Poems and Comics

I really dig this poem.

The Man We Wanted God to Be

September 19, 2012 By Rupert Loydell

The man we wanted God to be
is divorced and drinks on his own.
He watches too much television
and is never far from the settee.

The man we wanted God to be
has no motive or reason.
He doesn’t turn up for interviews,
if he did wouldn’t get the job.

The man we wanted God to be
can hardly find his own way home
or remember the way into town,
let alone manage to walk on water.

The man we wanted God to be
turned out to be somebody else.
His stories only confused us,
we didn’t much like his friends.

The man we wanted God to be
is still insistent that he is.
We had such high hopes for him
but heaven was not on his mind.

It comes from this site I frequent, Jesus Radicals. It was actually shown to me by a professor I greatly appreciated and admired, Dr. Chip Kooi.

Also, I find this comic to be hilarious and true.


 

Pros and Cons

I do not think money is bad. I think it is good. It helps me survive. I do think money causes many problems, something especially evident in developing and third world countries. I also think life is important and valuable. I think it should be cherished and no one has the right to impede upon another's life in any way with a direct, conscious decision to do so.
And so we find ourselves at that sticky place with abortion. Sifting through all the political rhetoric is very difficult and is often a trying task. So, it is hard for me to believe someone like Romney is pro-life when he is in favor of further military spending and expansion. Inherently, an innocent child will die. If just that one life is snuffed out due to a drone strike, I do not think Romney can say he is pro-life. Rather, he is anti-abortion and pro-American life and to me, that is a big difference than truly being pro-life. Romney was just an example. This is rhetoric I hear from conservatives all the time, including many conservatives that I am very close to and love, yet I find their view unreconcilable.
Conservatives would also like to do as they wish with their money, stating "how can the government think it knows what to do with my money better than I do?" This is valid. All tithing statistics aside though, obviously people don't really know what to do with their money. Conversely, should we allow the government to know what is best for our bodies and minds? Specifically women, can the government know what is right for women in the case of abortion? It seems to me that it cannot if it cannot know what is the right way to spend our money.

For further reading, here are some links to author, theologian and preacher Greg Boyd's blog on abortion and one on homosexuality that discusses the inadequacies of the Church's relationship with the LGBT community.

World

I keep listening to this song over and over. I can't get enough. It is so good. It was on the season opener of The Walking Dead.

Today I woke up at 5:30. To go to 6am breakfast call. Random, yes. But good. Savannah and I shared this giant plate of a scramble covered with gravy. We shared, which was definitely the best plan because it was huge.

Lastly, I just love Vice. They always have such great documentaries about stuff that normal news doesn't cover. It is great.
Well they had recently posted a video of a trailer for a new series they are going to put out about this dude Eddie Huang. They first showcased him in an episode of their series entitled "Munchies." Now he is up to no good traveling around and this first episode is about him going to the Bay area and doing his food thing there.

And here is the one I am really looking forward to. Not in a "wow this is going to be fun" but in a holy cow this is awesomely tragic way. Behold.

Pika Pi

I think I am going to be Pikachu for halloween. That will be awesome. I am 25 and I still love me some pokemon.

Also, I am going to attempt to introduce three new words into my regular conversation. Pedantic, ineptitude, and compunction. It just seems like the right thing to do.

High and Low

I have spoken about art before, my affinity for it. One thing I love is the absurd. Eccentric things. Black Metal being one of them. It is so alone. So still. Yet at the same time being a concussive wall of brilliant lo-fi hatred.
Another thing I love is Andy. Warhol that is. In grade four I did a report on him for my G.A.T.E. after school program (That stands for "gifted and talented education." Yeah, I was pretentious from the get go.) My parents even took me to the SFMOMA because they had a special exhibit on him. Come to think of it, I think that was when my love affair with modern art, especially abstract expressionism began. I distinctly remember a brilliantly oversized canvas that was entirely black save a thin red line near the bottom. I digress. I really want this shirt so much. SO MUCH. Yet it has been discontinued and is now being sold at an exorbitant price. Alas, I fear it was not meant to be. So instead, I think I shall just settle for a framed print one day.

Everything

It has long occurred to me that many times we take very simple things for granted. Specifically, we take basic functions for granted. Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead's foundational mathematical exploration the Principia Mathematica proves at length that one plus one does, in fact, equal two. Thus, it is entirely too important to understand very small things so we are able to cogently articulate larger things. I title this "That Which is the Nature of Non-Existence."

It is altogether impossible for anything to exist in non-existence. Not even non-existence can exist in non-existence as this admits an existence of that which would occupy nothing, as nothing is still a thing in the sense that it is that which is the absence of all things. Thus, the universe and even existence itself cannot be thought of in static terms as space in any sense does not exist outside of the universe. As such, our universe cannot be thought of as confined in a finite space, rather our universe is a possible infinite space and anything existing outside of our universe would then become a non-sequiter. Many times we view our universe as a ball of light in a sea of darkness that houses our universe. This cannot be if that space that holds our universe is non-existence. This is also opposed to the notion of something that does not exist, as that which does not exist holds within it the possibility for existence as it has already existed or could exist in the future. Thus, non-existence is the absence of all things, the absence of nothing, removing all forms from it, the existent probability, possibility, qualitative, quantitive self.

I wrote this a long time ago.
I still like it.

The Problem With the Christo-hyper-masculine Mythos

There is a sentiment being displayed currently in many non-denominational, reformed, evangelical streams of Christianity, that is, pervasive in Christendom in general. It is the growing tendency to display Christ as an individual who is not afraid of conflict or to get in your face. A Christ that will get in the octagon and "kick some ass."Those who support this Christological caricature posit that feminism has created a Christ deficient of masculinity and traditional male virtues. That Christ has become effeminate and that this is a terrible blow to the work of Christ. There is some truth in this, but only in that men are unwilling to sacrifice their lives for their wives and be the man Christ demands them to be in kindness, gentleness and love. However, there are also two horrible truths about this Christological sentiment. The first is that it forces men into a singularity of aggressive behaviors as the most virtuous behavior. This aggression does not have to manifest itself purely through physical violence but it does insist that the actions of men must be forceful in a seemingly tyrannical sort of way. This leaves little or no room for any behavior of men that does not include hunting or fighting as virtuous (or anything that could bring causational goodness to the work of Christ). In the very least, all other behaviors are a bastardized version of true masculinity. Things such as academia would be less virtuous than warfare. Playing Dungeons and Dragons less virtuous than playing football. All non-aggressive actions become mutually exclusive with virtue. The second truth is that this Christology ostracizes women almost entirely. It merely reestablishes a patriarchy that is only friendly toward male cisgender constitutions. It finds no virtue in the female form or voice and demonizes all ostensible feminine roles of liturgical practices and any orthopraxic gynocentric values of the Church. YHWH is no longer the pantocreator who is intimately and deeply in love with his creation and Christ is no longer the man who openly wept and bitterly cried out in advocation for creation upon his death. No, this is a Christology that wishes to re-imagine Christ as one who jumped off the cross, pulled it out of the ground and beat to death all the Centurions in attendance. Mark Driscoll famously said that Christ is "a pride fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up." It is proper, though not in totality, to esteem YHWH with feminine attributes and being connected with the feminine, as is seen directly within the hebraic canon in the use of Eloheim, a word that is both masculine and feminine. It is indicative in the nature of YHWH as he is the giver of life. It is also in Christ's life that we see his inclusion toward women, when they were scarcely more than chattel. It is again pervasive in the language of Pauline theology that demands an egalitarian acknowledgement of all humanity within the greater narrative of justification.
In conclusion, the aggression sought out by Driscoll and others in this camp seems to be wholly out of place with the ethos of a Christ who willingly died on the cross. He met violence with peace. He showed no aggression toward those who killed him. He begged YHWH to forgive them. These are the tenants of Christ and the life that we strive so desperately to follow. Christ should then not be viewed as wholly male and idolized as such, but rather, more specifically and properly, as the Logos, as God manifested in humanity as the perfection of humanity. Once our anthropological perception of Christ is shifted as such, we no longer see what it is to be a man, but we see what it is to be Christ like, the sole purveyor of wholly goodness in the world. A Christ that has broken all barriers and has reached out to all people not through any form of aggression or violence but through a scandalous birth, an impoverished life and an unwarranted criminal death. These are not the behaviors of a comic book super hero. These are the actions of one who would reach down into the darkness and love humanity, actions that do not establish that masculinity is important, rather, that people are important. To be sure, Mark Driscoll and others who support this type of hyper-masculine Christology are heartfelt Christians who are trying as much as I am to follow Christ. But it is also certain that this view of Christ is ignorant and demonstrably wrong.