Sartre to The Constitution

On authors in my recommended reading.

Sartre was an existentialist. A critic called existentialism the belief that because life is absurd, philosophy should be, too. --George Will

Why then, does Trotsky continue to appeal to a sympathetic audience of intellectuals who, despite their awareness that Soviet-style communism was one of the previous century’s most foolish and deadly “experiments,” still hold a reverence for “The Old Man,” and seek to exempt him alone from the other Bolshevik leaders, from Stalin through Brezhnev, for whom they have no sympathy? --Ron Radosh

Kierkegaard is the patron saint of the lonely. But ... he was also conflicted by what this did to him. --Ron Rolheiser, OMI

The new GOP Senate candidate and Tea Party favorite in Alaska, Joe Miller, answers almost any question by referring to the Constitution. ...
     This fatuous infatuation with the Constitution, particularly the 10th Amendment, is clearly the work of witches, wiccans and wackos. --Richard Cohen (via Veronique de Rugy at The Corner)

Going his way

You might recall that in the September 12th parish bulletin our pastor announced a snap retention election, including a ballot for the following Sunday, September 19th. As often happens in elections, the campaign had to issue a clarification of an earlier statement by the candidate. It appeared in the September 19th bulletin.

Regrets

I regret if my "ballot" in last week’s bulletin caused some members a bit of concern. There is no hidden agenda. I am quite happy as your pastor. I simply wanted to take the opportunity to re-affirm our "partnership," as outlined in the article in last week’s bulletin. I have done this in my previous parishes. Hope this helps to clarify. - Fr. Alan

It makes it even clearer that it was all his idea, but doesn't clarify how springing this fits with partnership, or with moving away from clericalism.

Opening Endora's box

It's such an ancient pitch
but one I wouldn't switch
'Cause there's no nicer witch than you!
--Carolyn Leigh

Sam Stein reports at the Huffington Post on reaction to renewed attention to a 1999 statement by current Delaware Republican candidate for U.S. Senate Christine O'Donnell that she had "dabbled into witchcraft" in her youth.

Wiccan Community Upset With O'Donnell, Calls Witchcraft Comments 'Teaching Moment'

(via Althouse)

From another direction, Tom Foley at Illusory Tenant posts O'Donnell dabbled into Transubstantiation.

Coetzee to Newman

On authors in my recommended reading.

Coetzee has used himself—or should we say a simulacrum of himself—to show that biography has a powerful a story to tell, regardless of who is hurt and whose privacy is violated. --Carl Rollyson

After publication of The Fire Next Time in 1963, he [James Bsldwin] became a celebrity presence at events — a “face.” At the end of the decade, however, demoralized by the assassinations of Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, he suffered a form of nervous collapse and retreated to the French hilltop village of St.-Paul-de-Vence, near Nice, where he lived in subdued peace and where he died in 1987 --James Campbell

As we reflect on the human frailty that these tragic events so starkly reveal, we are reminded that, if we are to be effective Christian leaders, we must live lives of the utmost integrity, humility and holiness. As Blessed John Henry Newman once wrote, “O that God would grant the clergy to feel their weakness as sinful men, and the people to sympathize with them and love them and pray for their increase in all good gifts of grace” (Sermon, 22 March 1829). --Pope Benedict XVI

Glass reunion

The Onion reported Ira Glass Tries To Explain 'This American Life' At High School Reunion.

Election preview

In our pastor's column in last Sunday's St. Al's bulletin he notes he is at the mid-point of his six year term. He goes on to say he is taking a step to reduce clericalism by, unilaterally it appears, setting a Yes or No vote this weekend on his continuing as pastor.

It looks like he's expecting a "Yes" vote, since he goes on to say,

Additionally, I am asking for your advice as to which pastoral needs you believe should be a priority. Your suggestions and ideas will be appreciated.

A campaign promise! It reminds me, though, that shortly after he arrived he held his first "Town Hall" meeting. The subject was liturgy. In the Q and A, another parishioner suggested the reverence of the parish liturgy would be enhanced by the presider genuflecting at the Consecration. Father's response left me with the distinct impression that the suggestion was not actually appreciated.

I expect a "Yes" vote if for no other reason than that voting him out would make the new pastor our fourth in less than six years.

Argh Gratia Argh

Remember, this coming Sunday, September 19th, is International Talk Like A Pirate Day.

What's in Lady Gaga's meat dress?

Butcher Mark Cacioppo says "It's the cheaper end cuts - not including her." --New York Daily News

(via Althouse)

Bohr to Bible (King James Version)

On authors in my recommended reading.

For Bohr, physics was not about finding out what nature is, but about what can be said about it. Quantum mechanics was a complete theory of the behavior of matter and light, and we just have to come to terms with the limitations it places on what can be known... . --Graham Farmelo

it bears noting that Mill used “stupid” as something of a technical term. A good test for whether someone is stupid, he suggests, would be to see whether their thoughts on a given topic could be inferred from those of their social circle. --Jonny Thakkar (via Arts & Letters Daily)

In eighteenth-century usage, a federation was a league between sovereign states. The federal government could relate only to the state governments; it could not deal directly with the individual citizens of those states. This arrangement characterized the Articles of Confederation. Hence, Congress could not impose taxes on individuals directly but had to petition the states for money. --Richard E. Wagner

Last year, Marc Grizzard, the pastor of a 14-member church in Canton, N.C. announced that on Halloween 2009 his flock would burn a pile of books they considered evil.
     That included every version of the Bible that wasn't the King James Version since only the KJV was "God's preserved, inspired, inerrant, infallible word of God... for English-speaking people" Grizzard said. --Frank James (via Brad A. Greenberg at Get Religion)

Fugard to The Koran

On authors in my recommended reading.

Few of us are blessed with a memoirist like Fugard, whose lyrical "Exits and Entrances" is a tender homage to both [South African stage actor Andre] Huguenet and theater itself. --Mike Fischer

Buying John Updike’s typewriter or Harlan Ellison’s tooth-scarred and twisted-in-rage screenplays is rather pedestrian, as literati curios go. Why not stop being such a phony and get a real conversation starter like J.D. Salinger’s “personally owned” toilet, which is currently being auctioned on eBay for the Buy It Now price of $1 million? --Sean O'Neal

Symbiogenesis theory flies in the face of an accepted scientific dogma called neo-Darwinism, which holds that adaptations occur exclusively through random mutation, and that as genes mutate in unpredictable ways, their gradual accumulation sometimes results in useful attributes that give the organisms an advantage that eventually translates into evolutionary change.
     What tipped Margulis off that new traits could arise in another way was the fact that DNA, thought to reside only in the nucleus, was found in other bodies of the same cell. This realization led to research showing not only how crucial symbiotic relationships can be to the immediate survival of organisms, but also that one of the most significant sources of innovation — indeed, even the origins of new species — occurs when, over time, symbiotic partners fuse to create new organisms. --Eric Goldscheider

The Carriage  --XKCD

(via Althouse)

He [Mark Twain] had one eye trained on his stock in trade, the Wild West, and the other searching the horizons 3,000 miles to the East, where all the great glorification factories were.
     “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” was first published not in The Alta California, but in a New York weekly, The Saturday Press, on Nov. 18, 1865, then reprinted all over the country. --Tom Wolfe

Piqued at the Jews for rejecting a creed that—with its dietary laws, ritual circumcision and daily prayers towards (at first) Jerusalem—was so closely modelled on their own, the Prophet Muhammad decreed that they, along with Christians, would henceforth be considered dhimmiyeen under Islam; “protected” as fellow monotheists, but subject to a heavy tax and various other indignities. --The Economist

Warp and woof

Australia, a place of rough-and- tumble democracy, gave the world the phrase “dog-whistle politics” to describe a certain sort of suggestive populism. For instance, it breaks no law to clear French gypsy camps. It is not inherently racist to call for tighter border controls. But deftly done, such moves send a discreet signal to voters with a taste for a stronger political message. --The Economist