at Christ by in essence mocking His children, i.e. His "little flock."

I doubt I can do justice to this subject off my cuff links; but I think it does run a parallel course to the almost exclusive use of Jesus Christ as a slur, never a blessing; as alluded to in my comments about "Cold Souls."

"MYSTERION..."

(this Greek word) can mean “revealed” as much as “concealed.”

--“something shown or given albeit in a surprising, obscure way.” –Jill Caratinni

“I have never met an ordinary human being.” CSL

“If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel’s heartbeat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence. As it is the quickest of us walk about well wadded with stupidity.”—George Eliot

But…is it Stupidity? Or more’n likely, Cupidity?

“Blessed are the poor in spirit…”

“Poor” must by the nature of the concept be defined in negatives, as a lack or even a vacuum.  (Poverty Sucks?)  It’s like Paul Giacometti  in a soul-free state—light, empty, and bored, in his own script. It’s a series of have-nots, not even have-knots of the soulful or the “soulish”!

Everyone has an idea of what false humility is—but we define it by finger pointing; finger painting makes more sense than this and is lots more fun—yet we are stuck by defining ourselves as righteous, if only because it’s all we know, it’s the only grid we have—and this “default setting” of Cupidity kicks in automatically. And even the mightiest of our efforts only serve to solidify our position as being the only possible correct one.  “O who will deliver me from this body….” As I discussed recently.

In reality, we don’t need to declare ourselves poor; because our poverty is far deeper and wider than we can “think or imagine.”  (Some would even define our worst poverty as primarily a want of imagination—for which we substitute “imaging studies” and other exercises in “the banality of evil.”

This Beatitude is truly a be-attitude—possibly more in an existential than a dynamic sense, at times—something that is fixed but of which we are not really aware—even though others can pick up on it instantly—esp. children.  Personality Order.  Disordered by nature?  (pretty sad compared to the order of the simplest feather of the the drabbest of birds)

Even a declaration of dependence, by its nature of being “my” declaration and hence remaining self-oriented, defeats itself; plus it is meant to be heard and recognized by others—and for what purpose—we can well imagine!!

We try so hard, esp. as Christians who consider ourselves “mature” “adults” but by our efforts have confined ourselves to a zero-sum option when we try so hard to embellish our humble estate and regale God Himself with words,  words, and more words.  I speak here as a word-addict, not as a free man!!!  But surely we don’t think we will be justified by our many words.

“To have lived is not enough—he (man) has to talk about it.” And so Mr. Beckett did so, as well—with the added warning that he too had to pander to the “bright set” or forfeit his living on the proceeds of writing.  I believe that the professional writer is handicapped from the outset—and has to be sure that his stuff has enough entertainment value to be purchased in sufficient quantities to support him or her. The “blog” avoids the trap of commercial bias—but cannot emerge from the self-serving bias nonetheless.

“Enough!” said Vladmir—for now. Pensees away! “Christ-shaped vacuums, unite! Nothing to lose but…”

It stands to reason

that there is more to life than reason...or is it still just all Kant?

"Kant never did anything"--countless Moms and Dads

If Descartes mistook the pineal gland for the soul--what else was he wrong about?

Man's real Dictum should be: "I think; therefore I'm wrong."  --even in a forest with no women in earshot--

Speaking of trees, I hope every body saw the video of the naturally falling double redwood on the weather channel! A tsunami of wood!!!

To: Dilbert cc Scott Adams Paper Co.: An ent in the office!!! "I am the Ambassador of Trees. You are accused of crimes against wood for your excessive copying and printing!"

"And then he started biting me."

dogbert: "His bark is worse."

Ta da!!!

(My blog is built on the shoulders of giants in da land--no trees or even bushes were harmed in the making of this blog, either. So dere!  Copying strictly prohibited.)

Flo, where did we put those ent traps..."

Gems from latest Touch Stone

Rebecca Sicree:”If Chesterton had been blessed with children, he would have learned that the ‘democracy of the dead’ is often overthrown by the dictatorship of one’s descendents.”

Phillip E. Johnson: “…despite the title, Darwin’s ‘Origin of Species’ explained the survival of species, but not the arrival of species.”

Anthony Esolen (on Christina Rossetti’s “In the Bleak Midwinter”:  “The good of the child is beyond quantity. A hedonistic world is, at base, cruel, pitiless.  That is because sensual pleasure can be calibrated. (“Cold Souls” make this a point of satire”

“What cheer for the heart!  All the gears of the world grind on, the smokestacks belch and politicians speak, scientists distill medicines and poisons, producers product, but the true world is (still, and still, I say…) is here, at the side of the Christ child, in stillness and joy.”

“ ‘What can I give him/poor as I am…?’”

“Again  it is no sentimental question…’Let the little children come unto me’”

(Paul the Giacometti sure uses His name a lot—it’s strangely almost the only swear word he uses…intentional, or just force of  habit? Due to the Force of “That Name”; and of course its rather intimate relationship to our souls--???

Joseph Honeycutt, reviewing “At the Roots of Christian Bioethics”, a collection of essays on the thought of Tristram Englehardt, Jr.:

“Englehardt’s longtime friend Thomas Bole says of him,’He came to realize that fallen man could not reason to a common morality.’

“Ethics is a process of healing and restoring the capacity to experience the Transcendent God raTther than conforming to a natural order characterized in terms of law.”

(How dys-appointing for all those “Natural Law” conservatives—and Pharisees as well!”

inter aliens

pensee-in'

Did u know :that insurance companies have hired bounty hunters?  Each worker gains on the average of  $8 for every drug they deny?  And how does one oppose such incentives?

"Cold Souls"--an interesting variant of a Faust legend.  It's still about commerce i.e. the "Blackest Market."

 Ta Dennis: Thanks for the film about Burmese Video Journalism--also on the black market as far as the "Martial Arts" government is concerned.  My Dad has a friend who has been banned from Burma for his support of these folks. But Mark is still there.  The agenda for the missionary is not antipolitical but, practically speaking, apolitical--Christ-ocentric as it were and is.  ML points out that the moral/philosophical roads may or may not include God--but I feel pretty strongly that politics defined all of the forces arrayed against Jesus--military, "King, eh." religious, secular, Law-Full et alia. By the Way, Dennis--are you related to the "Dennis" of the Holy Grail the movie? Dennis' words have found themselves into the Arthurian section of the Norton's Anthology of Literature.

"No man ever spoke like this man." is still true. I find no convincing reason to disbelieve Christ--least of all in favor of Beckett and his crew--in any particular.  When the secular world comes up with something even equal to the Words of Christ, I will pay attention. "Waiting for Godot" was memorized like the Koran while I was growing up, and my Dad  considered this "good news' with a few tons of secondary gain. Otherwise it's all fuel to the fire--sans annihilation. Even something burned or blown up retains all of its substance, merely dispersed to other forms.  The same is true of the soul--in spite of the "playing around" common to "Doc" Faust to Pall Giacometti and the New Yorker from which he gets his ideas and temptations. More about that perhaps after I actually finish the two movies referenced above.
//
By the way, one could do worse than go over the words of the 70's song, "The Garden of Earthly Delights" which of course comes from H. Bosch's trip-itch. Glad I didn't marry into that/her family!!!

What's Answers? Answers is a magazine...how much?

"Christians can anwer these objections clearly, correctly, and accurately because they have insight from the New Testament." --Martin Luther

"It is not that Christianity has been tried and found wanting; it is that it has been found too difficult and left untried." --G K Chesterton, my paraphrase..

Similarly, the answers to the semi-eternal rhetorical questions of doubters about suffering are already clearly spelled out, even to the point of Christ's and God's own suffering; albeit they are incomprehensible to those who cannot think their way out of the paper bag of carnality/materialism.  This is simply because suffering cannot be satisfactorily addressed by human reasong and its various -isms at all--unless one is "committed" -if that's the word in such a context- to total meaninglessness or utter absurdity.

I find it interesting, as an aside, that humans have returned from their industrial age hubris  to the pervasive idea of original sin and of man being innately sinful, minus a Savior of course. That is to say, "nature" is inherently good--and that if there is any evil on the earth, man is entirely to blame. Exactly! I would call this "Secular Calvinism"--which is ironically and humorously revealed in the mixture of Calvin and Hobbes! Again, exactly so!  The dividing point is, God IS or God isn't, which are axioms, not provable in this life--one has to go with one or the other--on faith--all men have to have a ready supply of faith; or as Camus implied, there's really only the Hamlet question--which ironically Shakespeare combines with Pascal's Wager.

Summa Theological: Yes Captain, we have answers. The Bible has answers even though we can't explain each individual case--but, neither can science--"(statistics) (one size) fits all--but not real well..."  And the fact that we CAN'T reason our way out of paper bag or cardboard box does not need proof, it is empirically a non-sequitir.

( I might also add the legal logic of "hard cases make bad law".)

mea culpa

I still can't seem to put comments in my own blog. Somehow it doesn't recognize my gmail account and won't give me any choices, even Google account. Strange.

But I am glad for your acute reading, my friend. At the time the letter was written, the most recent letter before that referred to the new publication of her second, and, alas, final novel. So I assumed that A was not commenting on something older. "MY BAD" an all thet there.

Flannery O'Connor to "A" 6-25-60

(Re: "The Violent Bear it Away" a just-)

"The mummy was an idol to Enoch if you want to anayze it but the fact is you can't analyze that kind of attraction. For the book as a whole, it was the figure for the new jesus--a shrivelled man."

"HIDE THE BEER THE PASTOR'S HERE!!!"

Re: Drink up and cheers:

Re: John 6:53  “unless you drink His Blood…you have no life in you.”

“Let’s look at this from another angle. If I were to say.’Wittenberg beer quenches thirst. Annaberg beer also quenches thirst,’ then I don’t exclude other beers. But it would be very different if I were to say,’If you don’t drink Wittenberg beer, no other beer will quench your thirst.’ In the same way, Christ doesn’t speak in the affirmative here. He excludes everything else…if we despise His flesh, nothing else will prove helpful.”

“No matter what anyone else says, this passage is clear.”    --Martin Luther

Way too clear for most of us---and most of His marginal disciples then, as well. Many “left off following Him” after this declaration. Talk about auto-weeding tares in the wheat!!!

According to the go-spell of Mr. Clemens noted yesterday, we do indeed have the basic facts about Jesus, not only from Matthew et al but from Genesis to Isaiah to Josephus. The distortions and contortions mankind goes through to attempt to defeat, declaw, or at least neutralize the simplicity of not only the Gospels but of Jesus’ actual words, are appalling indeed to observe—and there is no neutral ground; and, no, we are not here speaking of armies or politics or economics or any other form of reality-on-the-surface; mistaking tastes or personal preferences for the Reality that is utterly “other” but at the same time touching the very core of our hearts and souls—if we value them at all, of course.

The story and the spine of the world is, “Immanuel”, “God with us.”  Have we become so spineless that even the name of Christ can only be mentioned in “society”,--- high, low,  or median---except in the most profane and disrespectful sense—observing so strictly and totally the “don’t ask don’t tell” unwritten policy that the world despises about everything else except Jesus?

Mark Twain, G'nite

"First make sure you get the facts. Then you can twist them anyway you please."  (my paraphrase)

Verbicidal--Let's murder someone after we murder our English!!!

“Verbicide must precede homicide.  Vocabulary remains the turning point.” –Paul Greenberg, Pulitzer winning commentator. Think, “Tutsi cockroach” or “Jewish swine”…or “fetus”…

“Novelist and medical doctor Walker Percy wrote, in 1981, ‘To proabortionists; according to the oopinion polls, it looks as though you may get your way—‘

(much to their personal and group self-destruction, I might add—there’s no madness quite so complete as destroying your own offspring like Mr. Saturn—because their might be less [sic] for the individual in the short-short run)

…Percy might not be surprised by the continuing turn of events.”Picture the scene, a Galileo trial in reverse.  The Supreme Court is cross examining a high school biology teacher and admonishing him that of course it is only his personal opinion that the fertilized ovum is an individual human life. He is enjoined not to teach his private beliefs at a public school. Like Galileo, he caves in, but in turning away is heard to murmur, ‘But it’s still alive!’”

-Kathryn Jean Lopez