Defenestration is Fancy For "Toss Out a Window"

An Active Martyr Devotion
When we're killing for Christ it's important to remember it's not just the heathen that has to be killed. Oh it's important, but they're a steady outside threat that is easy enough to identify. When we need to round 'em up, we can easily spot them by their swarthiness, their funny hats, accents, or beards; and if it's too hard to spot them on the street, we can just wait until they gather to worship their false gods and collect them then.

Never forget, as dangerous as "they" are, there is a greater threat from the inside. Those who would claim to stand among us are a cancer in the Body of Christ. And like cancer, it often takes extreme measures to remove this threat. If we look to history as our example, we see there is as great a threat from those who would claim to be with us as there is from the outside.

We must be willing to examine our own communities and identify the Judas. Who is it that would threaten Christ from within our fold? That's a tough question, luckily we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses who possessed a great purity of vision and purpose.

Today's Active Martyr (that's what we'll call them) is Jan Zelivsky.

This Hussite preacher so loved the Lord and hated the corruption of the Church, he led his congregation to storm city hall and throw the city council from the upper windows and onto spears below.

Bold enough in itself, this move soon prompted the Hussite Wars wherein the Hussites were known to not take prisoners, preferring to shoot horses out from under mounted cavalry and then showering the heavily armored but immobile knights with musket fire in the streets.

They eventually got what they wanted: to celebrate with bread and wine.

Heavenly Father, give us a passion for your church. Let us act with boldness and zeal for the sake of Your Bride's purity.

That's Great But It Costs 250 MP to Use

Yahoo News story about a cloaking device.

Peter in The Garden

"Even if I must die with you, I will not deny you."
And behold, one of those with Jesus stretched out his hand and drew his sword, and struck the slave of the high priest, and cut off his ear.

Maybe this is the zenith of Peter's career. We don't hear of him doing anything like this again, but whatever it was that subsequently stole his passion for Our Lord, we still have his early example.

He wasn't a soldier, or even an independent contractor trained in special interrogation techniques, still we see he was willing to do what he could- blooming where he was planted, if you will.

Maybe you're worried that you don't have anything to offer. You're not old enough to buy a gun; you're too little to beat anyone up; all you have is a lead pipe or a tube sock full of rocks. Look to Peter. In the face of superior numbers and weapons he did what he could. What can you do?

Dear Lord, when I feel small and overwhelmed, when I'm afraid and hemmed in by a great enemy, give me the courage to act.

Now I Get It...

I think it rather stupid when someone looks to the past and says it was such a better time. Especially as it regards the collective morality of the country- our country, that sentiment is stupid. Well, it's stupid as far as an historical or moral perspective are concerned, but it may be a very smart way to alienate someone. Depending on who says it, it could mean, "Things were better before you showed up," or "Boy, wasn't it great when your people knew their place?" or, "I sure wish I could hire a 5 year old to work in my textile mill." Sure it works for those times when you want to make someone feel unwelcome but it's just not true that "things" were better in the past.

And...

... We can hardly overstate our bias for the present. We have an overwhelming preference for right now. That makes sense; after all, it's when we are. But it's limiting. I don't mean what MY PRESIDENT and HIS apologists mean- that we are unable to see the "big picture-" that 200 years from now, no one will remember the dead Iraqis and Americans or tortured Muslims and so everything will be okay. I mean it's easy to forget that people anywhere or anytime have ever thought differently. And if we do remember, it's difficult (impossible) to understand that thought from outside of our own thought.

So...

... I don't think there really is a sense of moral understanding that transcends right now. When we talk about the past being better, it's often a cudgel.

But...

... We can still look to the past for examples and for a bit of clariity. To wit, our present values distort our perspective on those questions of torture and fundamental human dignity. I guess I should be more clear when I say "our," especially if it suggest there is a single "our" or unitary "value." So broadly speaking, I guess I'm addressing me, or anyone like me that is deeply troubled as a disciple of Jesus or as an advocate of the public. Whether we are looking at it as a representative of the state or as disciples of Jesus we might be stuck in the present. As such we do not have the ability to see how what is being done may be perfectly compatible with or required by state or church values. We may need to look to the past.

We've forgotten what it means to kill for Christ. Not just kill, but mutilate, humiliate, ruin, make destitute. I don't think it does any good to say, "I'm a Christian and it's sometimes okay to kill people... or rip out their fingernails." That kind of equivocation is worthless. We have the example of a time when we could confidently say, "I am killing you for Christ;" "May the smoke from your searing flesh be a fragrant offering to my Lord;" "I throw you from this window in the name of the Prince of Peace." It worked before, we need to dust off that sentiment and see how it works today.

Perhaps it's time we add to the catalogue of martyrs those who were bold enough to kill for Jesus so we can remember things weren't always as confused as they might feel now.

I'll do it. If I can begin posting with any kind of regularity again, I will highlight heroes of the Church- those we can look to as shining examples of Christian fortitude and zeal. Let's start with: Peter in the Garden

Why Didn't Somebody Tell Me This Before?
Blue N' Boogie- Dizzy Gillespie
Go With the Flow- Queens of the Stone Age
1979- Smasing Pumpkins
Whatever Happened to Pong?- Frank Black
Seventeen- Sex Pistols
Bird Dream of the Olympus Mons- Pixies
Take Me Out- Franz Ferdinand
You are the Sunshine of My Life- Stevie Wonder
My Descent Into Madness- The Eels
Underture -The Who

Our Three Weapons are Fear, Surprise, and Ruthless Efficiency

Today, some clergy gathered a short walk from the White House to protest a policy prohibiting federal representatives from specifically praying in Jesus' name. It's described as "an 'escalating crisis' over chaplaincy prayer policies."

In the White House itself, MY PRESIDENT signed into law the Military Commissions Act of 2006- making it so "some individuals, at the designation of the executive branch alone, could be picked up, even in the United States, and held indefinitely without trial and without any access whatsoever to the courts" and "permit an individual to be convicted on the basis of coerced testimony" and even "allow someone convicted under these rules to be put to death." Well, that's what Russ Feingold says it would do- but he's a Democrat. And even though that is, in fact, what the law allows, he's probably just politicizing the issue.

Really, trying to make MY PRESIDENT look bad by explaining what this law actually does when MY PRESIDENT has already vaguely justified it, saying it's for saving Amer'can lives. Have you ever seen anything so low?

Well I was going to piss and moan, but I quit. How could I be right. I can hardly find any Christians who see anything wrong with this- I found myself more in agreement with the Jewish Russ Feingold than our Christian PRESIDENT. Shouldn't that be a red flag.

So, for my first act on the winning side (is it my first act...? I think I've pretended to quit before... I can't recall) I would like to offer a prayer- as a sponsor of the state, and of course since Christians are protesting for the right to do so, it must be in Jesus' name:

Lord and source of Love, we ask in our time of dire need that you would protect and guide our hands that interrogate our enemies;
We ask that Your blood would wash and seal us from the blood of those who oppose us.
In the name of the Prince of Peace, bring us victory in the form of actionable intelligence.
And in Your Holy and Life-Giving Name we ask that You make our enemies our victims,
So that Your name might be glorified through all the earth and that all may know, as we act in Your name, that Jesus is Lord.

I've Already Bought a Boat, Suckers

Dear Dr Samailla,
I get it- my cousin (wink) died in Liberia. Excellent. I have a lot of cousins, too many to count, so this is plausible enough for anyone casually interested. The other two questions remain unanswered though. I am willing to budge a little bit on the numbers, maybe a 75-25 split can work, but have decided I must be firm on insisting that I be paid with a large novelty check. Please respond to those two points in your next message.

I am ready and have arranged myself to follow normal banking procedures for perfection. And like you, I can't wait to see the reaction of the bank. You have my highest trust- and more than 100% attention. Like our American professional athletes- I will give 110% for this payoff. Here is the information you requested, aside from a fax number- unfortunately, I do not have a fax machine- but I will soon enough. Get it? Because I'll be so rich, I'll buy one.

Name: skybalon
Age: 66 (March 10, 1940)
Occupation: Ass Kicker
Nationality: Amer'kin
Phone: XXX-XXXX


God bless you, and thanks for thinking of me. But don't forget about my concerns regarding our split and the check. I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely
skybalon

YES!! I Am So Rich

Dear Friend skybalon,
 
I'm very happy for your willingness to handle this transaction with me.For your information, every information about the deceased customer are intact, i will direct you on what to do after you apply to the bank, every documents will be issued to you by the bank before the fund will transfer to your account, don't be afraid because this deal is real and i agreed with you let us move ahead.
 
I contacted you to stand as the next of kin to the deceased customer and stand as the cousin so that the bank will release the fund to your name and move it to your private account in your country or any country you know that will be safe because it's God who directed me to you, I want you to please keep this transaction confidential until this fund get into your account.
 
Like I told you in my proposal that one of our deceased customer left this fund in our bank since almost five years now and no body has ever come for the claim since that time, that's why I have decided to contact you as a foreign partner to solidly stand on the claim as the next of kin so that the money will be transfer to your private account because the bank want to move the money into banking treasurer as unclaimed fund after five years which the five years will complete by ending of this year, please i don't want this money to enter into bank treasurer because i believe that this is the only opportunity God give me in the position i have in the bank. So i wouldn't like to lose it.
 
You must be ready and arrange your self because we must follow the normal banking process to perfect the smooth transfer of the fund to your account. I want the fund to be transferred to your account within (10 working days) I contacted you because i am not capable of handling this deal alone. Be rest assured that this deal is 100% risk-free. I promised to use my position in the bank to perfect the smooth transfer of the fund direct to your account after approval.
 
I have all information about the deceased customer all you have to do is to apply to the bank as the next of kin then let's see the reaction of the bank. I will send the application form to you which you will fill and apply direct to bank as soon as i receive your positive answer. I demand the highest trust from you and 100% attention to enable us get the money without any funther delay.
 
Meanwhile, Send to me your personal information's like, your name in full,Age,Nationality, Occupation, your private Telephone and Fax numbers also your personal picture photograph to enable me know whom I’m dealing with.
 
I am Looking forward to hear from you.
Dr Samailla.
+226 7657 5118

I'm Blogtarded

The internets and the type of communication it can foster seem sometimes duplicitous. Aside from hiding behind anonymous or false identities, we also say things that we know are not true. If I were ever to say LOL- I bet I would not actually be LingOL. Those of you that do use that particular expression I am sure are more often than not lying.

But here is something that did make me laugh out loud, and spit powdered sugar and filo crust on my lap and keyboard at the same time.

Sorry, you may have to watch a commercial to see it.

So the internets foster deception, and now that I think about, have us waste time making and watching things like this.

Everything's Coming Up Skybaloncont'd

Dear Dr. SAMAILLA NUHU
I am glad to hear from you, but I should say, I am not surprised at all. I have just finished reading the Prayer of Jabez and knew that something to "enlarge my territory" was bound to come my way.

It's curious that the Burkina Faso Chamber of Commerce would have my email address or that any of my kin would have been killed in Liberia, but we know the Lord works in mysterious ways.

I am very eager to participate in this transfer of funds but wonder why I only get 45% of the 25.6 million. It seems that I deserve more, especially since this is an answer to prayer and I am an American. I don't mean that I deserve more simply because I am an American. You should know, that the $6,000,000 or so I would receive after taxes is hardly worth anything in my country. I understand that from your perspective this might seem like a large sum. Well, I am happy to tell you it isn't. I could hardly achieve the measure of life and largesse I see out my window with only $6,000,000. A house alone could eat up more than half of that. It seems only fair then, that I get a larger percentage, perhaps as much as 85%.

Before you say, "No," consider how much 15% is worth to you given your country's per capita GDP. I bet nearly $4,000,000 for you would go further in Burkina Faso than the $7,000,000 for me in Southern California. I could try to explain the vagaries of our global economy or the "dollar a day" rule of my purchasing power versus yours, but I'm afraid there is just no real way for you to relate to such wealth. Let's just say the split you suggest is untenable. It's another one of those divine mysteries.

So, yes. Let's split that money, but before we do I have a few questions I hope you can answer:
1.) I am confused, am I really the next of kin or are we pretending I am the next of kin (wink)?
2.) Do you agree to the 85-15 split I suggested?
3.) Can we arrange that I be paid with one of those big foam-core novelty checks?

I apologize for taking so long to get back to you. Thank you for being an answer to prayer; I look forward to you answering my questions and me sending whatever sensitive information you request.

Sincerely
-skybalon

Everything's Coming Up Skybalon

From : DR SAMAILLA NUHU
Reply-To : drsnuhu1980@yahoo.fr
Sent : Saturday, October 14, 2006 4:03 PM
Subject : REPLY BACK IMMEDIATELY.

Dear Friend,

(I am DR SAMAILLA NUHU, From Ouagadougou Burkina Faso) I know that this letter may come to you as a surprise.I got your address through Burkina Faso chambers and commerce.I must apologise for taking some of your valuable time to explain a proposal, that I believe will be of utmost benefit to us. I need your help and urgent assistance in transfering the sum of $25,600 000.00 USD(Twentyfive Million,Six Hundred Thousand US Dollars)to your account immediately, the fund belongs to one of our foreign customer who died along with his surposed next of kin in a war zone liberia on 15/6/2001.

Our bank banking law and guideline stipulated that if such money remains unclaimed after five years the money will be transfered into the bank treasurere as unclaimed fund. The request of a foreigner to be next of kin in this business is occassioned by the fact that the deceased customer was a
foreigner and a Burkinabe cannot stand as next of kin to make this type of claim.

The five years will complete by ending of this year,that is why I as a worker in my department want to release the money to you as the nearest person to the deceased for safety and subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming for the claim because I don't want the fund to be transferred into Bank treasurere as unclaimed fund. I will give you 40% of the total sum for the provision of foreign account and 55%will be for me while 5% will be set aside for any mislenious expenses incurred during the business.

This transaction is 100% risk-free on both side and has no atom of negativity,for I have made all the required arrangement for the transfer of this fund to your account. Please I would like you to keep this transaction very confidential as you may wish to know that i am a Bank officer.

I will send you more details as soon as i get a positive reply from you.
DR SAMAILLA NUHU.
(Bill and Exhange Manager)

What The Hell Is Wrong With Us?

Really.

The title is not rhetorical. What better day to ask that than today? Well, I guess if you don't ask today, you still have tomorrow. But I wouldn't take it for granted. So how about today? What the hell is wrong with us? I can think of two things: pretending we're good and apologizing rather than repenting when we can no longer pretend. Oh I'm sure that's not all- but I bet confessing those two things would go a long way in clearing the brush towards others.

If you live under a rock, or are someone who avoids the media because you are too cool for TV or figure avoiding the media somehow preserves your soul (what are you doing reading this?) you may not know that a Florida Congressman has resigned amid evidence of sexually harassing (at least) children participating in the Congressional Page program. Now you know. There, you still get to live under a rock and stay cool (though reading my interblog is very not cool), however, I cannot speak to the purity of your soul. But at least you know.

I've heard a couple of people, almost gleefully, point out the irony of a man so wrapped up in issues of combatting pedophilia himself being caught as a pedophile. I'm sure that is ironic- or maybe "justice of the unicorn." But I don't know that the irony matters all that much- especially if pointing out the irony is some veiled way of saying "See, nobody should tell anybody else that 'such and such' is bad."

There does seem to be a weird phenomenon of people harping on that which is secretly killing them- I may secretly be struggling with being a closet Republican. Perhaps. That's something, but not what I particularly care about right now. Right now it's those other things that stand out to me.

At first, Mark Foley said questions about his emails and relationships with pages were part of a despicable and desperate attack by his opponent. Of course, as is the case in many instances of sexual assault, upon hearing the news, other victims felt emboldened to speak when they realized they weren't alone and someone else could go to bat for them. So more kids did come forward and Foley resigned. Foley resigned, offered a vague apology and said he has checked himself into rehab. That's great if he's an alcoholic, but what does that have to do with harassing Congressional pages? If I get drunk, I start talking too loud.

He's not the first alcoholic so that's a lame defense. Unless of course every alcoholic is also a sexual predator (just so you know- they're not). The move seems to be made for locating the responsibility for who and what he is somewhere other than with him- it's the booze. Even that doesn't understand what is at the core of 12 Step style rehabs- you're the problem- not the booze.

Where do we get this idea that bad actions somehow originate from someone other than our selves? Oh, that's silly, I have an idea of its origin. But I wish we could stop being confused about what it is to be good. I'm a good person, I just happened to use my position of power to stalk children, I'm a good person, I just bully the one person of color in the room, I'm a good person, I just lie a lot. And when finally caught- we have some sort of defense to offer: I was drunk, I didn't know a confederate flag meant that, I'm protecting your family, Matt. We offer an apology; not repentance.

The other thing is, it seems that many people in power knew Mark Foley was the Congressman to avoid in the page program. It seems that there is an understanding that there are a few congress-people you don't want to serve under. But for the sake of covering your own- or at least your party's- ass, people looked the other way. For the sake of team spirit, people looked the other way while who knows what was/is going on. For the sake of team spirit we call torture interrogation (ha ha I threw it in).

Again that horrible sensibility has reared its head: when we do it, it's okay; and if it's too horrible to even pretend it's not, then we'll just look the other way or give it another name.

So there we go. How's your soul? How is our soul? How's my heavy handed harangue? Ohh, how's my alliteration?

Oh, and Reading won.

If I Wasn't Upset Before... I Have a Bill Moyers Interview In My Podcast Queue
Something -The Beatles
The 59th Street Bridge -Simon and Garfunkle
Oye Como Va -Tito Puente
I'll Be Your Baby -Bob Dylan
Black Math -The White Stripes
I Like Food -Descendants
London Calling -The Clash
Flamenco Sketches -Miles Davis

But This One Goes to 11

My blogging is thin. The things I write are silly. That's okay, the things I want to write are being written by others. I accept that for now. It's for a time.

As for the silly-

I listen to music as I read and write. I listen to music on my computer. The music on my computer is rated. That is, I actually use the "My Rating" feature in iTunes. I have a lot of five star songs. That seems fine- I should have a lot of songs that I like. But I wonder of there is a bit of star inflation going on.

I think I have a high bar for determining wether a song will make it to my library. Maybe I do, maybe not. In either case I have songs that have only one star. Still they are songs I enjoy. I have songs that have no stars- even those are songs that I like to hear. (There are songs in my library I don't listen to- or like. I leave those unchecked so I don't have to hear them. Ever.) It would seem because I load only songs that I think are worth hearing, I wouldn't have any one or zero star songs. But that's not the case. I wonder if it should be. Compared to someone else's library, I would say my one star songs may be better than their five star songs. I don't know.

But the five star song- five stars seems like something that should happen only infrequently. How do I have so many five star songs? Is it because I like great music that inevitably so many of my songs deserve five stars? Because I like such great music, should there be an even higher standard? Should a great song be considered only a fraction as great because of its association with other great songs? I don't know that either.

What's more, if I make a five start playlist, I invariably hear a song that stands head and shoulders above the others. Should I reassess my ratings based on those songs? Should they be categorized as unratable? Still not knowing.

Even if it remains unresolved, this song deserves six stars: If There's Such a Thing as Love -The Magnetic Fields. If I were a better blogger I would put it here for you.

Monday's Been Busy Roundup

We wouldn't think of going without the bait-- uhh, that is, the bait-thing beauty. The bathing beauty! Heh heh. I covered that up pretty well
I rolled with some nogoodniks in junior high. Once, at a hotel, one of these jackanapes spit on the head of a gentleman below. When caught and confronted later, the first words out of his mouth were, "I didn't spit on your head." But if you remember back to the beginning of the story- he did spit on his head.

So you quote love unquote me
Someone has called all the chaos, destruction, and real dead people in Iraq a comma in the larger history of DEMOCRACY's unstoppable march. I would bet whoever said that is himself a colon.

I discovered a new band to like
He says they are inevitably compared to Ween and They Might Be Giants. That's cool. I like both Ween and They Might Be Giants. I discovered them, this means I get to do whatever I like with them- up to and including enslave them and give them diseases because I am so filthy.

What a Baby

You may or may not know that Virginia Momzer, Senator George Allen, (R- McGuire Woods, Skoal, Peabody Energy) has considered it an "aspersion" to make reference to his Jewish ancestry. Well, he did. That's too bad.

It's common knowledge in my family that at least 4 streams of ancestors, on both my mom's and dad's sides, were conversos. More than just making it acceptable for me to make jokes about dentists, it gives me good reason to be a pirate for Halloween. Hooray.

I am not trying to create a boot-wearing Good 'Ol Boy persona nor do I want to embrace a Southern Kultur that includes honoring racist holy war, terrorism, and oppression- nor the flag that symbolizes it. So of course I'm okay with my assumed Jewish ancestry- Allen is, so he isn't okay with his.

To be clear, I don't say all of "the South" is what Allen wants it to be, and apparently wants with a convert's zeal- a place where it's okay to point to the one brown person in your lily-white crowd and call him "macaca" (whatever that might mean), a place where you have to make a point of having "ethnic" supporters, a place where you can be a general asshole and confuse that for being a mensch. From what I've seen, as a place, the South is just another place. Sure it's got some things we don't: Cracker Barrels, sleeveless t-shirts, peanut candies, out of control Kudzu, lots of mounted fish- and more of some things we do have: depressing poverty, scary hyper-Calvinism, humidity, Dr. Pepper. But none of those things make George Allen a jerk. He would be, he was, that in California. We have Denny's instead of Bob Evans, but that doesn't mean we are in short supply of racist, thuggish, mean-spirited jerks who would be more than happy to create a California that is as much "the South" as Alabama is assumed to be.

Oh- a funny joke from back in the day-
One night, a preacher from Chicago wakes up with a start. He wakes his wife and tells her God just spoke to him in a dream.
He says, "God spoke to me- as clear as anything has ever been in my life. The Lord told me to go to Birmingham and join the civil rights movement."
"Birmingham?" his wife asks.
"Yes." he answers.
"Well, did He say He'd go with you?"
"He said He'd go as far as Memphis-"

Eh- so what's my point- George Allen is a jerk and wants to foster and live in a culture that makes it easy for him to be so.

But there's more than that. Am I thinking about identity? Am I thinking about communities that thrive on and foster meanness? Am I wondering if we gravitate to communities according to our temperament and therein play a role? I guess so.

I am wondering what my community is and what it says about me. There's a lot that will seem dissociative about this, but I wonder about me and my community- What choices I've made, the assumptions I miss. Whether I fit or don't and if either is a fiction. That it's important we be EFCSW, not Yearly Meeting. That we today could not create a place to represent our collective sense like Quaker Meadow- as was done 60 years ago. How and why I fit into a larger group that can fittingly be described as, and seems to earnestly pursue the identity, shallow and earnestly "product oriented."

It's 'Cos I'm Shallow & Product Oriented
Knives Out -Radiohead
Many Rivers to Cross -Jimmy Cliff
Chubasco -Juan Garcia Esquivel
Misterioso -Tito Puente
Thank You -Descendents
Gordon's Message -Violent Femmes
Achille's Last Stand -Led Zeppelin

The Heyward Foundation

Jam-maker F Duerr & Son has debuted a commemorative £5,000 pot of marmelade made from rare whisky and champagne and decorated with edible flakes of gold.

via BOING

Did you know you can't taste gold?

Talk To Me, Goose

U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold is accepting applications for nominations to the U.S. Military Academy, U.S. Naval Academy, U.S. Air Force Academy and U.S. Merchant Marine Academy.

Interested students should contact Feingold's Middleton office at 608-828-1200 for application materials

WISCONSIN POST-CRESCENT

WAIT A MINUTE!

I thought Russ Feingold hated America as much as I do. What's the big idea in training another generation of stormtroopers? Unless...

Of course! As Bill O'Reilly says... or is it Sean Hannity? I'll say Bill Hannity. As Bill Hannity says, there is no place more liberal than Wisconsin. People in Wisconsin commune with Satan. Who better to subvert the military than horned cheese-heads?

When I was in junior high my dad was big into the idea of me going to a service academy. My dad was all over writing Alan Cranston and getting me a nomination, and when Top Gun came out- boy was I into it too. I mean the snappy uniforms, showers, and oiled-up volley ball- who wouldn't want that?

Then, during my sophomore year of high school I learned trying was for chumps. Oh well.

Ahh... but Feingold can see the big picture...

You know what? I may think I'm real cute with my Frequently Feingolds, I may think I'm making good points about the stupidity of some of the attacks leveled against liberals. I may think I'm cleverly highlighting good things about him. But even if I succeed in any of that, it seems like I'm trying to maintain a certain distance from him so that, should a shoe drop, I can feign detached interest and say something like, "Well I never really liked him anyway- not like all those other suckers."

I'll keep doing the Frequently Feingolds, but know I like him and I will be very sad if he does something untoward. I expect anyone to do something I don't agree with, but I mean if he does something that disturbs me regarding who he is inside- like Mc Cain did with radical cleric Jerry Falwell, it will be a shanda fur die goyim. At least. So, that said, where was I?

Oh yes, Russ Feingold can see the big picture and is looking to destroy the machine from the inside.

And That Which Has Been Done...

Usually my posts seem apropos of something. Why did I mention Augustine and Emergent Hipsters?

Well...

A couple of school chums and I were having a casual conversation about God and such, when in response to something one of them had said, I said, "Oh, pantheism." And in unison they said "No, its panentheism." I never heard of panentheism. Pantheism I knew.

Pantheism is the idea that God and everything are the same. If you take the sum of everything, and put it in a big pile, there's God. Does that seem to glib? Okay, sorry-
Pantheism literally means "everything god." It is used in reference to systems wherein God and Nature, or more clearly, God and the Entirety of the Universe are identical. God is the substance of all creation. So here's a part of God, this is a part of God- I just made another little part of God re-manifest - and again- now part of God is an X, now a J, over there a piece of dog food, there a fly, here some cheese, a piece of tortilla, high fructose corn syrup, a 2x4, tar paper, laminate flooring, the potassium in my brain causing electrical impulses, asbestos, water vapor, poop, some cancer, cat hair, bubbles.

I happen to think the universe is the universe and God is God. I think God's presence is not bound up in matter though God is present in creation. So matter changes but God doesn't ((bleeep blop blorb)) even though God causes the motion and effects we see. ((steam whistle sound, lights blinking)).

Panentheism sounded made up. But everything is made up at some point so I bit.

"What's panentheism?" I asked. (Now that's a pretty bold move on my part- most of the time you don't want to reveal what you don't know to other students- especially students from other programs. It makes it seem like they know more than you.)

Well, what my classmates were trying to explain to me is the presence of God in everything that allows us to seek God apart from dogma, the limits of our traditions, etc... Panentheism means God is in everything. Only they explained it as pantheism. They had just learned about panentheism which is why they could jinx each other with the "No, its panentheism" bit, but not explain it as such.

No thanks to them, I later discovered one Sallie McFague coined the term to say "Everything that is, is in God and God is in all things and yet God is not identical to the universe, for the universe is dependent on God in a way that God is not dependent on the universe."

Well, welcome to the conversation these millennia later. Don't feel bad- I do that all the time. It's cool.

Exene Cervenka Is A Woman
Uncle John's Band -Grateful Dead
La Donna e Mobile -Luciano Pavorotti (irony)
Trouble Is a Man -Sarah Vaughan (more)
Johnny Hit and Run Paulene -X

Outside the Box- Is Another Box

Among Emergent Hipsters it's popular to not appreciate Augustine. I think it comes from the vague obligatory fondness of some reified mystical "East" whose otherness affords it a bit of a free-ride. It seems among disaffected Western Christians there's the hope of finding something refreshing for the soul- something that hasn't been made mechanical and lifeless by familiarity and rote habit- in the Eastern Church. That may be naive but I don't think it's wrong. Though, it does remind me of a Monty Python sketch wherein a poet father refuses to stand by while his son ruins his life chasing his dream of being a coal miner.

Ha ha ha.

Anyway, being a Latin Church Father, Augustine is on the outs with the mystical, broad-minded, free range "East."

Go figure.

That is, figure it's more a function of church politics than anything else. True, there are things you find in Origen that you won't find in Augustine, and things with Augustine that you won't find with Origen- like testicles. (And how). But if you're looking to avoid dogma and take it or leave it tradition, your journey does not lead to the East. Unless by "East" we mean some idea so wrenched from history that it means whatever we want it to mean.

Of course there is a lot to turn you off in the West, as there is in any tradition. I find plenty objectionable in Augustine's writing. But unfortunately, I am tragically unhip (again with the loser talk) so the source of my distaste for some of his work does not come from being a thirty-something disaffected Evangelical searching for refreshment in something outside of what I know and so assuming that I ditch Augustine for that ride. I guess that makes me a bit of a poseur. Oh don't get me wrong, I am a thirty-something disaffected Evangelical, but I think the perennial mistake, or tragedy of our soul's searching, is the mistake Augustine makes when he turns to what I find problematic. It's the outward gaze; it's the move to compare our selves with some external measure of faith rather than seeing and confronting our self as revealed by God's light.

The parts of Augustine's Confessions that might be called devotional (only because we think of theology as building vast unifying systems) are lovely and hopeful, especially in their honest appraisal of who he is as God reveals it to him. He writes that way elsewhere too. But not often enough, and he is prone to thinking in tedious and unfaithful ways. Then again, so am I. Still, he can remind me it's not in what we search or the systems we erect in our limited knowledge. It's in how we are searched and what God makes of us that is meaningful.

Tu autem eras interior intimo meo et superior summo meo.

Latin! Isn't that the language of patriarchy, High Church Stuffiness and the fake Bible?! I know, can you believe it? But there it is.

God is more present to us than we are to our selves; our journey is necessarily, but not naturally, inward. It is not to a tradition from East or West that we imagine is more relevant or to a time in our history imagined as more authentic. It is to a place where we stand before God.

If someone needs to take a step away from the familiar to see this- if that's what it takes to see our home is not in the traditions of an East or West but is in Christ- well then that's a fine move I suppose. Only, I don't know that the step outside of the familiar leads directly home- even as we are stuck feeding the pigs, it is only after we see our own condition that we begin to sense where we belong.

Hey! My iPod Doesn't Glow and Leave Light Streamers!
You and Whose Army? -Radiohead
At Least That's What You Said -Wilco
The Wind -Cat Stevens
Fiddle Riddle -Frank Black
Wild World -Jimmy Cliff
Is This Love -Bob Marley
Elizabeth on The Bathroom Floor- Eels
Sweet Talkin' Woman -E.L.O.
It's The End of The World as We Know It -R.E.M.
Take The A Train -Dizzy Gillespie
We're Going to Be Friends -The White Stripes
Subterranean Homesick Blues -Bob Dylan
Lithium -Nirvana

I Wash My Hands, I Wash My Face, I Wash My Arsenal

Ever the loser, I selected Reading for my team to care about in the English Premier League. Well, I guess if I were really a loser, I'd have picked Sheffield. Or I wouldn't like soccer at all. I suppose picking Reading still makes me a bit of a frontrunner. That was my fear in picking a team, which is why I didn't pick Arsenal. I like Arsenal- but secretly. I like the international make up of the club. I like the weird statistic that they have the most ethnically diverse fan base in England. And it doesn't hurt that they are good. Yikes- Lehmann just took one in the face!

So Reading. It might be self-deceptive to pick a promoted team with an incredible streak as an underdog. They keep winning. They have made me very happy so far. So the charge of frontrunner might still be made. Well, eat it, Swindon pig.

Not Cinco de Mayo

Cinco de Mayo is often just an excuse for late spring parties and a boost in Corona sales. It is not, however Mexican Independence Day. This is, in fact, the weekend for celebrating Mexican Independence.

Perhaps fittingly, this year's commemoration of El Grito in Los Angeles was corporately sponsored by Cingular Wireless.

Your Independence is Sponsored
Cold Sweat -James Brown
Let Down -Radiohead
Rock the House -Gorillaz