075 Trinity 1: I Am Not Your Disappointment
Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you. ~ Psalm 33
I Am Not Your Disappointment
Don't be a prude.
That used to mean, "Don't refuse my advances for premarital sex, baby doll."
The word prudence means, "prescience, foresight, premeditation, brilliance."
The Hebrew word is ערמה ("Armah"). You want you some'a that.
No one was ashamed to name the bank "Prudential."
Be a prude. Let them be their own disappointment.
Till angel cry and trumpet sound,
Jonathan Fisk
Clickbait Paradise
There's no place like here
If you are listening carefully, you may have noticed that it is not just the Mad Christian who has been encouraging people to consider what they want their local community to be, decades from now. Voices calling for a return to localism are getting louder. Frustration with national politics, as well as the space to think that 2020 provided, means a lot of us are unplugging a bit and taking a look around.
All technology changes the society that adopts it, for better or ill, and the ubiquity of communication tech has quietly formed us in ways that are sometimes hard to discern. C.S. Lewis once wrote to a friend: “It is one of the evils of rapid diffusion of news that the sorrows of all the world come to us every morning." And he was only speaking about radio! With today's digital whizzbangery, news from far away is no longer yesterday's news but as geographer Yi-Fu Tuan pointed out: "With instantaneous transmission, all news is contemporary." Welcome to life in Modernland.
Writing for Tablet, Alana Newhouse covered a huge amount of ground in her stellar essayabout what she calls "flatness". The slow homogenizing effect of Modernism, she argues, is the result of making everything "frictionless," that is, low-cost and convenient. Newhouse sees the internet as a huge driver of this, the ultimate mass producer, spewing approved messages across placeless time and space. She writes that it is no wonder that Progressivism spreads so easily on the internet - to Newhouse it is the pinnacle offlatness.
Sean Blanda picks up on a lot of the same points as Newhouse, pointing out that Big Tech seeks to make location irrelevant. He writes that the hope of “techno-futurists” is that people would become free from the constraints of physicality. But as he points out, "If I wave that magic wand and everyone holds Bitcoin, goes to school via Zoom and Youtube, and can work anywhere with a wifi connection — what do we, as a nation, build? The very things we want flexibility to enjoy are only possible because someone made a commitment to a community and a place."
Another sharp observation is made by Michael Sacasas in his excellent article for the Convivial Society. He writes that having access to the "digital deluge of indiscriminately instantaneous information" leads to a feeling of listlessness, which medieval folks knew as acedia. He argues that before electronic media, your news intake was regulated by where you were. It was easier to be "present" as we might say today, dealing with the information that was coming from your locality, rather than navigating dispatches from afar. Moreover, Sacasas points out that local news is more likely to be information that you can do something about.
Sacasas follows a series of threads in his piece, analyzing the ramifications of news from far away. He notes the exhausting work of "tending to our information ecosystem" and the blurring of work and rest as a result of "ubiquitous connectivity." He also ponders how access to endless information leads to a kind of "context collapse", where the lack of delineation between types of information and audience leave us unsure how to act or be. He ends with a half-finished thought: historically, the "body has been the root of all human understanding" but in an age of disembodied information, the body is increasingly seen as a liability.
Each of these essays is worth reading and considering, with a gold mine of links and references that we haven't been able to do justice. But they also contain some very practical ways to stave off the acedia and start building for the future. This is not a call to a Luddite existence or to cut cords. But it is a call to "Give up on our current institutions; they already gave up on us," as Newhouse says. Write, build something that will remain after you're gone, learn the names of trees, as Dr. Koontz has recommended. Try hard things and lead lives which are characterized as Newhouse puts it by "lots and lots of creative waste."
As Proverbs 25 says, there is definitely a place for news from far away and global events can impact us, no matter where we are. But C.S. Lewis continues, in his letter to his friend:
"I think each village was meant to feel pity for its own sick and poor whom it can help and I doubt if it is the duty of any private person to fix his mind on ills which he cannot help. (This may even become an escape from the works of charity we really can do to those we know). A great many people do now seem to think that the mere state of being worried is in itself meritorious. I don't think it is. We must, if it so happens, give our lives for others: but even while we're doing it, I think we're meant to enjoy Our Lord and, in Him, our friends, our food, our sleep, our jokes, and the birds song and the frosty sunrise."
Yes, the days are evil and the future is often in shadow but we have treasures in this darkness - the sure Word of God which is a lamp to our feet, the comfort of the sacraments which assure us we are his, and the fellowship of the saints, a foretaste of Paradise. As Lewis concludes, "It is very dark: but there's usually light enough for the next step or so.”
Credibility leak
The "lab leak" fallout has continued with the Washington Post securing some 800 pages of emails from Dr. Fauci in a FOIA email dump. While left-leaning publications say the emails reveal a tireless public servant who was undermined by the powerful above him, conservative media say that the pandemic correspondence show the good Doctor is a bit of a hack. PJMedia outlined five of the most important takeaways. But in the end, the whole affair will probably be ignored by major media, similar to the way they dismissed the Hunter Biden laptop story.
COVID variants are now to be given Greek letter names to avoid the stigma attached to naming them after a place. You know, because: racism.
Giddy from the "success" of mRNA vaccines used against COVID, CNN reports that the gene-based technology is set to be used in a host of medical applications. This includes therapy for childhood diseases, cancers and new vaccines. Lifesit reported in April that the long-term effects are still untested.
Can anything good come out of Cali? A Californian court has ordered Governor Newsom to pay churches' legal fees, and ruled that he is not allowed to indiscriminately close churches. Also, a California restaurant is adding a $5 surcharge for customers who wearmasks!
We'd like to believe you
A scientific panel has loosened regulations around lab-grown embryos. It is one of those murky areas of science, with human stem cells stimulated to "form clusters that closely resemble the true thing", a human blastocyte. The stem cells can be taken from skin or other tissue samples. A scientist researching miscarriage and human fertility said that "The blastoids are not embryos, but are 'a collection of cells that undergoes the early stages of embryogenesis.'” Hmm. He also said, "A human blastoid could not develop into a fetus." Double hmmm.
The Federalist has reported that a bill ostensibly pitched to address Chinese competition and incentivize American innovation has been hijacked by special interest groups. Rep. Ro Khanna said, "Everyone knows this thing is going to pass, so every lobbyist wants to add everything they can." Funding for institutions known to use human-animal chimera in their research were among the 215 amendments added to the bill.
To market, to market..
Owning Bitcoin seems to be a bit of a rollercoaster. The crypto currency surged in value after Tesla announced it would accept Bitcoin for purchases of its cars. But the value dropped after Tesla CEO Elon Musk walked back the decision, saying he was concerned about how much energy crypto mining uses.
Indeed, Iran recently banned Bitcoin mining due to power outages. A Bitcoin mining operation in England was recently raided by police, who thought it was a cannabis farm. They were stealing heaps of power from the grid, though..
VisualCapitalist made a handy graphic to show how much energy Bitcoin mining actually uses.
Big Chocolate is in the news with the Supreme Court of the USA set to rule on a case that highlights the dark side of chocolate production. In the meantime, Nestle is trying to think of ways to make its products healthier. It seems being a purveyor of candy has a limited shelf life, as governments and consumers pressure companies to increase the nutritional value of their products. Maybe it's time for sugar passports..🍬🛂
There has been a shake up at the oil and gas company, ExxonMobil, with three "green-friendly" directors voted on to its governing board. The appointments follow campaigning on the part of an activist hedge fund, which has been targeting the company for a few months. In Alaska, President Biden has suspended oil and gas mining on a wilderness refuge. Leases for the mining had been approved under the Trump administration.
Some egg on your face? Liberty Oilfield Services is trolling the outdoor clothing brand North Face after it refused to sell jackets to a Texas oil company. The majority of North Face's clothing is made using synthetic fibers which as Liberty pointed out, rely heavily on petroleum products.
May your Monday be better than a trunk full of puppies..
All guns blazing
Firearms have been in the news a lot recently, with President Biden nominating David Chipman for his ATF Director. During a nomination hearing, Chipman said he supports banning AR-15 rifles. The government has also said it will go after "ghost guns" but one Twitter user said the under the proposed rules, Nerf guns could be considered 80% receivers. Sorry kids, you need a serial number on that Nerf.
In a 9-0 decision, the SCOTUS recently ruled that police cannot take people's guns from their homes. And in California, a judge has overturned the state's 32-year old ban on AR-15 rifles.
If you want to hear a level-headed discussion of gun control in the USA, tune into A Brief History of Power. On the most recent episode, special guest Pastor Willie Grills talks firearm history, amendments, court cases and more. (link below)
Drones are also hitting the headlines, with reports last week that a drone had autonomously "hunted down" a human target. Yikes!
Only Illuminati Need Apply
Your Reaction Highlights
Us The Chill is the gift that keeps giving. Sporlo recommended "The Tunnel Under the World", a science fiction short story from 1955, written by Frederick Pohl. It follows Guy Burckhardt, a man who finds he is trapped, repeating a single day. But even when he breaks free, is he really free?
Quick Hits for the Eyebuds
🍗 Among Us chicken nugget sold for $100K
🛀 A bath to float your boat
♞ Captured: Where chess pieces go to die
🇵🇱 "Visual bridge" portal art installation in Poland
🦄 When you accidentally find a unicorn
🎾 Tennis champion Naomi Osaka withdraws from grand slam citing mental health issues
❓ If websites were countries..
🗺️ The impressive span of the Roman Empire
🌊 Scientists say "something big must have happened" to cause a "mass extinction" of ancient shark populations..
🚘 When cars are partially automated, people drive more
🚛 Driverless truck shaved ten hours off a cross country delivery
✈️ No one really knows how planes stay in the air
🛳️ The biggest passenger ships since 1830
✏️ The largest images ever made by humans?
🍦 The man who drank cholera and launched a yogurt craze
🦜 Don't fear the reaper: heavy metal parrot
⏱️ A seven-year old boy swam for an hour to get help for family after boating mishap
🇰🇪 Secretary of atheist society in Kenya steps down after he "found Jesus"
🇳🇬Twitter deleted Nigerian president's tweet, so Nigeria deleted Twitter
🚫 Facebook's suspension of former president Trump's account will continue till 2023
⌚ RSI? New "assistive touch" Apple watch is pretty wild
🇨🇳 China announces "three child" policy
Sweetness You May Have Missed
Control of Gun Culture with Willie Grills Part 1
The Best Form of FearThe Book of Proverbs
Let us pray: Let Your continual mercy cleanse and defend Your Church, O Lord, and because she cannot continue in safety without Your help, protect and govern her always by Your goodness; for You live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.