Sure, evolution as such is not to be found in the book containing what God gave Moses as an explanation of origins suitable for illiterate nomads. No, and beer is not mentioned in the Bible either, though man has been making it for about twelve centuries.
Bishop Tikhon of San Francisco, Los Angeles and the West

«— Butterfly Kiss-Off
—» Hairology

People who are always right

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James takes issue with people who are always right. So is he saying these “people” need some help with their logic skills? Or is he saying that they point out the fallacies in his own arguments, and therefore he needs help with his? Just kidding. In fact, I totally relate.

Yesterday, I left my iPod at work, plugged in, fully charged. It had been paused on a song (I can’t remember which one.) This doesn’t bother me, because leaving it allows the duty sonarmen to have some music to pass the time after everyone has gone home.

I arrived this morning to find it was on a game (my iPod has games?), unplugged, and the battery nearly depleted. I said to no one in particular, “I wish people wouldn’t play games on my iPod unplugged when the charger is right there!” A cow-orker spoke up rather angrily (as if being accused) and affirmed in as forceful a manner as possible that no one had messed with my excrement. When I tried to point out to him that iPods don’t play games and run down their batteries by themselves, he again, more forcefully, asserted that no one had messed with my excrement.

The mind boggles at the logic. Or perhaps he thinks raising his voice would make me infer that I have a ghost in my machine.

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Filed under: — Basil @ 7:38 pm

«— Rhetorical Question Begging
—» People who are always right

Butterfly Kiss-Off

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There are many points in this editorial that give pause for thought, but this one piqued my interest:

There are reasonable compromises that address the most serious concerns, which, it is fair to say, are more educational and ethical than environmental. For weddings, butterfly farms could be required to ship only sterile adults. Of course, research would be needed to find the right dose of radiation or chemosterilant for a butterfly species, but the breeders claim to be concerned about wild butterflies and the butterfly association could “walk the walk” of conservation by offering some money for studies. The neutered butterflies might be a bit more expensive, but cost can’t be a big issue for a father of the bride who’s already plunking down $300 for the “Fill the Sky” package.

It strikes me that this is another indication that our culture has absolutely no sense of symbolism whatsoever. Releasing sterilized butterflies at a wedding?

Read the entire article: Butterfly Kiss-Off – New York Times

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Filed under: — Basil @ 11:22 pm

«— Anti-war group alters display
—» Butterfly Kiss-Off

Rhetorical Question Begging

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Clifton notes the subtle rhetoric of people more enlightened than you, me, or Jesus:

The pill acts in two ways. Primarily, it prevents the ovaries from releasing an egg so no fertilization can occur. Then in the rare event that an egg has already been released by the ovaries, the pill also changes the chemistry of the lining of the uterus so that any fertilized egg cannot implant.

Is this an abortion pill? No. For the most part the pill simply stops an egg from being available to come in contact with sperm. And even if there happens to be an egg present when sex occurs there is no disruption of an implanted embryo. The only way the pill can be seen as inducing an abortion is if one holds the view that non-implanted, fertilized eggs are fetuses — a view which few doctors, pharmacists, scientists or Americans subscribe to.

So, the good doctor and all those calm rational people who agree with them are true by fiat. Ipse dixit indeed.

Read the rest: This is Life: Revolutions around the cruciform axis — Lies, More Damned Lies

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Filed under: — Basil @ 9:36 pm

«— White Man’s Religion?
—» Rhetorical Question Begging

Anti-war group alters display

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The name of Rob Henderson, who was killed in Iraq in 2004, was among 52 Kentucky service members names posted at the fair under a piece of paper that read “In honor of their sacrifices” when Henderson’s wife saw the display.

“It was like someone stabbed me in the heart,” said Lisa Henderson, 27, of Bowling Green. “My husband went over there and was supportive of the military and of going over there. For someone to use his name to end the war and ask to pull all the troops out, my husband would not have been in support of that.”

Read more: Lexington Herald-Leader: Anti-war group alters display

Related, from the archives of MSNBC:

All war presidents find ways to deal with the strain of sending soldiers off to die. During the Vietnam War, LBJ used to pray after midnight with Roman Catholic monks. Bush’s father, George H.W. Bush, prayed with the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church on the eve of the first gulf war. For George W. Bush, these private audiences with the families of dead soldiers and Marines seem to be an outlet of sorts. (They are perhaps harder for Laura, who sometimes accompanies Bush and looks devastated afterward.) Family members interviewed by NEWSWEEK say they have been taken aback by the president’s emotionalism and his sincerity. More complicated is the question of whether Bush’s suffering is essentially sympathetic, or whether he is agonizing over the war that he chose to start.

The most telling—and moving—picture of Bush grieving with the families of the dead was provided by Rachel Ascione, who met with him last summer. Her older brother, Ron Payne, was a Marine who had been killed in Afghanistan only a few weeks before Ascione was invited to meet with Bush at MacDill Air Force Base, near Tampa, Fla.

Ascione wasn’t sure she could restrain herself with the president. She was feeling “raw.” “I wanted him to look me in the eye and tell me why my brother was never coming back, and I wanted him to know it was his fault that my heart was broken,” she recalls. The president was coming to Florida, a key swing state, in the middle of his re-election campaign. Ascione was worried that her family would be “exploited” by a “phony effort to make good with people in order to get votes.”

Ascione’s family was one of the last Bush approached. Ascione still planned to confront him, but Bush disarmed her in an almost uncanny way. Ascione is just over five feet; her late brother was 6 feet 7. “My whole life, he used to put his hand on the top of my head and just hold it there, and it drove me crazy,” she says. When Bush saw that she was crying, he leaned over and put his hand on the top of her head and drew her to him. “It was just like my brother used to do,” she says, beginning to cry at the memory.

Read it all: ‘I’m So Sorry’

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Filed under: — Basil @ 9:28 pm

«— Panagia stolen from Elona Monastery in Greece
—» Anti-war group alters display

White Man’s Religion?

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Fr. John Whiteford brings to our attention a video that highlights Northeast Africa (Carthage, Egypt and Ethiopa) as one of the cradles of ancient Christianity, as well as current African Orthodoxy and African-American Orthodoxy.

Hat tip: Fr. Joseph Huneycutt

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Filed under: — Basil @ 8:00 pm

«— Unpublishing One’s Writing
—» White Man’s Religion?

Panagia stolen from Elona Monastery in Greece

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According to pious tradition, the Elona Monastery was founded when a miraculous icon of the most-holy Theotokos (panagia) was found among the crags of a high cliff. This panagia has now been stolen, reports the BBC.

The monastery and the icon brought hope to the Greek people during Turkish oppression that one day they would know freedom. “So important is this particular Panagia… that the deputy chief of the national police force is leading the inquiry.”

Read more: BBC NEWS | Europe | Greek police hunt for stolen icon

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Filed under: — Basil @ 8:40 pm

«— Darth Smartass
—» Panagia stolen from Elona Monastery in Greece

Unpublishing One’s Writing

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What would have become of the world if Dostoevsky’s spiritual father told him, “I really don’t like your latest book. You don’t understand monasticism or true spirituality at all. That young monk — what is his name? Alexei Feodorovich? Yes, Alyosha! — not a proper monk at all! You must UNPUBLISH this book at once!”

Luckily for the world, such unpublishing was not possible then.

What a loss for us all that it is now. Thank God for the Wayback Machine and Google cached pages.

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Filed under: — Basil @ 5:06 pm

«— Where are the Floodbanks?
—» Unpublishing One’s Writing

Darth Smartass

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Just hilarious. Darth Vader Being a Smartass.

Hat tip: Binary Bonsai

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Filed under: — Basil @ 9:54 pm

«— Conversation I Wish For
—» Darth Smartass

Where are the Floodbanks?

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Nathan at Fighting the Little Fights struggles with the use of allegory in interpreting scripture:

I encountered a rather frustrating use of allegory in reading “Mary: The Untrodden Portal“. Frustrating because I could easily understand the argument the author was making from the text but really coudn’t see how anyone would come up with that novel interpretation without first importing the idea. The author, quoting a saint whose name escapes me, argues that the East gate in Ezekiel 44 allegorically represents Mary (or her womb) and since it was shut after God went through it, similarly Mary was shut after God went through her in the Incarnation, thus “proving” the ever-virginity of the Theotokos. But the text itself could never be made to say any such thing if the doctrine had not already been firmly established in the mind of the interpreter – so what is authoritative about that kind of interpretation? Clearly it is not the text. Wright argues that at least some of the uses of allegory “constitute a step away from the Jewish world of the first century within which Jesus and his first followers were at home.” He does concede that allegory, given the nature of the debates surrounding difficult passages in the OT which might have lead to them being tossed altogether, did serve as a way of saving the Bible for the church. But where allegory fails is that it does not appeal to the Bible itself, even though it operates with a Christian framework and uses biblical language, but rather to previously established doctrines and traditions within the church. (Read the whole article: Fighting the Little Fights: Allegory as love affair?)

Well, let me first say that I have not read this book, but the excerpts and reports I have seen lead me to believe that this will be the least difficult bit of the book. At least, maybe it will be after we put it into perspective.

The prophecy of Ezekiel is apocalyptic literature — like the prophecy of Daniel or the Apocalypse of Saint John (Revelation). To put it crassly: It’s weird. It is impossible to understand the imagery employed without resorting to allegory. (Think, for example, of the valley of dry bones passage.) The interpretation of the East Gate as prophesying about the Theotokos is the most common Orthodox Catholic interpretation; in fact, I know of no other interpretation, in East or West.

But the underlying question is: What are the floodbanks surrounding the allegorical interpretation of scripture? What keeps allegory from overflowing its banks and becoming a devastating flood of rank heresy only pretending to have any root in scripture?

Let’s streamline the question a little and see if it offers some insight: What are the floodbanks surrounding the interpretation of scripture? Answer: The living Tradition of the Church, which is nothing less than the Holy Spirit moving within the Bark of the Church and steering her true. Does this sound circular? It is; the circularity of the argument is unavoidable.

The authority of any interpretation is based on the authority of the Tradition, the authority of the Church, which is ultimately based on the authority of God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ and the scriptures which testify of him, both old and new testaments. Before you can determine what you should believe about any interpretation of scripture, you must first establish whether you believe that the Holy Spirit has continuously led the Church into all truth from the time of the Apostles.

Once you accept this primary dogma of the Church — this foundational point of ecclesiology — then the determination of what counts as an authentic interpretation is a far easier question.

Whether Anglican Bishop Wright’s position on allegory vis a vis the early Church holds up under scrutiny I will leave to more capable minds than my own. But, here’s a clue: “He argues that the current understanding of Jesus must be connected with what is known to be true about him from the historical perspective of first-century Judaism and Christianity.”

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Filed under: — Basil @ 8:50 pm