From Luther’s hymn, “May God Bestow on Us His Grace”
Oh, let the people praise Thy worth,
In all good works increasing;
The land shall plenteous fruit bring forth,
Thy Word is rich in blessing.
May God the Father, God the Son,
And God the Spirit bless us!
Let all theworld praise Him alone,
Let solemn awe possess us.
Now let our hearts say, Amen.
The weekend went fine. Tiring but fine. My presentation to the Sverdrup Society in Fargo was well received (though I think I ran over my time). It did snow on us for the Viking exhibit in Bloomington, but we set up inside the museum, so it didn’t bother us much.
I’m not a great re-reader. I do re-read books that I especially like, but I usually wait at least a couple years before doing it, to give myself time to forget plot elements.
So I was surprised that a little voice in my head kept nagging me to re-read Andrew Klavan’s Weiss and Bishop trilogy. “It’s still got things to teach you,” it told me.
So I started the three books again, Dynamite Road, Shotgun Alley and Damnation Street.
I’m glad I did.
What Klavan is doing here, I think, is unprecedented. I don’t think there’s ever been a detective epic before—a trilogy of free-standing books that are nevertheless bound together by a single overarching theme.
I can’t summarize the theme—or if I can, I think it would give too much away for those of you who haven’t enjoyed the books yet.
But it has to do with love. Not just love as romance and a plot device, but love as the clue to the meaning of everything in our lives. The whole complicated nexus of love and sex and maleness and femaleness and idealism and disillusionment.
Klavan himself has said, in an NRO interview (this link is to the first in the series; I’m not sure which of the five contains the anecdote) that his journey to faith began with an act of voyeurism. He and his girlfriend (now his wife) lived in an apartment that looked directly into the windows of a neighboring apartment. A couple moved in who were exhibitionists, performing their private acts in full light, with the shades open. As Klavan discussed the situation with his girlfriend, it occurred to him that there’s a difference between the simple, physical act of sex (as when, for instance, one observes other people doing it) and the experience of sex when enjoyed with someone you love. He began to wonder what made the difference, and that led him into a spiritual search that culminated in his conversion. Continue reading Of outlaws and deconstructionists
This is one of the reasons I vote for the people I do. “More than 600 adults have been arrested and 47 children were rescued in a three-day roundup targeting people who force children into prostitution.” I expect our officials and law enforcers to this very thing, and I worry about certain political leaders/opportunists who actively or passively promote various perversions and immorality in the name of privacy. No one would defend child prostitution, of course, but some people take a few steps down the road to protecting all manner of deviancy and ridiculing morality. These are the kinds of raids I want the feds to being working on, not ripping Elian Gonzales from his family to take him back to Castro.
Perhaps questions marks are falling out of favor. Quotation marks too.
At least, I doubt I could handle it. I don’t go in for scary movies or haunted houses, though I have done scant but real research into occultic things–I hate all of it. I want to hate it more than I do even. Regardless, if I were the type to seek out scary adventures for Halloween and I lived in Britain, I’d consider the ones pictured here.
Having attempted to debunk God and not being one to leave well enough alone, author Richard Dawkins now wants to debunk Harry Potter.
I think looking back to my own childhood, the fact that so many of the stories I read allowed the possibility of frogs turning into princes, whether that has a sort of insidious affect on rationality, I’m not sure. Perhaps it’s something for research.
Chilling, what? Maybe he’s open to the harmlessness of fairy tales, but he’s already convinced that teaching children about hell is abusive. (via Books, Inq.)
A hymn of Martin Luther’s
Christ Jesus lay in death’s strong bands,
For our offenses given;
But now at God’s right hand He stands
And brings us life from heaven;
Therefore let us joyful be
And sing to God right thankfully
Loud songs of hallelujah!
Hallelujah!
No son of man could conquer Death,
Such mischief sin had wrought us,
For innocence dwelt not on earth,
And therefore Death had brought us
Into thraldom from of old
And ever grew more strong and bold
And kept us in his bondage. Hallelujah!
But Jesus Christ, God’s only Son,
To our low state descended,
The cause of Death He has undone,
His power forever ended,
Ruined all his right and claim
And left him nothing but the name,–
His sting is lost forever.
Hallelujah! Continue reading Christ Jesus lay in death’s strong bands
I have a full calendar this weekend. Or rather, full by my standards. Quite leisurely compared with the calendars of those of you who are caring for invalid parents or raising two-year-olds. But if God had meant me to have old parents or young children, he wouldn’t have made me me.
In which case somebody else would be taking care of them anyway.
Tomorrow I ride up to Fargo, North Dakota, to St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, where I shall speak to the Georg Sverdrup Society on “Problems in Translating Georg Sverdrup.” I’m sure they could find room for you as a guest, if you find PowerPoint presentations on 19th-Century Norwegian syntax compelling.
And on Sunday I’ll be with the Viking Age Club at the Bloomington Town Hall Museum in Bloomington, MN. We’ll have an outdoor camp. The forecast high temperature is 40°, with high winds.
Vikings wore down-filled parkas, didn’t they? Sure they did.
There are questions about the story of that McCain volunteer who says she was robbed, then beaten up and then had a letter B “carved” into her face. As others have noted, it doesn’t smell right. I could be wrong, but I don’t like it.
Talk show hosts made much yesterday of graffitti painted on the homes of Sen. Coleman and Congresswoman Bachmann here in Minnesota. Some of these stories failed to notice that some Democrats’ houses were also targeted, notably that of my very liberal congressman, Keith Ellison.
When you’re a Republican, winning shouldn’t be everything.