Holy crap Radiohead is awesome. Yes, I know I'm like 15 years behind the times here, but "The Bends" and "OK Computer" are just ... I mean ... my head hurts from how amazing those albums are. "Pablo Honey," which I had more exposure to earlier, had a few good songs but never really did it for me. And "Kid A" and "In Rainbows" are fine, but frankly pale in comparison to OK and Bends.
Anyway, just felt like posting something random, since I haven't posted in like forever.
Also:
- LOST is the best TV show ever. If I could get stuck in a time-loop, I hope it would drop me off at January, 2010.
- The "Glee" pilot was pretty great, and inspired a nearly-debilitating nostalgia in me.
- "hysterical and useless, hysterical and let down..."
Finally, I've been thinking, as much as I sometimes feel certain people on the political right have more-or-less become caricatures of themselves (Limbaugh, Dobson, Rove, etc.), and as much as I'm sure the same is true for those on the left (I've just never identified with any of them enough before to discern the moment when they switch from crusader to cartoon), this crucial truth occurred to me, which I will try to keep in my mind as the perpetual American political circus parades around the news:
No person is every truly a caricature, and all caricatures are unfair. No exceptions.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Saturday, March 28, 2009
new blog
My writing class is over, and I don't think I have time for new pieces right now, but instead I'm going to take up something I've been meaning to do for a long time. I'm going to update into more modern English my favorite collection of sermons, George MacDonald's "Unspoken Sermons." When I finish that, I may tackle some others if I come across any that have not been updated and could use it.
http://updated-sermons.blogspot.com/
http://updated-sermons.blogspot.com/
Sunday, January 25, 2009
stuff
In keeping with my strident "at least one update a month" policy, here we are. A lot has happened. I'm moving forward on a condo, to close on Feb. 13th. I've got a creative writing class starting a week from Wednesday. We're also getting closer and closer to the mission trip to Panama mid-March. Oh, and work is crazy busy too. It's kind of overwhelming when I think about it. No, strike the "kind of." It's just plain overwhelming.
Still, inexplicably I find myself musing on other things. So here's a few stray throughts:
1. Wanting what we can't or shouldn't have possesses a special kind of bitterness, for we seem to cherish it. Seems like pining and tragic-romantic dreams are built into our DNA. Mine, anyway.
2. I want a Bible translation providing me with as many different possible meanings as possible. No "amplified" alternate words intended to give fuller meaning but really just contributing to the meaning the translators want me to derive, no adding words to make sure I interpret properly, none of that. Give me The Ambiguity Bible.
3. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? Then why does the standard interpretation of much of the judgment parts of the New Testament make me doubt this point? Predestination used to bug me because I worried if I was in that number. I don't worry about that anymore. I worry about the whole concept, the lack of justice of it. How can God choose some to be saved and some not? Work on some hearts and not others? The idea is appalling to me. The fear that it might be true churns my stomach and steals away my peace. I can't bear that God would choose me and not another. Doesn't it seem to contradict His own egalitarian teaching in handling the affairs of justice in this world? To choose arbitrarily...I can't understand it. I can believe He chose this or that life for us, prepared this or that work for us to do, but to choose with finality to create a creature He knows will never be saved, no matter what; I ... in the end I just can't believe it.
4. This world keeps us busy, this world keeps us distracted, and I wonder how much beauty of the kingdom passes by us unseen, neither cherished nor enjoyed.
Still, inexplicably I find myself musing on other things. So here's a few stray throughts:
1. Wanting what we can't or shouldn't have possesses a special kind of bitterness, for we seem to cherish it. Seems like pining and tragic-romantic dreams are built into our DNA. Mine, anyway.
2. I want a Bible translation providing me with as many different possible meanings as possible. No "amplified" alternate words intended to give fuller meaning but really just contributing to the meaning the translators want me to derive, no adding words to make sure I interpret properly, none of that. Give me The Ambiguity Bible.
3. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? Then why does the standard interpretation of much of the judgment parts of the New Testament make me doubt this point? Predestination used to bug me because I worried if I was in that number. I don't worry about that anymore. I worry about the whole concept, the lack of justice of it. How can God choose some to be saved and some not? Work on some hearts and not others? The idea is appalling to me. The fear that it might be true churns my stomach and steals away my peace. I can't bear that God would choose me and not another. Doesn't it seem to contradict His own egalitarian teaching in handling the affairs of justice in this world? To choose arbitrarily...I can't understand it. I can believe He chose this or that life for us, prepared this or that work for us to do, but to choose with finality to create a creature He knows will never be saved, no matter what; I ... in the end I just can't believe it.
4. This world keeps us busy, this world keeps us distracted, and I wonder how much beauty of the kingdom passes by us unseen, neither cherished nor enjoyed.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)