partsofspeaking

Time for some random comments. Why are we wasting time and money having Stephen Colbert speak before Congress? I don't think we got the joke. I am not sure who the butt of the joke was (I think it was supposed to be the arrogant character he portrays.) We need rain in North Georgia. I just mowed the dust this morning. Why do weeds grow even in a drought? And if you water your landscaping, why do the weeds thrive the best? There is an old saying, "A weed is a flower in the wrong place." (something along that line.) I have some pretty weeds in my beds. But I don't want them there. A boat is a hole you throw money into. Is there an inverse correlation between the weight of a person and the distance he/she parks from the entrance to Walmart? The world's worst invention: Those scooters at the grocery store. If you can't walk because of your weight, don't buy groceries! (That's really mean.) Those things take up the aisles.) I am r...

Ephesians 2:16: and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity (between Jews and Gentiles.) Another benefit of the cross--the death of racial and ethnic hatred and animosity. Now, don't get thinking I'm a hypocrite based on the next post. My views of the president's policies have no racial component, and those who accuse such, especially Christians, are not living in light of this verse. Let's recognize the death of racial and ethnic enmity through Christ.

http://www.charter.net/news/read.php?rip_id=%3CD9ICDPSO0%40news.ap.org%3E&ps=1011 Could somebody explain to me why the president's aunt is living in poverty? He wants to raise our taxes to help the poor we don't know and he can't help the poor he does know?

I give this to my humanities students to explain Thomas Aquinas Aquinas’ philosophical work, as shown in the lengthy book Summa Theologica , is very complicated but is often attributed with making the change in the intellectual world from the medieval way of thinking to the modern way of thinking. We have to understand that up to this time there was a generally Platonic, dualistic view of the world. Spiritual things (heaven, Bible, prayer, asceticism) were good, and physical things (the body, government, secular learning) were, not so much bad, as potentially anti-good—that is, they could get in the way of the spiritual, which is what really mattered. Beyond that, Aquinas’ philosophical school was called Scholasticism; it involved epistemology (how we know truth and learn it) and influenced education for centuries and theology until the 16th century and John Calvin. As the text (Cunningham and Reich, Culture and Values ) says on p. 228: “For Aquinas, reason finds truth when it s...

I like NPR. They are very biased, and really obviously so, but they do a great job of thoroughness, and of course they are strongest on the arts and culture side. They had a good interview on the Tea Partiers this morning. I would recommend it (Jonathan Rausch, on Morning Edition, Sept. 15, 2010). They archive everything. I haven't come to a decision about Tea Partiers. I hope they are not just a flash in the pan. Anything that gets people involved in choosing their leaders, I am for, and I seriously mean that, left or right.

This is honestly true. Cut and paste the link (I'm having trouble with this blogging software's linking system) and read the "in lieu of flowers" part. http://obits.dignitymemorial.com/dignity-memorial/obituary.aspx?n=Donald-Unsworth&lc=4768&mid=4371599 Of course, given the record of dead people voting in Chicago in past elections, this seems like turnabout and that's fair play.

Aretha Wants Halle Berry to Play Her in Biopic. This was a webpage on Christianity Today. It is disturbing on a number of levels. Why is CT posting this in the first place? Do people really get to pick who plays them in biopics? (Who would you pick?) I guess like Aretha I'd go for good looking, not similar looking. Can Halle Berry even sing? Hasn't Halle Berry had her own problems with respect? And most of all, did Aretha not realize the 200 pound differential between her and Halle Berry.

How’s your vision? The book of Ephesians has a lot to say about vision and Christian living. Up close and far away. Up close we see details but miss the bigger reality. As the old saying goes, we can’t see the whole forest for the individual trees. As we grow as Christians, our individual vision should change. Our lesson is the second half of Eph. 1. Last week Paul we saw that Paul starts his letter off saying “let’s get this into perspective. This is what has happened to you spiritually since and because you trusted Christ as savior. You are forgiven, redeemed, excepted in the Beloved (I take that to mean that the most beloved persons to God are the other persons of the trinity, and God sees us the way he sees Jesus). We are seated in the heavenlies (also discussed in Colossians). In verses 15 he says, A. I thank God for you. Are we truly thankful for people? Not just for what they give us, not for how they make us feel, not for the memories we have with them, not for w...

Follow this link to my other blog to find a review of a great book. I am not posting it here because of length. http://thechristiancollegeinstructor.blogspot.com/2010/09/shallows-review.html

Sometimes I go back over old posts to either edit or delete. I noticed one at the bottom of this page about the murder of Christian aid workers in Afghanistan last month. I said at the time it wouldn't get much press. I was right. While it did get reported by all the media, it got reported and discussed for maybe a day or two. Compare that to the so-called "pastor" in FL and his Quranic bonfire. We've been under that barrage of media for three or four weeks now. Discrepancy, anyone?

That morning was typical. I think that is the first thing we all remember about it. How typically the day began for all of us. It was a pretty day; destined to still be hot down here in the Georgia mountains, but cool that morning. At the time I was working at Northwestern Technical College, an institution that does not even go by that name anymore. I was not teaching at the time; we were on quarters and summer quarter had not ended, but I was getting paid to work on accreditation matters. How inconsequential those things are now--I only remember them because they figured into why I was doing what I was doing that day. I didn't leave the house til right before 9:00. I listen to Moody radio, which at the time, and probably still does, had a lot of programming as opposed to free DJ time. A program was coming on, but the local announcer, Andy Napier, mentioned, with an usually concerned sound to his voice, that "we are getting reports that a plane has flown into the World...

For those who read nonfiction (some people just don't); for those who teach; for those of middle-age who suspect their brains are working differently than they did twenty years ago; for those who turn to Google every time some fact slips their minds; for those who check email and facebook every couple of minutes; for those who begin to feel withdrawal symptoms when they haven't been online in a day-- I recommend The Shallows by Nicholas Carr. It's changing my life--well, it's in the process of making me think about changing my life, because obviously I am still blogging about it which means I am on the Internet. The book is about neural plasticity and how the Internet really is changing our brains, how we read (probably the worst effect), how we process, and how we remember. I happen to like the way my brain was before, but now I feel like it is a frenetic mess. I can feed my workaholic nature and work all the time. How I (think I) want to leave the computer at the...

So it seems the whack job in Florida who was going to burn the Q'urans on 9/11 has changed his mind and will have a sit-down with the imam behind the mosque planned for near Ground Zero. I am so surprised. Like this wasn't a stunt for attention, and the media loved it. Let's make all Christians look bad because of this "pastor." If the media had just refused to report this, they wouldn't be threatening Christians in Muslim countries, nor would our soldiers be in even greater danger. I think the media is as responsible as this Jones fellow for all this brouhaha. I don't think he ever intended to do it anyway, that he would respond at the last minute to whatever semblance of common sense came along. In short, a stunt. On a different note, I wish someone would help me understand this "Islam is about tolerance" idea. Then why do Christians, Jews, and even Buddhists and Hindus face such opposition in Muslim countries (specifically where Sharia ...

Especially since I respect Dr. Land so much and he was my pastor for over a year (interim). http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2010/septemberweb-only/45-51.0.html I realized today how much I was writing about this issue when I wrote Traveling Through (forgive the plug, but I spent eight years on that book and it means a lot, even if it's not very good). Some of us want to protect the sacred space from intrusion from politics; some of us, I suppose, feel we are providing a more holistic view if we integrate the sacred and secular. At the same time, maybe some of us are being dualistic (separating the sacred sphere too much from the public sphere), or maybe some of us are letting our passions for political causes control us. I don't know. Christians can't protect the sacred space so much that the gospel doesn't go out; we also can't get distracted, nor can we let the world think we only welcome people who have our political views, whatever they may be. But Glenn...

I never send or post things like this but this one is funny. WHY MEN ARE NEVER DEPRESSED: Men Are Just Happier People-- What do you expect from such simple creatures? Your last name stays put. The garage is all yours. Wedding plans take care of themselves. Chocolate is just another snack. You can be President. You can never be pregnant. You can wear a white T-shirt to a water park. You can wear NO shirt to a water park. Car mechanics tell you the truth. The world is your urinal. You never have to drive to another gas station restroom because this one is just too icky. You don't have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut on a bolt. Same work, more pay. Wrinkles add character. Wedding dress $5000. Tux rental-$100. People never stare at your chest when you're talking to them. New shoes don't cut, blister, or mangle your feet. One mood all the time. Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat. You know stuff about tanks.. A five-day vacation requires only one suitcas...

For someone who wants to read a good book, especially to help them with the craft of fiction, I recommend Olive Kitteridge. Very, very good. I'm still thinking about it three days after finishing it. I am now reading The Shallows , about how the Internet is changing our brains. Good grief! Quite interesting. I read a review today of Jonathan Franzen's new book. Don't know if I'll go there. I tried to read The Corrections and just plain got bogged down in, well, the sexual stuff. Just don't care to read some of that. It's funny how people want to say, "I'm not a prude." when discussing sex in the arts, but what they mean is they really don't want to look at very much of it but they can put up with it if they have to. What is a prude, anyway? It's like academic people not admitting they voted for a Republican when they did. For Pete's sake, take a stand.

Liberals, among other things, have a consistency problem. Even though "a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds," a foolish inconsistency boggles everyone else's minds. First, they say there are too many people on the planet. So we need to get rid of some of them, or the potential ones. But we need to protect animals. Did it ever occur to them that animals use resources on the planet too. Let's be consistent--abortion rights for the animals. And of course, we need to protect the lives of convicted and confessed murders and not execute them (I'm not completely pro-death penalty, but I'm consistent about it). They want law enforcement for some things and not for others. This is just a start. Any others?

I got to say, I don't get Glenn Beck. I know, I know--"You're a conservative, Barbara, you're supposed to love him." Not by my definition of a conservative. For some reason, I just find him disingenuous (an elitist word for fake). How could he not know that 8/28 was the date of MLKing's speech? Where does he get off telling Christians to leave their churches if the pastor mentions "social justice?" (There being many levels of interpretation of that word, from social concern to full-blown socialism). Why is he all of a sudden preaching like an evangelical, when he's a Mormom? (and probably one who doesn't know that much about his church's doctrine.) I am not sure if he reminds me of the main character on Paddy Chayevsky's Network , or some other demagogue. It's just a little creepy. I am not sure what he wants, other than money and power. I am not sure he has a coherent philosophy or is capable of creating or articulating ...