Perhaps Dan Brown is taking so much time to write his follow-up to The Da Vinci Code because he is taking all of the criticism he received to heart, planning to make this next book critical as well as popular success. Doubt it, but why be pessimistic? For far superior books on secrets and religion, take up the ones Will Duquette read yesterday.
Warming up Mom
The Minnesota blog Freedom Dogs posted this YouTube video yesterday, and I forwarded the URL to several people, because I thought it was hilarious. Maybe you’ve got to live up here to appreciate it, but this is gritty, slice-of-life filmmaking.
By the way, Minnesotans for Global Warming is a real group. They’re planning a rally at the state capitol this weekend.
I’d be tempted to go, except it’s so cold this time of year.
Today was quite nice, actually. The mercury rocketed up to about 40° F. (that’s about 5° Euro). Driving home, I saw people sitting at outside tables at a coffee shop (they were wearing parkas, but they were nevertheless drinking their coffee outside).
But it’s all a cheat. All tease. Tomorrow the high temperature will be 25 or 30 degrees lower than today. And the high Wednesday will be about zero. Then it’ll ease up a little, but there’s plenty of freeze left in the freezer.
That’s why I think nature worship will never catch on in Minnesota. If you live in California, you might be able to join some animist cult and delude yourself into thinking Mother Nature is a soft and indulgent sort, a nurturer. Up here we know her better. We figured out long ago that if she doesn’t take her medication regularly she’s likely to wander out of the house in her nightgown, and sometimes at night you hear her playing with the cutlery in the kitchen, and you wonder…
Light Without End
Bill has had a moment–you know, one of those epiphany things. “I read a glowing tribute to the movie It’s a Wonderful Life a while ago (and that’s one of my favorite movies), and, apropos of almost nothing, the author of the tribute said that he believed people would be watching that movie long after Christianity is forgotten. . . . ” As if.
Refreshment in The Cruciform Life
My cousin has taken up church planting in northeast Tennessee, and I remember that I have not prayed for him and his team as I originally wanted to. Perhaps, you can pray with me. He is blogging at The Cruciform Life now (updated link). In one post, he writes about finding spiritual refreshment during, not after, a trial and draws beautiful pictures of water coming from the rock. I needed to read that today. I’m also looking forward to his posts on dashboard lights. Can’t say too much about those little lights.
For a writer without a publisher, this is just about the last straw
The fact that he’s going to have his memoirs published probably surprises me less (in today’s media world) than the fact that he’s still alive at all.
Via Blue Crab Boulevard: Cheetah, the chimp from the Johnny Weismuller movies, will finally tell all.
Expect a heart-wrenching account of a life-long struggle against speciesist stereotypes.
“I never got the girl,” the hominid will complain. “I really wanted to direct, but I couldn’t get past the glass ceiling.”
Fred Scuttle eclesiology
Since I’m on a roll with this anti-unity argument (by the way, what do you have when you don’t have unity? You have diversity. That’s a good thing, right?), I’ll extend it with some remarks on the subject of Christian unity. The opinions expressed below are my own, and do not represent the views of Brandywine Books, its employees or parent corporation, or of real persons, living or dead.
It may be different for those of you not connected to “mainline” denominations (so called because their leaders either use intravenous drugs or act as if they do), but for those of us who are so connected, it’s hard to go a week without hearing or reading some lament about “the shameful lack of unity within the Christian church,” or even “the sin of disunity in the church.”
The Fred Scuttle principle applies here, just as in politics. Fred’s idea of “popular prices” is prices he likes. The ecumenists’ (that’s the name for people who promote institutional Christian unity) idea of reconciliation is a world-wide church that runs precisely along the lines they approve of.
This is the part they never talk about. Their proposals are all very touch-feely, very kum-ba-ya. They include very few concrete proposals at first.
Because somebody’s got to give up something. I believe in congregational church government (that’s odd for a Lutheran, but I belong to an odd Lutheran group). My Catholic friend (I have at least one) believes strongly in episcopal government (that means bishops call the shots). Continue reading Fred Scuttle eclesiology
Simplify
With a knee-jerk tax “rebate” coming from Uncle Sam, that great benefactor without whom we could not live nearly as well as we do, let me point out a bit of common advice from Paul Borthwick’s book Simplify: 106 Ways to Uncomplicate Your Life. He writes:
#3 Resist Temptation
An article in a local paper described customers at a local “bargain” store as “People Shopping for Things to Need.” Stay away from shopping centers or malls except when you have a specific purchase in mind. Don’t surf the Internet gazing at all the stuff for sale on eBay or at the website of your favorite clothing, technology, music or DVD store. Window-shopping in all forms induces buying. That’s why professionals spend so much time decorating the windows, jazzing up their websites, and bombarding your Christmas mail with catalogs.
According to the must-be-decent people at feedthepig.org, any money we get from the federal government (which is probably being stolen from starving children in the first place) should go to pay off our debt and save for our future. How boring is that? America was built on the back of responsibility, now was it? No, sir. Spend that money, citizen, and vote for the candidates who will beat down the rich man to save you from victimhood–in good ole American fashion.
Fred Scuttle politics
The temperature was subzero and bitter this morning when I went to work, but it eased gradually through the day. Didn’t get as warm as the forecast promised, but tomorrow is supposed to be in the teens, and we may actually see a little melt over the weekend.
This is the point where we say to ourselves, “Maybe this will be the last hard siege of the winter. Maybe it’ll be uphill from here.”
This is pure self-delusion, but self-delusion is one of the coping devices that permit us to live in this part of the country.
Today’s subject: “Bringing us all together.” One of the presidential candidates (let’s call him, oh, Baback Orama) made a speech about wanting to bring all Americans together. Dennis Prager pounced on it and has been jumping on it off and on ever since. I thought I’d comment too, because it’s a general subject I’ve been thinking about for a long time.
I first started noticing this, if I remember correctly, while watching how the news media reported on religion. Every time a liberal was elected to the leadership of a denomination, it was treated as a straight story. “Dr. Bozo, a world-renowned expert on Syro-Phoenician gerunds, has a disarming sense of humor, plays the harmonium, and is well-liked both by supporters and opponents.” That sort of thing. Continue reading Fred Scuttle politics
Why So Downcast, Oh My Soul?
“By day the Lord commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life.” (from Psalm 42 ESV)
Bowling — the next big thing
Today the temperature didn’t claw its way up much past zero (about 17 Celsius, for our European readers), but according to the best authorities it will be warmer tomorrow, and may get up around freezing by the weekend. Oh, how sweet that sounds—“up around freezing.” Where did I put my sunscreen?
I’ve had an unaccustomed streak of feeling unusually good for the past week or so, but tonight I’m depleted. It probably has something to do with my renter waking me up at 5:00 a.m. to jump-start his car, but I also feel as if I’m coming down with another cold. So I’m galvanizing my stomach with zinc tablets, as Phil has counseled me.
I found myself, while driving home tonight, behind a car with a bumper sticker that said, “Equal Rights Are Not Special Rights.”
I don’t think it was an act of unreasonable stereotyping for me to assume that anybody with a bumper sticker like that is very likely homosexual.
Then the car turned off into a bowling alley.
What’s wrong with this picture? I thought.
Perhaps I was observing the first emanations of a harbinger. Perhaps the creative minds that determine what’s fashionable and what’s not in our culture have decided, at long last, to embrace the noble and ancient sport of bowling.
Think of it—bowling, the new feng shui.
Bowling shirts will suddenly be trés chic, seen on all the A List celebrities, and on sale in trendy shops at exorbitant prices.
Bowling shoes will come in exciting new colors.
Bowling alley snack bars will start selling brie and espresso and white wine.
The movie “Kingpin” will be adapted into a Broadway musical.
“Bowling For Dollars” will be revived on network television in prime time.
Go now and invest in Brunswick stock. And remember, you read it here first.