Category: Uncategorized

Margaret and I were probing the mystery of the different appellations for Thomas Aquinas’ major work this afternoon. Some sources give Summa Theologica, “Theological Summa,” and others Summa Theologiae, “Summa of Theology.” There are high stakes among Thomists, we gather, but we aren’t sure who lines up on which side, or why.

As we were seeking illumination on this point, we discovered the Vicipaedia, the Latin-language Wikipedia. On the first page today was an article about pong cervisiale, which you Anglophones may know as “beer pong.”

That was startlingly provocative enough, but the illustration brought to mind Margaret’s and my dismay recently to discover that most of America plays beer pong by rules very different from the ones we knew back at Bowdoin. We played (not Margaret, who abstains from both pong and beer) with real table tennis equipment and very basic rules (hit cup, take sip; land in cup, drain cup). Evidently there is now a World Series of Beer Pong played by the decadent variant rules. O tempora, o mores!

The other night as I was lying awake, my thoughts rambled about the popular-music trope of the “book of love.” There’s the Monotones’ classic single, of course (“Oh I wonder, wonder, who boo-pe-doo, who, who wrote the book of love”), but Elvis Costello invokes it in “Every Day I Write the Book” and Nick Lowe and Dave Edmunds recorded a single with Rockpile, “When I Write the Book (About My Love)” — subsequently covered by a number of performers. There was a band named Book of Love.

Is there a traditional background for this motif? Biblical tradition alludes to a “book of life,” and there’s the “talking book” tradition to which my radio conversation partner Allen Callahan refers in his book’s title. Am I forgetting a “book of love” tradition from folklore? Did the Monotones give birth to what became an utterly convincing folk-repertoire metaphor?

This morning while we were waking up, Margaret asked me, “Agoraphobia — isn’t that ‘fear of open places’? What about ‘angoraphobia’?”

He: “You mean, ‘fear of fuzzy cats’? Or are you thinking of ‘Igoraphobia’?”

She: “ ‘Fear of hunchbacks’? Oh, dear; what about ‘angeraphobia’?”

He: “ ‘Fear of wrath‘?”

She: Or “ ‘Al-Gore-aphobia’?”

He: “ ‘Fear of being trapped in conversation by an earnest policy wonk’?”

She: “Oh, dear! Or what about ‘Elgaraphobia’?”

He: “Fear of ‘Pomp and Circumstance’?”

[And as I was typing this, it occurred to me to add, “auguraphobia,” “fear of hand tools.”]
Continue reading “Why We Were Late To Church”

Tuesday night, the kids and I went to New Comiskey to see the ball game. We had a wonderful time, for the most part. The game was close, the teams played decent ball (especially considering how weak the Sox offense has gotten), and the game was tied going into the ninth, the beer was. . . golden.

One drawback: the row behind us was a birthday group of girls Pippa’s age, who spent the whole first eight and half innings squabbling, shrieking, and slapping one another. We had to cover our years pretty much any time there was the least excuse for noise — or none. The most boisterous among them sat immediately behind me.

In the first inning, she dumped her empty peanut shells down my back.

In the third inning, she splattered her soda all over my back.

In the sixth inning, she whacked one of her neighbors, who shrieked even more.

Nate and I figured they’d tire out rapidly, but they were still squealing strong by the ninth inning. The only thing that silenced them was Dan Uggla’s ninth-inning home run, after which they decided the Sox didn’t have a chance, and the whole row left. Those last five outs were the best part of the game.

Yesterday I wore my “I’m blogging this” t-shirt all day — and I didn’t blog.

I’d have thought it went without saying, but since “speaking out about the alleged Episcopal priest-Muslim combo” has become a litmus test in some quarters, I will say that I dissent emphatically from the Rev. Ms. Redding’s understanding of Christian faith and priesthood, and from her bishop’s sense that her situation entails an “exciting opportunity.” Indeed, I take it that only by falsifying that which has historically constituted both of these ways of life can one arrive at both/and approach.

I respect certain Islamic specific traditions tremendously, and I recognize and learn freely from general tenets of Islam. If the Rev. Ms. Redding were to convert to Islam, I’d be able to see reasons for that change of path (though I cannot but regard it as a sad detour from the truth, for someone who has tasted the heavenly gift, and has shared in the Holy Spirit). Claiming that God’s triune identity is dispensable (contrary to the Christian side), though, and that Jesus really did die on the cross and rise from death (contrary to the Muslim side), seems to amount to a callow Sheilaism.

So, were I in a position to counsel the Rev. Ms. Redding — assuming that the facts reported reflect the situation reliably — I’d suggest that she take some time, examine her heart, learn more about what it means actually to live as a member of the Body of Christ and about what it means to submit to Allah, and in the meantime to avoid making public professions of matters about which she’s still in discernment. I’d strongly advise her to avoid exercising any sacerdotal responsibility. I’d pray that Bishop Warner return to the promises he made at his accepting the weighty office of the episcopate.

And if Prof. Webb actually said, “It’s a matter of interpretation. But a lot of people on both sides do not believe in interpretation,” he should be ashamed of himself. Nobody “doesn’t believe in interpretation”; it’s impossible to do without interpretation. What people discountenance is “using ‘interpretation’ as a fig leaf for disregarding clear and explicit, contradictory doctrinal claims without advancing an explanation as coherent and profound as the claims themselves.”
Continue reading “I Don’t Think So”

As Seabury considers alternatives in realizing its long-range plan, perhaps we too should consider recruiting a Formationator. . . .

(My favorite part is the opening sequence, where two seminarians are agreeing that a whole litany of classical heresies are more pastoral, more affirming, more inviting than true doctrine.)

[I should add that my attention was called to this clip and to the Arian Catholic Church by Rick Harris, to whom I herewith tip my hat, twice.]
Continue reading “Strategic Plan?”

Many aspects of online life commend themselves to thoughtful attention right now, and I might even be motivated to put my oar in if we actually had more engaged blog discussions such as we used to have on olden times. (What’s different? Well, for just one factor, all of us have so many more, divergent online friends to keep in touch with, our energies have been splintered more than when the “us” about whom we seem to be speaking was a lot smaller.)

But I’m exhausted. The stress of the school year, which had settled cozily into by neck and shoulders, has begun a lazy unwinding act. My tenuous attention span permits me to accomplish fifteen-second tasks, or longer tasks that require only tangential attention. I’m subject to sudden weariness, aches and kinks and clumsiness (more so than usual, he rejoined with anticipatory asperity). Simple errands feel as though they require an all-encompassing effort.

On the other hand, relief is coming. Margaret says I look better every day, and my reading list promises stimulating, engrossing food for thought. I may declare email bankruptcy, or in a fit of resurggent energy, actually do something about my backlogged communications. For now, though, if I seem listless or sluggish, please consider me burned out and exhausted, and know that I’m trying to do the things necessary for pulling back together.

{If you came due to a link from a Boing Boing, the link you’re looking for is here. My own “ten years later” link is here.}

It’s been months, now, and the furore has died down. Kathy Sierra has issued a joint statement with Chris Locke; she no longer lumps him and Jeneane and Frank in with whoever was allegedly sending her anonymous emailed death threats. Life goes on.

In the interim, Shelley points out that Tara Hunt (proximate target of “the mean kids”) has raised the question of reality-testing the actual dangers involved in last winter’s dust-up. Is anyone actually at any greater danger if they participate in public life online? To be fair to Kathy and to what Tara herself said earlier, there’s an extent to which “actuality” can be deployed to excuse abusive threats; if vulnerable people hear a threat, they need to take it more seriously than do people who are insulated from danger. Still, even vulnerable people can overreact. Part of their friends’ role is to help them tell the difference. Tara now wonders whether Kathy might have been better served to hear that she didn’t need to be afraid.

In a related retrospective deliberation, have you noticed Blogarians en masse adopting Good Housekeeping speech codes, as Tim O’Reilly suggested they do? Clue: I don’t see a badge, a credo, a promissory note, or some other public asseveration of good behavior on the home page of Tim’s own blog (maybe I missed it). At the time, some observers suggested that badges of good citizenship wouldn’t solve the problem, wouldn’t provide a workable framework for inculcating respect and civility.

In the interest of not repeating an incident that has cost several people a lot, it would constitute a great favor for us all if reporters, online writers, opinion-makers, and fanboys and -girls gave this event more than casual consideration. If anything would strengthen the sense of shared civil norms, it wasn’t pledges and badges. It’s the kind of relationships of mutuality that Tim himself drew on to help defuse the fireworks, and that subsequent conversations between the principals strengthened and extended, that engender more civil discourse.

Lawrence Lessig is changing the trajectory of his leadership efforts from “copyright reform” to the corruption that makes reform necessary. By “corruption,” he doesn’t exactly mean “bribery of public officials,” but more the corrosion of the political system that presses so consistently toward extending copyright, when (to quote from Lessig’s paraphrase from Britain’s Gowers Commission) “a government should never extend an existing copyright term. No public regarding justification could justify the extraordinary deadweight loss that such extensions impose.”

Cheers from this quarter; Prof. Lessig embodies the best qualities of the activist academic, and his cause is sound, his heart is set on an ideal. “Corruption” won’t go away from Lessig’s opposition, but even if he only shines sunlight on infected political tissue he will have done plenty.

David notes that Nature has launched Nature Precedings, an open access preprint archive comparable to arXiv. Still awaiting word on when someone will support an open access theological preprint archive. . . .