As I am writing this at about 530 pm, it has been a slow rain all day long. My neighbor's usually large anniversary celebration--they have 10 kids--has been moved to a pole barn in Troy Grove. I picked beans in the rain after church since it seemed to me it was not going to let up. And it hasn't. It picks up, then slows slightly--a perfect storm, that is, no thunder, high winds or lightning. I am also pretty sure this is due to hurricane activity to the south of us, as I have seen this pattern before.
The concept of the latter rain, as a segment of the earth cools, is recorded in the Bible, in fact, it was very much depended upon and often made a second crop possible. Jews were expected to contribute a percentage of their first fruits from the former rain, ie the first crop after spring rains. The second harvest in some ways could trump the first in that the plants had longer to mature, and one could plant again even around the first ones, and there was no latter rain harvest offering required. So that if one is less than thankful, one could withhold more of the harvest for one's self or the winter, whichever is worse!
Winter wheat is the product of latter rains and the cooling of the land to the point of enhanced growth growth and may even come from the ungleaned seeds left on the ground, to the point where it is not necessary to scatter new seed. I plant some wheat and oats every year, and the oats are sprouting again at the base of my small patch.
Two items of interest from the BBC: first, a man in Massachusets was operated upon for a lung cancer, and it turns out it was a "biodiversity neoplasm," a pea plant about one half inch long that had gone to seed, and out of it again, in his lung. Very funny, God, said the patient. It is not recorded whether he has stopped the sin of smoking yet--Ban the Hobbits!!!
Also that areas of subSaharan Africa have been in a 40 year drought--yet the biomass of the area has actually increased! (It sure doesn't slow down the weeds much, here) In other words, it only took subtle changes in order to adapt fully, at least on the green side of the equation.
In Serbia, the Greek Orthodox bishop has called for repentance in exchange for rain. He says it is all because of sin and lack of stewardship of what we have been given. Which is of course exactly the doctrine of the religion of Science. Whatever bad happens down here, it's still and always our fault. Some of our Greenpeace folks could give us some lessons in the worldwise application of Absolute Calvinism. Religion does not in general deal in the sins of animals or plants, were that even possible. (on the other hand, bad kittie! See Simon's Cat on U Tube)
Being so involved with plants and trees, naturally I am very drought-sensitive and tend even to stress about it. This drought felt different than 1988 and so on. Maybe because I am older. I tended from the beginning towards acceptance and a kind of resignation. And the fact that weathermen are like doctors--they have to get paid whether they are right or wrong--is an additional reassurance for us! Life goes on.
Taking a wait-and-see approach is usually better than global panic, wouldn't you say? Nor with all the green I have planted--diversity included for those who obsess about such things--do I have any use for guilty feelings about the environment. If everyone was like me, the corporate world and our consumerist capacity would be starving to death. Don't look to me to give the economy a lift!
On the other hand, I agree with one statement from "Jurassic Park"--- "Life will find a way." It will take a lot stronger force than mere human sin, original or invented or proposed, to make this planet uninhabitable. It will be be desolated at some point of course, no matter how old one thinks the earth is. And it will not be flooding but "fervent heat," or "heat death." As James Baldwin titled his most salient work with a Biblically-derived quote, "The Fire Next Time" could occur soon--but probably not today....
Sunday, August 26, 2012
"The Rash (of) Vows of Youth"
I mentioned recently Mike Roe and the 77's, a rock band which provided some music on the darker side for some of us in the Christian Halfway House. A lot of his songs have to do with the disappointments of the love affairs of youth. Sanguine on the music, melancholic on relationships, struggling with "the lonely crowd" (Riesman's concept and book now a sociology classic)
One of their earlier albums was called, "Sticks and Stones," and was well known for one ironic reason; Side A features a song called, "This is the Way Love is," with the chorus including the statement that love is: "one-sided, double-minded mirror with no reflection." Clever. But side B has no Roe at all. Someone at "Broken Records" and company mistakenly put what I guess I could only call Christian Easy Listening, as I might have called it in my more rash and impertinent days.
It includes some songs familiar to many "ordinary" Christians in the West, such as, "The More Excellent Way," and "Make me a Servant," which largely speak to the qualities of genuine love, which, as Paul avowed in 1Cor 13, is never self serving, nor merely a mirror of our own feelings, but an effort to escape the distortion- mirrors of teenage angst and self-consciousness which is so biologically present at that age.
.
Whereas in those days I was upset and irritated by this "unmet expectation," when I listened this time I was greatly relieved to find that Roe was wrong. It brought me back to our wedding day when we affirmed Paul's words and his near-absolute definition of love. With the steadiness of Flo, that definition has become a daily reality, tho I still struggle with selfishness much more than she does--hence I know, practically speaking, what "unconditional love" is-- and this is what Love Really Is. McWorld may agree with this in principle, but the practices it sells are quite the opposite.
In fact, I would say that my attraction to the 77's of old is part of my partial refusal to grow up. I could say that about all my preoccupations with hard rock--which is almost entirely about power, certainly not about love--as opposed to the simple commands of Christ, which are "not grievous," not impossible, and not to be neglected. The "easy listening" songs hit me much harder last week, and in a much more needy spot, than this early music of youth.
The book of Numbers, in Chapter 30, deals entirely with vows. And how they can be superseded. For men, sadly, there was left little recourse except to pay them and to keep their promises. You can choose your options, as it has been said, but not your consequences. I also might add that vows leave scars; that our culture is perpetually adolescent and virtually parentless on the whole, being defined largely by contracts, not covenants; and that the youth of my generation suffered from too much money and privilege and determined to deliberatly poison their own nest--and, sad to add, their own marriages and children. After a very bad start, but also after 30 more years, I can say that all of that wisdom and most of those feelings were bogus. Love does drive us--but if there is no working and bedrock definition, love loses all power and is utterly inconvincing and fickle to the core. There is virtually nothing at which to aim.
Another line of Roe's from that era was, "You won't change me, that I know!" Well surprise x 3!!!
"Never tell God what you won't do"--because that may well be the very thing he requires of you--and I would add, the very thing you will need to go forward from the glue factory of youth culture. Roe, to his credit, and some of his friends, did actually grow up. No doubt they were very angry with "Broken Records" at the time--but from what I hear from The Lost Dogs, there really isn't anything on Side B with which they would now disagree. Roe was ironically blessed by an antidote to his own despair, on his own recording! Stange and Wonderful how God breaks in--with, uh, "mistakes."
Unconditional Love is Real, folks; "that I know." Not impossible at all; and we all can live under its umbrella--if we want it--"come and get it..."
One of their earlier albums was called, "Sticks and Stones," and was well known for one ironic reason; Side A features a song called, "This is the Way Love is," with the chorus including the statement that love is: "one-sided, double-minded mirror with no reflection." Clever. But side B has no Roe at all. Someone at "Broken Records" and company mistakenly put what I guess I could only call Christian Easy Listening, as I might have called it in my more rash and impertinent days.
It includes some songs familiar to many "ordinary" Christians in the West, such as, "The More Excellent Way," and "Make me a Servant," which largely speak to the qualities of genuine love, which, as Paul avowed in 1Cor 13, is never self serving, nor merely a mirror of our own feelings, but an effort to escape the distortion- mirrors of teenage angst and self-consciousness which is so biologically present at that age.
.
Whereas in those days I was upset and irritated by this "unmet expectation," when I listened this time I was greatly relieved to find that Roe was wrong. It brought me back to our wedding day when we affirmed Paul's words and his near-absolute definition of love. With the steadiness of Flo, that definition has become a daily reality, tho I still struggle with selfishness much more than she does--hence I know, practically speaking, what "unconditional love" is-- and this is what Love Really Is. McWorld may agree with this in principle, but the practices it sells are quite the opposite.
In fact, I would say that my attraction to the 77's of old is part of my partial refusal to grow up. I could say that about all my preoccupations with hard rock--which is almost entirely about power, certainly not about love--as opposed to the simple commands of Christ, which are "not grievous," not impossible, and not to be neglected. The "easy listening" songs hit me much harder last week, and in a much more needy spot, than this early music of youth.
The book of Numbers, in Chapter 30, deals entirely with vows. And how they can be superseded. For men, sadly, there was left little recourse except to pay them and to keep their promises. You can choose your options, as it has been said, but not your consequences. I also might add that vows leave scars; that our culture is perpetually adolescent and virtually parentless on the whole, being defined largely by contracts, not covenants; and that the youth of my generation suffered from too much money and privilege and determined to deliberatly poison their own nest--and, sad to add, their own marriages and children. After a very bad start, but also after 30 more years, I can say that all of that wisdom and most of those feelings were bogus. Love does drive us--but if there is no working and bedrock definition, love loses all power and is utterly inconvincing and fickle to the core. There is virtually nothing at which to aim.
Another line of Roe's from that era was, "You won't change me, that I know!" Well surprise x 3!!!
"Never tell God what you won't do"--because that may well be the very thing he requires of you--and I would add, the very thing you will need to go forward from the glue factory of youth culture. Roe, to his credit, and some of his friends, did actually grow up. No doubt they were very angry with "Broken Records" at the time--but from what I hear from The Lost Dogs, there really isn't anything on Side B with which they would now disagree. Roe was ironically blessed by an antidote to his own despair, on his own recording! Stange and Wonderful how God breaks in--with, uh, "mistakes."
Unconditional Love is Real, folks; "that I know." Not impossible at all; and we all can live under its umbrella--if we want it--"come and get it..."
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Mass Rx
Dennis and I will remember those high and mighty hippie days when some dreamed of putting LSD in the water system so as to "enlighten" the "endarkened" masses of older and less sanguine/progressive folks.
The hipsters used the Dow Co. slogan of "Better Living Through Chemistry." I didn't particularly buy into this. The couple of times I inhaled cannabis it did nothing for me except make we look strange to my girlfriend of the time; at Shimer College circa 1970.
But there are those-- perhaps the majority of those who still celebrate the halycon hippie days of Shimer-- who have never grown out of this--like the Huxley's, they simply have added the old brew of evolution, materialism, sophistry, and gossip--so they remain stuck--how ironic for Progressives, so-called! But then, as now, outsiders to this very limited paradigm are not welcome--it is, also ironically, a closed shop. They have forfeited their curiosity for reactionary nostalgia and tossed in more hubris to help them to fail to change.
I was not then, nor am I now, part of this. Also strangely enough, some of the conversants, still materialists to the core, sound a lot like tea partiers.It strengthens my theory that there is always an Uncle Adolph in each one of us who would like nothing better than world domination (see again Animal Farm and When the Sleeper Wakes.) Darwinism drastically lowers the threshold for the raw expression of this anti-God particle, as we saw unmixed in the 20th Century. And on into the 21st, with drone executions and the extension of governmental and corporate individual surveillance ad infinitum. Drone sales to police departments will soon eclipse their use in war; as if that weren't bad enough, or unsuccessful enough!
There was only one person, a prophetess, who warned the Trojans (our team in Mendota) not to bring the wooden giant hobby horse into the city. It was no offering, neither to the godz nor to the Trojans and Trojanettes. Dennis probably can find her name. (Penelope?)
Small single voices are increasingly unheard in the decrepit buzzing mess we call our civilization. It certainly sometimes seems as if someone had dropped a general anesthetic in the water. (See Walker Percy's "The Thanatos Syndrome," for a full blown application of this--that was his last book, and the one most prophetic, and the most thoroughly ignored. Probably because it sounds pretty pro-life by the end of the book.) However, given our 99.999% carnal nature, mass applications of drugs, like fertilizer in a drought, are pretty useless, even to the evil one!.
I am very careful not to call myself a prophet, since the standards of a prophet are pretty high; you have to be in near perfect communication with God, like Elijah or Moses; and even if you get the right instructions, it makes no difference at the last if you disobey them, like Balaam or even Moses himself.
"The discerning of spirits" is more my gift--what seems perfectly clear to me about the various manifestations and excretions of the Weltgeist seem quite opaque to others and, as Chesterton said of Christianity itself, "found too difficult and left untried." I don't find this difficult at all--just like a recurring nightmare, it comes unbidden. ("I see dead people," now revived in the cartoon ParaNorman.) I see dead and dying societies, ideas, sciences, sophisticated men and ladies, philosophies, and so on--rather in the spirit of Ste. Flannery, who had this gift in spades; and was ignored because of it.
When few people or no one listens, this is a difficult gift. One does not get positive feedback--it's rather like pain, which Yancey describes as, "The Gift Nobody Wants;" Unless you are a leper, in which case your will be wanting it more than anything.....
The hipsters used the Dow Co. slogan of "Better Living Through Chemistry." I didn't particularly buy into this. The couple of times I inhaled cannabis it did nothing for me except make we look strange to my girlfriend of the time; at Shimer College circa 1970.
But there are those-- perhaps the majority of those who still celebrate the halycon hippie days of Shimer-- who have never grown out of this--like the Huxley's, they simply have added the old brew of evolution, materialism, sophistry, and gossip--so they remain stuck--how ironic for Progressives, so-called! But then, as now, outsiders to this very limited paradigm are not welcome--it is, also ironically, a closed shop. They have forfeited their curiosity for reactionary nostalgia and tossed in more hubris to help them to fail to change.
I was not then, nor am I now, part of this. Also strangely enough, some of the conversants, still materialists to the core, sound a lot like tea partiers.It strengthens my theory that there is always an Uncle Adolph in each one of us who would like nothing better than world domination (see again Animal Farm and When the Sleeper Wakes.) Darwinism drastically lowers the threshold for the raw expression of this anti-God particle, as we saw unmixed in the 20th Century. And on into the 21st, with drone executions and the extension of governmental and corporate individual surveillance ad infinitum. Drone sales to police departments will soon eclipse their use in war; as if that weren't bad enough, or unsuccessful enough!
There was only one person, a prophetess, who warned the Trojans (our team in Mendota) not to bring the wooden giant hobby horse into the city. It was no offering, neither to the godz nor to the Trojans and Trojanettes. Dennis probably can find her name. (Penelope?)
Small single voices are increasingly unheard in the decrepit buzzing mess we call our civilization. It certainly sometimes seems as if someone had dropped a general anesthetic in the water. (See Walker Percy's "The Thanatos Syndrome," for a full blown application of this--that was his last book, and the one most prophetic, and the most thoroughly ignored. Probably because it sounds pretty pro-life by the end of the book.) However, given our 99.999% carnal nature, mass applications of drugs, like fertilizer in a drought, are pretty useless, even to the evil one!.
I am very careful not to call myself a prophet, since the standards of a prophet are pretty high; you have to be in near perfect communication with God, like Elijah or Moses; and even if you get the right instructions, it makes no difference at the last if you disobey them, like Balaam or even Moses himself.
"The discerning of spirits" is more my gift--what seems perfectly clear to me about the various manifestations and excretions of the Weltgeist seem quite opaque to others and, as Chesterton said of Christianity itself, "found too difficult and left untried." I don't find this difficult at all--just like a recurring nightmare, it comes unbidden. ("I see dead people," now revived in the cartoon ParaNorman.) I see dead and dying societies, ideas, sciences, sophisticated men and ladies, philosophies, and so on--rather in the spirit of Ste. Flannery, who had this gift in spades; and was ignored because of it.
When few people or no one listens, this is a difficult gift. One does not get positive feedback--it's rather like pain, which Yancey describes as, "The Gift Nobody Wants;" Unless you are a leper, in which case your will be wanting it more than anything.....
Sunday, August 19, 2012
"3 in the afternoon" (earlier than Lorca)
Lorca was certainly a great Spanish poet--who wrote in Portugese --and he was also a victim of Franco's, the dictator and ally of Hitler who cut short what might have been a lengthy and splendid reign as Spain's Poet Laureate. Or would he have been able to do so? If he had not been killed, would he have ended like Sylvia Plath in her Bell Jar anyway?
I have been reviewing some of my old music, from the Doors to Christian Alternative Music--whatever that was. As is obvious from the careers of young musicians from Mozart to now, there are many who burn themselves out like a shooting star, as the most common metaphor goes.
But then there are others who start out ablaze and then just gradually turn the heat down. I think that would in particular pertain to the Rolling Stones, who have developed into a money making machine and another property of the corporate world while talking politics out of the other sides of their mouth. (I guess the side of the mouth that doesn't have the cigarette hanging out of it.)
But most people aren't that "lucky." Yet, how boring must it be to play, "I can't get no satisfaction," for the 10,000 time; but at the same time also knowing that it is still true? More so than ever?
During my Cornerstone years, I followed a few bands and leaders avidly, such as Derri Daugherty of The Choir, Mike Roe of the 77's (the Jim Morrison for Christians), and also the multifaceted careers of Eugene Eugene, Terry Taylor, and the other musicians of The Swirling Eddies, Adam Again, and Daniel Amos. I came across a minor compilation album called Brow Beat which is loosely subtitled as "unplugged alternative." It has one song by The Choir and another one by the Lost Dogs, the latter entitled, "No Ship Coming in."
It appears that the younger the artist, the more ferociously they tend to point the finger, backwards actually, at older types of music or ministry as being inane, inadequate, and hypocritical. Of course this is biologically a necessity, they tell me, and unhealthy if you don't fully indulge yourself in full tilt assault on one's parents and authority figures that are on the way out anyway... It is as if what is old and probably already on the way out, have to be given an extra push from the artist in order to wipe out the middle class or what ever. Then the artist can probably point back and show how they made a difference, contributing to something that was going to happen anyway, but wouldn't have had to happen with such bitterness and envy and not a little hubris; had it not been for their little pushcarts.(Notice how abruptly it stopped, and how little it seemed, on 9/11/01.)
To say that I did not indulge myself in that would of course be quite untrue. Nonetheless, I did hue to my Unitarian traditions which for a while since they seemed to fit in with this Manifest Destiny of the spirit of the age type of juggernaut; for almost 30 years. Marriage, the advent of children, the making of friends, the finding of meaningful work well beyond the reach of artistic talent; tend to change most of us. However for those who are yet still doomed to, "work it on out, baby" there are indeed alternatives which have not much to do with alternative music, whose wave has already passed anyway.
That the men I named above were unsung musical and poetic paragons I can allege but not prove to those who have not listened. But even though their original bands are currently on-again and off-again, and some members are physically dead or live at great distances apart, their alternative career has been to compose songs "together separately" and occasionally find time to play in public but more often release albums under the band name of "The Lost Dogs." This you might say is a small collection of the best musicians of their time. Except that they have chosen for the most part to go back to a kind of roots music, a mix of original folks music and country music only occasionally resorting to rock 'n roll per se. Of all the songs on the album, "No Ship Coming in," is the most thoughtful and least reactionary--reactionary in the rebellious sense as opposed to the conservative sense which is largely defined by the opposition.
Some people never do grow up. I keep a sign in my house that says, "Hippies Welcome," in case any of these come to dinner--but generally they do not as they are too urbane to wander out this far. I occasionally meet burned out hipsters who only come here because they have no "alternative." R. Crumb may be one of those, although he has taken quite a piercing second look at his first career. Thus he remains productive, in a sense, and can still try "new-old things."
I suppose one might ask in the face of this whether I have grown up. I said I wouldn't. Or couldn't. But it may have snuck up on me. Nonetheless, my point would be that no matter how badly your chosen culture beats you up and spits you out, for many if not most they claim to what they know i.e. the ash heap is better than the devil that they don't--worse yet, than the angel that they don't know...
Getting back to "The Lost Dogs"--who got lost for a minute there--I guess my point would be that one doesn't necessarily have to give up one's talent altogether but it can be redirected in a more practical and humane manner, with due respect for what has gone before, while still disdaining, to an appropriate level, the quarterly report. There certainly is no financial incentive for the leaders of forever struggling small groups to come together and pool their talents. The one thing I miss about Cornerstone is that the inter-generational conflict eventually gave way to peacemaking not in a wishful sense but in a very practical sense. But for now, we are still lost dogs, we still have lost dogs, and we still have The Lost Dogs as well. One could do far worse on a Sunday afternoon then to give them a thoughtful listen.
(But for those of us who still have to have an occasional taste of hard rock, sample the 77's!)
I have been reviewing some of my old music, from the Doors to Christian Alternative Music--whatever that was. As is obvious from the careers of young musicians from Mozart to now, there are many who burn themselves out like a shooting star, as the most common metaphor goes.
But then there are others who start out ablaze and then just gradually turn the heat down. I think that would in particular pertain to the Rolling Stones, who have developed into a money making machine and another property of the corporate world while talking politics out of the other sides of their mouth. (I guess the side of the mouth that doesn't have the cigarette hanging out of it.)
But most people aren't that "lucky." Yet, how boring must it be to play, "I can't get no satisfaction," for the 10,000 time; but at the same time also knowing that it is still true? More so than ever?
During my Cornerstone years, I followed a few bands and leaders avidly, such as Derri Daugherty of The Choir, Mike Roe of the 77's (the Jim Morrison for Christians), and also the multifaceted careers of Eugene Eugene, Terry Taylor, and the other musicians of The Swirling Eddies, Adam Again, and Daniel Amos. I came across a minor compilation album called Brow Beat which is loosely subtitled as "unplugged alternative." It has one song by The Choir and another one by the Lost Dogs, the latter entitled, "No Ship Coming in."
It appears that the younger the artist, the more ferociously they tend to point the finger, backwards actually, at older types of music or ministry as being inane, inadequate, and hypocritical. Of course this is biologically a necessity, they tell me, and unhealthy if you don't fully indulge yourself in full tilt assault on one's parents and authority figures that are on the way out anyway... It is as if what is old and probably already on the way out, have to be given an extra push from the artist in order to wipe out the middle class or what ever. Then the artist can probably point back and show how they made a difference, contributing to something that was going to happen anyway, but wouldn't have had to happen with such bitterness and envy and not a little hubris; had it not been for their little pushcarts.(Notice how abruptly it stopped, and how little it seemed, on 9/11/01.)
To say that I did not indulge myself in that would of course be quite untrue. Nonetheless, I did hue to my Unitarian traditions which for a while since they seemed to fit in with this Manifest Destiny of the spirit of the age type of juggernaut; for almost 30 years. Marriage, the advent of children, the making of friends, the finding of meaningful work well beyond the reach of artistic talent; tend to change most of us. However for those who are yet still doomed to, "work it on out, baby" there are indeed alternatives which have not much to do with alternative music, whose wave has already passed anyway.
That the men I named above were unsung musical and poetic paragons I can allege but not prove to those who have not listened. But even though their original bands are currently on-again and off-again, and some members are physically dead or live at great distances apart, their alternative career has been to compose songs "together separately" and occasionally find time to play in public but more often release albums under the band name of "The Lost Dogs." This you might say is a small collection of the best musicians of their time. Except that they have chosen for the most part to go back to a kind of roots music, a mix of original folks music and country music only occasionally resorting to rock 'n roll per se. Of all the songs on the album, "No Ship Coming in," is the most thoughtful and least reactionary--reactionary in the rebellious sense as opposed to the conservative sense which is largely defined by the opposition.
Some people never do grow up. I keep a sign in my house that says, "Hippies Welcome," in case any of these come to dinner--but generally they do not as they are too urbane to wander out this far. I occasionally meet burned out hipsters who only come here because they have no "alternative." R. Crumb may be one of those, although he has taken quite a piercing second look at his first career. Thus he remains productive, in a sense, and can still try "new-old things."
I suppose one might ask in the face of this whether I have grown up. I said I wouldn't. Or couldn't. But it may have snuck up on me. Nonetheless, my point would be that no matter how badly your chosen culture beats you up and spits you out, for many if not most they claim to what they know i.e. the ash heap is better than the devil that they don't--worse yet, than the angel that they don't know...
Getting back to "The Lost Dogs"--who got lost for a minute there--I guess my point would be that one doesn't necessarily have to give up one's talent altogether but it can be redirected in a more practical and humane manner, with due respect for what has gone before, while still disdaining, to an appropriate level, the quarterly report. There certainly is no financial incentive for the leaders of forever struggling small groups to come together and pool their talents. The one thing I miss about Cornerstone is that the inter-generational conflict eventually gave way to peacemaking not in a wishful sense but in a very practical sense. But for now, we are still lost dogs, we still have lost dogs, and we still have The Lost Dogs as well. One could do far worse on a Sunday afternoon then to give them a thoughtful listen.
(But for those of us who still have to have an occasional taste of hard rock, sample the 77's!)
THE HIGHER DEGREES
have in some senses the greater opportunity to bless, in some cases--but the higher degree of responsibility gives them even greater risks of hazard and hubris. Whether it be MD, DO, PhD, MDiv or any other--"when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." (Maslow) Whether you are Calvin or Thor, or an Orthopedist. " The temptation to misuse these things" is awe full.
"Does she want anything sawed?" --Hobbes
"Does she want anything sawed?" --Hobbes
Friday, August 17, 2012
"Poetry isn't revolution
but a way of knowing why it must come." --Adrienne Rich, "Dreamwood," 1987
Like unto Balaam, whose name I have been misspelling for decades. His encounters with Moab and Balak, trying to maintain the status quo, is paradoxical to say the least. Two encounters with God and one with The Angel of the Lord seem unable to quell his urge to just have a peek at the moneypile. He did, to his credit, recognize the New Order in the Valley of Decision.
"A woman dreaming when she should be typing
the last report of the day. If this were a map,
she thinks, a map laid down to memorize
because she might be walking it, it shows
ridge upon ridge fading into a hazed desert
here and there a sign of aquifers
and one possible watering hole. If this were a map
it would be the map of the last age of her life,
not a map of choices but a map of variations
on the one great choice...
Republished in Poetry June 2012--which presciently or not, contains several poems referring to droughty conditions. Is this because the 20th Century was such a dry and vapid wasteland, as Eliot observed? Or some other confluence of "variations on the one great choice..."?
For example, "Desert" by Josephine Miles from Sept.,1934:
"When with the skin you do acknowledge drought,
The dry in the voice, the lightness of the feet, the fine
Flake of the heat at every level line;
When with the hand you learn to touch without
Surprise the spine for the leaf, the prickled petal,
The stone scorched in the shine, and the wood brittle;
Then where the pipe drips and the fronds sprout
And the foot-square forest of clover blooms in the sand,
You will lean and watch, but never touch it with your hand."
Whatever be the case, such songs in and of the desert places and places undergoing desertification, do arouse thirst...and the desire for the Hand of the Holy and for God and the pleasure of God...
Like unto Balaam, whose name I have been misspelling for decades. His encounters with Moab and Balak, trying to maintain the status quo, is paradoxical to say the least. Two encounters with God and one with The Angel of the Lord seem unable to quell his urge to just have a peek at the moneypile. He did, to his credit, recognize the New Order in the Valley of Decision.
"A woman dreaming when she should be typing
the last report of the day. If this were a map,
she thinks, a map laid down to memorize
because she might be walking it, it shows
ridge upon ridge fading into a hazed desert
here and there a sign of aquifers
and one possible watering hole. If this were a map
it would be the map of the last age of her life,
not a map of choices but a map of variations
on the one great choice...
Republished in Poetry June 2012--which presciently or not, contains several poems referring to droughty conditions. Is this because the 20th Century was such a dry and vapid wasteland, as Eliot observed? Or some other confluence of "variations on the one great choice..."?
For example, "Desert" by Josephine Miles from Sept.,1934:
"When with the skin you do acknowledge drought,
The dry in the voice, the lightness of the feet, the fine
Flake of the heat at every level line;
When with the hand you learn to touch without
Surprise the spine for the leaf, the prickled petal,
The stone scorched in the shine, and the wood brittle;
Then where the pipe drips and the fronds sprout
And the foot-square forest of clover blooms in the sand,
You will lean and watch, but never touch it with your hand."
Whatever be the case, such songs in and of the desert places and places undergoing desertification, do arouse thirst...and the desire for the Hand of the Holy and for God and the pleasure of God...
Sunday, August 12, 2012
thoughts upon thoughts (upon thoughts)
"You and I may have no relatives left in farming, and our memory of the farm, if we have any, may be faint, but the livestock judging is meaningful to us--husbandry is what we do, even if we call it education or health care or management. Sport is a seductive metaphor (life as a game in which we gain victory through hard work, discipline, and visualizing success), but the older metaphor of farming (life is hard labor that is subject to weather and works of blind fate and may return no reward whatsoever and don't be surprised) is still in our blood, especially those of was raised on holy scripture. Young men and women leading cows around the show ring are relatives of Abraham and Job and the faithful father of the prodigal son. They subscribe to the Love By Neighbor doctrine. They knows about late-summer hail storms. You could learn something from these people"
-Garrison Keillor July 2009 National Geographic, "Garrison Keillor Goes to the Fair"
In the same issue:
In regards to
Angkor Wat and the original Khmer empire:
--Which not only suggests that this Hindu empire was the victim of its own successes, as is the case with our USA Today, and for many of the same reasons; much of it having to do with technology; and some of it having to do with incredible atrocities which echo the more recent transgressions of the Khmer Rouge; but also that they encountered some rough weather much in excess of that from which we currently suffer
. In thinking about our own countrywide drought which rivals that of 1953 and 1988, and of course in regards to "global warming,"--- it seems that this empire which borders on the largest lake in Southeast Asia, suffered incredible droughts which far surpassed anything that America has seen so far. At least as far as the Midwest is concerned.
Are these vagaries of weather or something else? It seems that a similar drought may have brought down the Mayan empire around the same time. To quote the article itself: "Sets of constricted growth rings showed that the trees had endured back to back mega droughts from 1362--1392 and from 1415-1440. During these periods the monsoon was weak or delayed, and in some years it failed completely. In other years, mega-monsoons lashed the region. To a tottering kingdom, extreme weather could have been the coupe de grace."
It does appear that the hubris of man makes him believe that he can create and control the weather. As in Bill Kibble's "The End Of Nature." Whether it is a matter of offending one or many gods, or of committing the sin of large carbon footprints which offends the Earth Goddess; whether one uses the paradigm of deity or science it all comes back to original sin of some kind or another. That is, if anything goes wrong on Mother Earth, it pretty much has to be our fault. Being as we are the only species that is concerned about morality and ethics or even the future, that pretty much makes sense. But is this in fact anti-nature or is it simply part of nature? The artificial separation of man from nature is a man-made thought-creation. And an incredibly proud assumption.
It would be pretty hard in a scientific way to say that the forty-year droughts were the fault of the complex water control system devised by the Khmer Empire. Their Magificent Plumbing was simply overwhelmed by neglect and by weather and geography--such that even the largest lake in their back yard could not save them.
So what are we complaining about? And if we do have a 40+ year drought, while we might be able to say that we brought it on ourselves, it would appear that all slides agree that our failure is one of moral imagination rather than that of nerve or verve Science and technology are just along for the ride. I would say again that science is the product of culture and culture is merely a tool of immediate self-interest; and therefore true objective science is lost almost as soon as it is theoretically gained. As such it is a minor player that has become, after being an unwitting captain of industry, merely a hollow idol that we defend ferociously as our "god." It would seem that science has merely been the engineer of our greatest destructive capacities--yet we cling to it and trust in it as if there was nothing else.
If nothing else, these two articles, regardless of the lack of specific editorial intent, are marvellously paired--for our benefit, if we have "ears to hear."
-Garrison Keillor July 2009 National Geographic, "Garrison Keillor Goes to the Fair"
In the same issue:
In regards to
Angkor Wat and the original Khmer empire:
--Which not only suggests that this Hindu empire was the victim of its own successes, as is the case with our USA Today, and for many of the same reasons; much of it having to do with technology; and some of it having to do with incredible atrocities which echo the more recent transgressions of the Khmer Rouge; but also that they encountered some rough weather much in excess of that from which we currently suffer
. In thinking about our own countrywide drought which rivals that of 1953 and 1988, and of course in regards to "global warming,"--- it seems that this empire which borders on the largest lake in Southeast Asia, suffered incredible droughts which far surpassed anything that America has seen so far. At least as far as the Midwest is concerned.
Are these vagaries of weather or something else? It seems that a similar drought may have brought down the Mayan empire around the same time. To quote the article itself: "Sets of constricted growth rings showed that the trees had endured back to back mega droughts from 1362--1392 and from 1415-1440. During these periods the monsoon was weak or delayed, and in some years it failed completely. In other years, mega-monsoons lashed the region. To a tottering kingdom, extreme weather could have been the coupe de grace."
It does appear that the hubris of man makes him believe that he can create and control the weather. As in Bill Kibble's "The End Of Nature." Whether it is a matter of offending one or many gods, or of committing the sin of large carbon footprints which offends the Earth Goddess; whether one uses the paradigm of deity or science it all comes back to original sin of some kind or another. That is, if anything goes wrong on Mother Earth, it pretty much has to be our fault. Being as we are the only species that is concerned about morality and ethics or even the future, that pretty much makes sense. But is this in fact anti-nature or is it simply part of nature? The artificial separation of man from nature is a man-made thought-creation. And an incredibly proud assumption.
It would be pretty hard in a scientific way to say that the forty-year droughts were the fault of the complex water control system devised by the Khmer Empire. Their Magificent Plumbing was simply overwhelmed by neglect and by weather and geography--such that even the largest lake in their back yard could not save them.
So what are we complaining about? And if we do have a 40+ year drought, while we might be able to say that we brought it on ourselves, it would appear that all slides agree that our failure is one of moral imagination rather than that of nerve or verve Science and technology are just along for the ride. I would say again that science is the product of culture and culture is merely a tool of immediate self-interest; and therefore true objective science is lost almost as soon as it is theoretically gained. As such it is a minor player that has become, after being an unwitting captain of industry, merely a hollow idol that we defend ferociously as our "god." It would seem that science has merely been the engineer of our greatest destructive capacities--yet we cling to it and trust in it as if there was nothing else.
If nothing else, these two articles, regardless of the lack of specific editorial intent, are marvellously paired--for our benefit, if we have "ears to hear."
Saturday, August 11, 2012
"How Shall We Then Live?"
Still practicing my typing...
TNY has an interesting article on Mormonism, which is now in the spotlight more than ever. It makes the point that if Brigham Young had not been willing to compromise, the U.S. Army would have pretty well wiped our their Salt Lake colony and were in fact on the way to do so. Mormonism hence survived by its willingness to be complicit with political might; it is doubtful that Smith would have done so, but Young was much more of an entrepreneur and purity of doctrine came in a distant second to worldly success.
Of course the article states in its round of certainties that all American religion devolves into enterprises based on success, wealth-making, and empire-building. The extent to which this is true is embarrassing; but the very definition of religion makes it into a purely human enterprise.
My point would be that journalists in particular and McWorld in general wouldn't be able to begin to discern true from false Christian individuals, nor differentiate between the Holy Spirit and the weltgeist of any given age. Stephen made that claim before he was stoned; and Kierkegaard's main theme was exactly this--that the Protestant (Lutheran) church of Scandinavia was so far from the Holy Spirit that it operated only by sight, not by faith; or by faith in word only. Of course we know that McLutheranism soon became a political force just like Catholicism before it. So man quickly turns Jesus into an "Article." As H.G. Wells also noted--indignantly--in "When The Sleeper Wakes."
David Wilkerson's son Gary makes a point in the World Challenge newsletter this month that I had not considered before. He says that the New Covenant is not between man and God, but between God and Jesus. It had been demonstrated--as examples--for many centuries that making a covenant with Adam, Noah, Moses, or the Prophets was an exercise in futility--but had to be demonstrated beyond doubt. As GK Chesterton implied and modern environmentalists aver, original sin can be now assumed as fact.
But God had had, all along, an Agreement with not only His Son but His Spirit before Jesus' incarnation. But that covenant came to flesh in that flesh could not save itself--in fact flesh unaided always works mightily towards its own destruction.
So in a way the New Covenant was before the Old--not an act of desperation on the part of God; nor on the part of most men who are well content with the status quo and hell-on-earth. It's Hell all right, but at least it's our Home-Built Hell. Which ties into the current campaign slogan, "We built it!" Sad to say, this is perfectly correct, and an impetus to a quicker decay from the heights of still-indelible Grace.
Grace cannot be a cult, a cult is an organization, like religion in general, that is created specifically to root out grace and to cancel both its methods and purpose, not to mention its effects; which if from God as Gift must be marked by and essential allegiance to full reality, i.e. Truth from God, not the truthiness of man.
Man can't handle this; but is too proud to admit it, so turns inward on himself and "self-esteem."
Whatever God wanted was done-"once for all"- by Jesus--as predicted by the Prophets but unattainable by any of all of them--or by me/us. "Jesus Himself is the guarantee that the Covenant is being kept. Every other man would fail at this, but one man keeps the Covenant perfectly: Jesus. He is our surety." And no other has appeared. "No man spoke like this Man." True now more than ever, now that we have tried a few billion other alternatives: hey! "Business is Business!"
TNY has an interesting article on Mormonism, which is now in the spotlight more than ever. It makes the point that if Brigham Young had not been willing to compromise, the U.S. Army would have pretty well wiped our their Salt Lake colony and were in fact on the way to do so. Mormonism hence survived by its willingness to be complicit with political might; it is doubtful that Smith would have done so, but Young was much more of an entrepreneur and purity of doctrine came in a distant second to worldly success.
Of course the article states in its round of certainties that all American religion devolves into enterprises based on success, wealth-making, and empire-building. The extent to which this is true is embarrassing; but the very definition of religion makes it into a purely human enterprise.
My point would be that journalists in particular and McWorld in general wouldn't be able to begin to discern true from false Christian individuals, nor differentiate between the Holy Spirit and the weltgeist of any given age. Stephen made that claim before he was stoned; and Kierkegaard's main theme was exactly this--that the Protestant (Lutheran) church of Scandinavia was so far from the Holy Spirit that it operated only by sight, not by faith; or by faith in word only. Of course we know that McLutheranism soon became a political force just like Catholicism before it. So man quickly turns Jesus into an "Article." As H.G. Wells also noted--indignantly--in "When The Sleeper Wakes."
David Wilkerson's son Gary makes a point in the World Challenge newsletter this month that I had not considered before. He says that the New Covenant is not between man and God, but between God and Jesus. It had been demonstrated--as examples--for many centuries that making a covenant with Adam, Noah, Moses, or the Prophets was an exercise in futility--but had to be demonstrated beyond doubt. As GK Chesterton implied and modern environmentalists aver, original sin can be now assumed as fact.
But God had had, all along, an Agreement with not only His Son but His Spirit before Jesus' incarnation. But that covenant came to flesh in that flesh could not save itself--in fact flesh unaided always works mightily towards its own destruction.
So in a way the New Covenant was before the Old--not an act of desperation on the part of God; nor on the part of most men who are well content with the status quo and hell-on-earth. It's Hell all right, but at least it's our Home-Built Hell. Which ties into the current campaign slogan, "We built it!" Sad to say, this is perfectly correct, and an impetus to a quicker decay from the heights of still-indelible Grace.
Grace cannot be a cult, a cult is an organization, like religion in general, that is created specifically to root out grace and to cancel both its methods and purpose, not to mention its effects; which if from God as Gift must be marked by and essential allegiance to full reality, i.e. Truth from God, not the truthiness of man.
Man can't handle this; but is too proud to admit it, so turns inward on himself and "self-esteem."
Whatever God wanted was done-"once for all"- by Jesus--as predicted by the Prophets but unattainable by any of all of them--or by me/us. "Jesus Himself is the guarantee that the Covenant is being kept. Every other man would fail at this, but one man keeps the Covenant perfectly: Jesus. He is our surety." And no other has appeared. "No man spoke like this Man." True now more than ever, now that we have tried a few billion other alternatives: hey! "Business is Business!"
Monday, August 6, 2012
Lions 'o Love (the carnivorous kind)
Those scattered few that read this may be under the impression that I blame atheists and agnostics for the rapid decline of the world and its vast stages.
While they have done their share of the damage, it really devolves on Christians to be salt and light; we bear the greater responsibility. Yet it increasingly seems that Christians would rather be proud of ourselves for the few good works that we do, rather than to increase our reliance not on our own poorly chosen thoughts, plans, and ethics; but on God And Christ And Holy Spirit.
I am always disturbed at the saying, "YOU CAN HAVE AS MUCH OF GOD AS YOU WANT; IN FACT YOU ALREADY HAVE AS MUCH OF GOD AS YOU WANT."
We, meantime, concentrate on those good works such as will earn us praise from the world. A "silent witness," as some say. But we are called upon to do good works and to proclaim truth, as incompatible as that seems to McWorld. Loveless Truth is actually an oxymoron to God. "Loveless fundamentalism" as Frances Schaeffer coined the term, is the product of mans' errant thought patterns and is not of God much less Christ Jesus.
God is love; but not all that calls itself love is God. If truth is not part and parcel of caritas, then I am indeed a clanging gongster and a tinkling cymbalist.
"Love of the worldly variety is both truthless and toothless--a very noisy lion who loves only his own "pride."
And even what the world thinks it has is so transient and wind-blown that it truly is not worth the candle to cling to it--and people don't--their love objects and idols are changed daily or hourly.
But where then is the salt? The light? Largely it has moved overseas, which is a subject that is too sadly profound for me to tackle on a Monday morning. But I will only say that in certain people, especially those who are aware of their own foibles and inadequacy, Christ is alive and well and "moving on." A remnant, if you will, who still fully believe in and rely upon All Three, in the very face of the fast, and furious, and deadly (for its unwitting promoters that is) opposition to God, His people, but in truth, to its own existence and claims.
But I would hesitate greatly to put myself, as I am now, into the above category. Too much whiny child left...
While they have done their share of the damage, it really devolves on Christians to be salt and light; we bear the greater responsibility. Yet it increasingly seems that Christians would rather be proud of ourselves for the few good works that we do, rather than to increase our reliance not on our own poorly chosen thoughts, plans, and ethics; but on God And Christ And Holy Spirit.
I am always disturbed at the saying, "YOU CAN HAVE AS MUCH OF GOD AS YOU WANT; IN FACT YOU ALREADY HAVE AS MUCH OF GOD AS YOU WANT."
We, meantime, concentrate on those good works such as will earn us praise from the world. A "silent witness," as some say. But we are called upon to do good works and to proclaim truth, as incompatible as that seems to McWorld. Loveless Truth is actually an oxymoron to God. "Loveless fundamentalism" as Frances Schaeffer coined the term, is the product of mans' errant thought patterns and is not of God much less Christ Jesus.
God is love; but not all that calls itself love is God. If truth is not part and parcel of caritas, then I am indeed a clanging gongster and a tinkling cymbalist.
"Love of the worldly variety is both truthless and toothless--a very noisy lion who loves only his own "pride."
And even what the world thinks it has is so transient and wind-blown that it truly is not worth the candle to cling to it--and people don't--their love objects and idols are changed daily or hourly.
But where then is the salt? The light? Largely it has moved overseas, which is a subject that is too sadly profound for me to tackle on a Monday morning. But I will only say that in certain people, especially those who are aware of their own foibles and inadequacy, Christ is alive and well and "moving on." A remnant, if you will, who still fully believe in and rely upon All Three, in the very face of the fast, and furious, and deadly (for its unwitting promoters that is) opposition to God, His people, but in truth, to its own existence and claims.
But I would hesitate greatly to put myself, as I am now, into the above category. Too much whiny child left...
Saturday, August 4, 2012
What did the fly know?
And When Did He Know It?
This seems to be more and more the measure of public discourse. The famous fly on the wall has become very real, and hyper-publicity and an increasing loss of privacy are the new rules. H.G. Wells and Ray Bradbury were prescient on this point.
Fortunately no one is after what I know because I am not busy buzzing around people to find out their secrets or to gain power over them. Medical practice largely allows me to trust people to a further extent than in most business transactions. Hopefully the reverse is true; but with the rapid advance of medical recipes from which one may not deviate but that changed on a daily basis, it is very difficult to know who to trust or what to say when you are profoundly skeptical anyway
. Not only that but in the media those who lie are often the (anti) heroes and those who tell the truth no matter what are at best beknighted and at worst a kind of Green Knight (the Pearl Poet) who comes only to take away our privileges, especially the right to whine.
What do your flies know?
If you are fortunate, it won't matter. I am not running for office and whatever I do know, or believe, is currently of no interest to the urban centers that control our world. It's also probably good to be a semi-anonymous blogger. Hopefully if it ever does matter the sheer volume of output will be intimidating enough to keep most from pursuing it. I.e. me.
An American Blessing: May you be in heaven half an hour before the Government realises you existed...
This seems to be more and more the measure of public discourse. The famous fly on the wall has become very real, and hyper-publicity and an increasing loss of privacy are the new rules. H.G. Wells and Ray Bradbury were prescient on this point.
Fortunately no one is after what I know because I am not busy buzzing around people to find out their secrets or to gain power over them. Medical practice largely allows me to trust people to a further extent than in most business transactions. Hopefully the reverse is true; but with the rapid advance of medical recipes from which one may not deviate but that changed on a daily basis, it is very difficult to know who to trust or what to say when you are profoundly skeptical anyway
. Not only that but in the media those who lie are often the (anti) heroes and those who tell the truth no matter what are at best beknighted and at worst a kind of Green Knight (the Pearl Poet) who comes only to take away our privileges, especially the right to whine.
What do your flies know?
If you are fortunate, it won't matter. I am not running for office and whatever I do know, or believe, is currently of no interest to the urban centers that control our world. It's also probably good to be a semi-anonymous blogger. Hopefully if it ever does matter the sheer volume of output will be intimidating enough to keep most from pursuing it. I.e. me.
An American Blessing: May you be in heaven half an hour before the Government realises you existed...
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