I’m rather down today after formally ending a friendship that went all the way back to childhood. Normally, I would feel it was better to simply fade away, but in this case I felt I had to draw a very clear line. After a couple of attempts to try to maintain the friendship despite our deepening differences, there was a online conversation back and forth about a news story that troubled me. The way the comments were framed, the information…
A snapshot of recent bits: Be thankful for government US Senate To Vote On Bill That Will Allow The Military To Arrest Americans On American Soil And Hold Them Indefinitely Seymour Hersh: Propaganda Used Ahead of Iraq War Is Now Being Reused Over Iran’s Nuke Program Giant Nasa rover launches to Mars “How Could This Happen in America?” Why Police Are Treating Americans Like Military Threats Discussing Occupy Wall Street, Coulter Says: “It Just Took A Few Shootings At Kent…
I might be alone in my interpretation of the unforgivable sin, the sin against the spirit. I’ve always taken it to mean something like invoking God/spirit to authenticate and make authoritative a view or action that directly expresses everything of its opposite. My journey is still very much in process, but it does seem even to me as though some of the people claiming to be christians might really take a new name for themselves. I think “Pharisee” doesn’t even…
I was re-reading a dissertation exam question, and I was somewhat surprised to discover that there has been no real transformation in my views on evil in more than a decade. Question: Compare the language of cause, analysis, description, and solution to evil in Augustine, Nietzsche, Schüssler-Fiorenza and one author of your choice (Buber). Identify juxtapositions, similarities, opposition, etc., amongst the authors, and situate your own view. The text of Augustine’s Confessions constructs an aesthetic metaphysics from within a post-Manichaean…
Wow – fantastic video. Americans – do not despair. How You Ended The War
I received an email today from Senator Saxby Chambliss, and I’m posting both his communication and my own. Dear Ms. N: Thank you for contacting me regarding the National Security Agency’s (NSA) monitoring of conversations connected to terrorist activity and the treatment of military detainees. It is good to hear from you. I certainly understand your concerns regarding personal freedoms. We are blessed to live in a free and effective democracy, and, just like you, I hold dear the personal…