And now, a bit of performance poetry from rapper shai linne with Blair Linne presenting.
shai linne – “The Perfection of Beauty” ft. Blair Linne (Official Trailer) from Lamp Mode Recordings on Vimeo.
The Offensive Stories of O'Connor
Jonathan Rogers has written a spiritual biography of Flannery O’Connor. He writes about it here, saying, “People are offended by Flannery O’Connor’s stories, and they ought to be. They’re offensive… [They are] startling figures drawn for the almost-blind… If the stories offend conventional morality, it is because the gospel itself is an offense to conventional morality. Grace is a scandal; it always has been. Jesus put out the glad hand to lepers and cripples and prostitutes and losers of every stripe even as he called the self-righteous a brood of vipers.”
Endless War, by Ralph Peters
[Personal update: I stayed home from work again today. Still no voice. Maybe I’ll make it in tomorrow. I really don’t want to pass this nightmare on to the students, though.]
The conviction prevails, in privileged circles that, if we study history without reshaping it to our contemporary prejudices, history will corrupt us. May I suggest that the opposite is true?
…Those who deny history die of myth.
In that quotation from his Introduction, Ralph Peters sums up much of the lessons he propounds in his 2010 collection of essays and columns, Endless War
Our great mistake, as I read him, is our insistence on “understanding” our opponents. That’s not a bad thing in itself, but the way our academics and academically-trained soldiers do it is so informed by postmodern secularism that they end up violating both fact and logic. Better than academic anthropology and political theory, these people should read original historical and religious texts, and myth. Our enemies are fighting for a dream, not an ideology.
Peters (who is also the author, under the name Owen Parry, of the Abel Jones novels which I’ve often praised in this space) expresses some iconoclastic opinions on our current struggle. Contrary to what you’ve read, he says, Iraq was the “good war,” and Afghanistan (following the original incursion, which should have been more massive) is a waste of time. Afghanistan, he says, has no strategic importance, is impossible to govern, and was only the base for the 9/11 terrorists because they’d been kicked out of every other safe haven. In Iraq, he maintains, the terrorists chose to make their real stand, and Saddam Hussein was genuine military threat. Control of Iraq also gives us considerable strategic advantages.
Having read Endless War, I feel a little better informed than I was, though the whole question remains Endlessly Complex.
The only major problem I had with the book was one essay (can’t find it now) in which he said he was as afraid of Christian fundamentalists as of Muslim fundamentalists. That’s a remarkably “conventional wisdom” kind of observation for a thinker of Peters’ originality. He doesn’t repeat it, so perhaps he thought better of it later.
Full disclosure: I got this book free for my Kindle through a special offer.
Endless War is an extremely readable, highly original, and penetrating analysis of the struggle between East and West. Recommended.
If You Have To Explain It, It's No Longer Funny
Patrick Kurp talks to a ghost about G.K. Chesterton and being funny. “Chesterton is right: Only the serious is worthy of joking. Joy-killers preoccupy themselves with trivia.”
Festival post-mortem (almost literally)
I was going to post yesterday, even though I said I wouldn’t, because I’d scheduled the day off from work in order to recover from the Norway, Michigan trip. Little did I know how much I’d need to recover—enough that I didn’t have the energy to post anyway.
The event in Michigan was generally good. I rode along with a friend to save gas costs, and we arrived mid-afternoon on Friday. I really like Norway, Michigan. It’s a pretty, clean town in a lovely setting among the hills, and it’s got the name “Norway” plastered all over it. The people were nice. I didn’t sell a lot of books, though. I’m not sure I covered my food costs.
Part of the problem may have been that I was purposely keeping my distance from people, in this case out of consideration for them (though that’s my usual reason, come to think of it). On Friday I was starting to come down with a cold, and on Saturday I woke up completely unable to speak. Nevertheless I dosed myself with a combination of nostrums from the local drug store/gift shop, and soldiered through. I even fought a couple combat fights, just to show one of our young guys how the axe was used (I lost them both). Then he took the weapon over, and I considered my obligations fulfilled.
Driving back Sunday I felt pretty bad, and on Monday (today too) I felt no better. I think I’ll prop myself up with drugs and try to go to work tomorrow anyway. Who cares if I infect the whole campus? The point is not to be a sissy!
Bad news today. My publisher has turned down my latest submission. Not because they didn’t like it, but because of financial hard times, and a corporate decision to turn away from fiction.
Our friend Ori says he can help me publish digitally. I’ll let you know how that progresses.
Making Culture Courageously
Filmmaker Anthony Parisi makes some good points in his overly negative review of the movie, Courageous. He writes:
Films like this reinforce the unfortunate impulse that anything we create must be explicitly “Christianized” or evangelistic. Churches are to spread the kingdom not by some sort of cultural revival but by the unglamorous life of local ministry God has founded on Word and sacrament. Making movies falls far outside the bounds of what the church has been called to do.
I sympathize with that first sentence. I chafe at the notion of seeing every cultural good in terms its value for evangelism. But I can’t agree with his next two sentences. Perhaps he means the institutional church should not make movies, and he’s probably right, but the church, as in the whole body of Christ or all Christians, should make movies if they have the skills and talent to do so. That’s what Mr. Parisi does himself or a variation of it.
Andy Crouch argues in his book, Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling
Movies are not teaching illustrations. I felt that strain while watching Fireproof. Clearly, Mr. Parisi would make different movies, perhaps even better ones. Showing more of what Christ did for us and less of our moral lifestyle, as he says, would improve the story, but I think Courageous is a respectable story in its own right. It isn’t a bad film. I don’t say anything worth doing is worthy doing badly to say Courageous is a terrible movie. I mean it’s good movie which could be a lot better, if the producers had pushed toward the things Mr. Parisi describes. “The gospel,” he observes, “pulls us out of our fragile self-worth built on performance and centers our identity on God’s love for us in Christ.” If one of the Courageous movie characters had been shown blowing it repeated and asking his wife and children’s forgiveness, pointing to the grace of Christ in his life despite his sin, that would have been powerful. Perhaps something like that can make it into the next film. I wish them the best on it.
Speaking of movie tie-in material, I encourage you to look into this four-week study on fatherhood issues produced as a follow-up to the movie.
Have They Discovered the Kracken's Lair?
The four boats were soon on the water; Ahab’s in advance, and all swiftly pulling towards their prey. Soon it went down, and while, with oars suspended, we were awaiting its reappearance, lo! in the same spot where it sank, once more it slowly rose. Almost forgetting for the moment all thoughts of Moby Dick, we now gazed at the most wondrous phenomenon which the secret seas have hitherto revealed to mankind. A vast pulpy mass, furlongs in length and breadth, of a glancing cream-color, lay floating on the water, innumerable long arms radiating from its centre, and curling and twisting like a nest of anacondas, as if blindly to catch at any hapless object within reach. No perceptible face or front did it have; no conceivable token of either sensation or instinct; but undulated there on the billows, an unearthly, formless, chance-like apparition of life.
As with a low sucking sound it slowly disappeared again, Starbuck still gazing at the agitated waters where it had sunk, with a wild voice exclaimed- “Almost rather had I seen Moby Dick and fought him, than to have seen thee, thou white ghost!”
“What was it, Sir?” said Flask.
It was not a Kracken, but a great squid which Starbuck said was rarely seen by whalers who lived to tell about it over a warm pint on shore. It was another sign of their doom.
Paleontologist Mark McMenamin explains how he may have discovered the Kracken’s liar by finding “markings on the bones of the remains of nine 45-foot (14 meter) ichthyosaurs of the species Shonisaurus popularis.” The bones are neatly arranged, as if the skeletons were taken back to the monster’s lair after succumbing. McMenamin doubts he will find evidence of a Kracken itself, because only the creature’s beak would have been hard enough to fossilize.
Deep, Beautiful Music
That’s what being a Christian musician is about.
Books on Writing
Damyanti has a long list of books on writing, which may remind you of that one you have been wanting to read or help you find one from an author you respect.
If this list is too daunting for you, then read these ten recommendations from Paste Magazine. In this list, Kevin Keller notes, “For most of us, that moment [of manic inspiration] never comes, and the only way to unleash creativity is through persistence and discipline.”
Princesses Aren't All Bad
John Mark Reynolds describes his reasons for liking the Disney princesses.
The films are far from perfect and marketing lurks behind every product. Still the harm is more in parents allowing too much consumption, than the innocent fantasies of childhood.
My daughters all struggle with the bad images that our culture sends women, but chief amongst these is not the Disney princess. Too much glitter and self-esteem isn’t good for anyone, but modern young women don’t seem to have enough of either!
…
Blaming the poor Disney princess, especially in her modern form, is wrongheaded. One cultural icon cannot do all the work of forming a good image. If Ophelia needs to be revived, it is more likely due to a culture of male Hamlets than from too much of the Little Mermaid.
(via Trevin Wax, may his ever-afters always be happy)