This web log is a place to conduct a conversation on the elusive nature or features of listening to and following God’s will. That is, it is concerned with the “how and why” of seeing with Eyes of Faith. Besides the “how and why” it is also about the “what.” What does one see in the world through Eyes of Faith? This component of the weblog is, alas, likely to be the preponderant content for some time. Seeing with eyes of faith is ultimately about viewing the world as a creature of a personal God.
Being a not entirely serious reflection on the bizarre news of the day and how it deeply impacts our lives.
A political cartoon by Steve Kelly (see Steve Kelly at Creator's Syndicate) on October 19 (to be posted on Halloween) brilliantly captured our current political climate. I'll leave it to my readers to puzzle out its full significance...
(See Part 1.) Continuing with my interpretation of why God afflicts us with plagues, even though we're not living in ancient Egypt and we haven't enslaved the Hebrews…
A long time ago, in a land far, far away, Santa Claus was just starting his Christmas ministry. He was looking for animals that could fly, and pull his sleigh. Such animals are rare, indeed, because they have magical powers. Some animals, like birds, of course, fly under natural power, but unless you go back to primordial times, you won't find birds big enough to pull a sleigh loaded with toys.
Are you suffering from PPTSD? Never fear, help is only a few short therapy sessions away!
It's understandable that the world's elite news media failed to capture the essence of who Pope Francis is, given their dogged determination to always be ahead of the narrative. One can find a representative sample of the approach taken in the New York Times piece by Rachel Donadio from July of last year, "On Gay Priests, Pope Francis Asks, ‘Who Am I to Judge?’" Who can blame them for failing to understand a personality such as his — compassionate, humble, and yet with firm convictions regarding the difference between truth and falsehood, good and evil, beauty and ugliness, wisdom and folly, material and spiritual, timeless and ephemeral. One must travel far and wide to find such a combination in a world leader these days. Even Catholic journalists found him confusing, although one can come across the occasionally balanced perspective, such as that of Colleen Carroll Campbell in her piece "God and Mammon". And as the English poet, Alexander Pope, noted, "Hope springs eternal in the human breast." It matters not the provenance of that hope.
Lt. Commander Scott, meet your Bynar counterpart...
One version of the Mother Goose rhyme...
Thirty days have September,
April, June, and November;
February has 28 alone,
All the rest have 31;
Except leap year, that's the time,
When February's days are 29.
You can also remember which months have 31 by counting on and between your knuckles. Beginning with January, you run out of knuckles on one hand (at July) and start over (with August). December and January are also two months in a row requiring 31 days.
The increasing cultural references to the phrase "zombie apocalypse" have finally caught my attention. As I understand it, the phrase is apparently the independent invention of bloggers, one in the entertainment industry, the other in the video game industry. The zombie character is tailor made for video games, but is related to such movie horrors as vampires (because they're described as "undead"), killers that can't be killed (like Jason), pod people and triffids (because they spread their own kind -- come to think of it, vampires are included here, too). According to David Hambling ("How to Survive a Zombie Apocalypse," the zombie idea originated in Voodoo, but the notion of a zombie-like creature can be traced to earlier European literature. See Homunculus, and note that Hollywood's concept of Frankenstein's monster is decidedly more zombie-like than Mary Shelley's original conception!)