This is a devotional for those who don't fit into the happy-little-Christian box. And it's also for those who think it's okay to have a little humor in their reading reflections. Kennedy doesn't pick all the easy verses either. She pulls devotion to God out of what may have seemed random acts in history. Our days are kind of like that, aren't they? Circumstances often seem arbitrary and we sometimes question if it really matters how we get through them. That is what I especially appreciated about the book---Anne weaves all the tapestry together and helps the reader see the significance of God's holiness, mercy, and love in Christ working in our own lives now.
Lately I’ve found myself pondering unity in the local church and considering that cracks in the unity of a church often begin at the bottom. They often begin at the foundation and work their way up to the roof. What I mean is that disunity often begins with the membership and spreads toward the leadership rather than beginning with the leadership and spreading toward the membership. This is not always the case, of course, but often it is.
-"Mere Fidelity: On Bible Designs, with J. Mark Bertrand": I enjoyed this episode a lot. It's interesting to think about how design and format influences our reading experience, especially when it comes to scripture.
Family
-"The High and Holy Calling of Being a Wife": This is by the excellent Frederica Mathewes-Green and definitely falls into that category of "wise advice from someone who's ahead of you on the path." It's a bit rambling (I think it's notes from a live talk, so that makes sense), but there's lots of good stuff in there.
Fiction
-"The Compromise": This is a rather beautiful short story that recently appeared in Daily Science Fiction. -"Better Than Bones and Dust": This is another one from Daily Sci Fi (they've been hitting it out of the park recently, IMHO), and it is a bit grim, but it's super-short, well-constructed, and the author absolutely nailed the ending. A good one to read just for the craft of it. I hope the remainder of your weekend is restful and good!
There’s a classic saying: "Neurons that fire together, wire together." What that means is that repeated patterns of mental activity build neural structure.
Fiction
-Odyssey Writing Workshop Podcasts: I found a lot of useful info in these podcasts on writing science fiction and fantasy. -Reading Writers Podcast: Another recent find--and I'll admit that, for this one, I definitely enjoyed the interview episodes the most. -"Teaching Stuff: Vast and Cool and Unsympathetic": This is an account of a FANTASTIC editing exercise for your fiction. I hope you have a restful Sunday, with time for worship and time for rest!
We experience this particular kind of self-deception in daily life when we do things like tell ourselves we can absolutely make it through a yellow traffic light, and we keep on believing it until we see the light turn red above us, or even a few yards ahead of us. The moment when we were saying “I know I can make it” is when we were suppressing the truth. The moment when we see the light turn red while our car is still in the middle of the intersection is when we admit, “I knew I couldn’t make.” That’s when we know we were fooling ourselves.
-"Home Row: A Podcast on Writing with Writers": A new podcast find for me. This could have gone under the "fiction" heading too, but as the host is a Christian who has (so far) been interviewing Christian writers, I thought I'd put it here. I've really been enjoying this one! -"Trump: An Icon of the Western Soul": Anne Kennedy, being brilliant again:
Is this where we wanted to be? Embarrassed by someone’s sexual chatter? No, but we wanted everything leading up to it. And God, in his justice, said have what you want. It seems kind of flat doesn’t it? Sorry, sad, boring, ridiculous. There isn’t anything scintillating or provocative about the way that Trump was talking. There isn’t anything shocking about it either. There should be, but there isn’t.
I was pushed to finish this book because of a contract and a deadline. If I’d been on my own, I might have put it away. We’ve all heard writers everywhere say, “Sometimes you have to accept that this book isn’t your book to write, right now.” Like there’s magic in that, somehow. Whenever I hear this, I want to throw my hands in the air because how do you know?
-Brandon Sanderson, "The Business of Writing": I'm slowly listening through Sanderson's writing class (free on YouTube), and I'm sharing this one because it's a particularly good explanation of how fiction publishing works--well worth listening to if you're an aspiring (or newish) author.
For Christian communities to encourage gay people to remain celibate, they will have to model with integrity the implications of their teachings. Whether gay or straight, this means valuing celibacy to an equal if not greater degree than valuing marriage. On Facebook, through sermons, and in conversation, they must highly esteem Jesus’ celibacy. They will have to model in word and practice that all humans need love and connection—and not primarily in marriage and dating relationships. If this does not occur, LGBT Christians will not be convinced. No one likes a double standard.
On those last two: I met Mike Duran at a writing conference and really enjoyed my conversation with him, and Erin Straza provided excellent editing on my Christ and Pop Culture piece. You might assume that means I'm positively biased towards them*, but I prefer to think that my good fortune in meeting a couple of excellent writers and thinkers is your gain, because it means I get to introduce you to their work!
SOME GOOD READING FOR YOUR SUNDAY AFTERNOON, SET OUT IN MY USUAL CATEGORIES OF FAITH, and FAMILY, AND FICTION (not this week!) ...
Faith
"Pentecost" - This is Pentecost Sunday, and Mere Fidelity came through with a podcast all about the day of Pentecost as seen in the book of Acts, and how it relates to the rest of Scripture! Great stuff.
Throughout the Bible, there are specific calls for women to be kind, gentle, pure, and respectful (Prov. 31:26, Titus 2:5, 1 Peter 3:3). We could assume such traits would result in likeability, yet none of these character values presuppose that we’ll make our decisions by prioritizing how to stay in someone’s good graces. Christ’s upside down kingdom, where the first is the last—or perhaps for this example, where the cool is the uncool – doesn’t leave much room for seriously caring about being liked.
Every week at church one of our pastors leads us through a time of corporate confession of sins and an assurance of pardon. This week my pastor Jason noticed the tentative way people were walking into church. “Are we allowed to come in like this on the clean wood floors? Is all the salt, slush, dirt, and powder too much of a mess for church this morning?”
He pointed out that’s the way all too many of us walk into church every week: “Am I allowed to come in like this? Is this mess okay in here? Can I come sit in the pews with all the slush, grime, and filth from my life? Is this sin too dirty to clean up? Is my mess going to stain the carpet? Do I have to make sure I’m gotten every single speck off before I walk through the door?”
I came to understand that God’s commands are not suggestions. They are not vague notions of propriety. They are not tasks or to-dos. Not to the Christian, that is. To the Christian, God’s commands are promises. They are promises that you really can be this, you really can have this, you really can do this if you take hold of what he offers. God does not merely give the command and then leave you to your own devices. That would be impossible. No, God gives the command and offers the means to obey and fulfill the command.
- "More on Memoir": in my editing job, I see a lot of memoir proposals and queries. And this post hit home, more than I can say.
- Mere Fidelity podcast "Transfiguration": This episode is a great example of what I love about this podcast: intelligent Christians discussing approaching scripture and theology with great curiosity, knowledge, & love.
-And, finally, as this Sunday is the first Sunday in Advent, I couldn't let this go without an Advent link. So, take the time to head over to Anne's place to read about why Advent is a "Contrarian Celebration":
The great looming temptation is to become tired and call it a day, to stop short at the end of the work, and miss the incredible mercy of what all the work is for.
Many families do all that we can to foster and nurture learning in the earliest years of a child’s life, as well we should. But when our children begin spending their days in the classroom, we aren’t off the hook! Continuing to build a home where learning is nurtured and valued is one of the best ways we can equip our children for life after graduation.
Yet there is another force at play today ... The belief that our sexual desires determine who we are at the deepest level. This is somewhat ironic: The age which denies any real significance to sex also wants to argue that sexual desires are of paramount importance to personal identity and fulfillment.
Ben Grimm: Hey. Anyone else think it’s weird that a high school is doing a science fair, but every single exhibit looks like an elementary school science fair project? Reed Richards: So basically, science science science. Here, let me steal a toy plane from a kid so I can teleport it for you. Ben Grimm: Wait a second. Why is there an elementary school kid with an exhibit next to Reed? Is this an all-ages science fair? Reed Richards: (presses button, plane is teleported). See? Science! Teacher: Even though I am apparently judging this science fair, I know nothing about science and thus have to assume you used magic to make that kid’s toy disappear. I have to disqualify you, because you are obviously a witch.
Finally, I really, really, really liked Family Life Today's interview series with Rosaria Butterfield. You can listen to the whole thing free. Here are the links:
1) A Train Wreck Conversion
2) What Is Hospitality?
3) What Is Truth?
I've rarely heard anyone so thoughtful, so open and considerate, and yet so thoroughly Christian. Really worth the listen.
Martin’s real women problem has much deeper roots. For most of the female characters in Game of Thrones, their value resides, without question, in their sexuality.
As a novel, the problem with Martin’s reductionist criticism of religion is not that it’s silly (although it certainly is). The problem is that his characters, taken as a whole, become a bit unrealistic, lacking a facet that was pretty common for many people in the Middle Ages, namely: religious beliefs that were both genuine and not reducible to violent fundamentalism.
"Why I Am Opposed to Gay Marriage": I said earlier this week (on Facebook) that I thought a better name for this (10,000 word!) article might be "Why I Am For Marriage, Full Stop". This is beautiful, and articles on this topic are rarely beautiful. But this one is. Read on for some really good & lovely thought about how creation was set up from the beginning. Much more a positive construction than a negative tearing-down. Worth the time it takes to read (or even, to re-read).
Johnson opens the book with the story of a pastor asking him, “which theory of the atonement do you believe in?” Johnson’s response: “All of them!” Something has gone wrong when the question “which theory” somehow becomes the main, or the only, question about atonement. Johnson is concerned to make that question unaskable, to “resist the search for a controlling category” that would cover all theologizing about the atonement. “There are better ways to engage the doctrine,” he says . . .
And, if you need yet more Trinity goodness (and seriously, we all do), here's some more:
Finally, "Macbeth" is one of the scariest of Shakespeare's plays, and this trailer makes me hope that this movie actually captured the horror of it (i.e., the guy &; his wife are tempted by devils, they GIVE IN, and terrible things happen, and then Macduff comes 'round and wreaks bloody, righteous vengence):
I love it when every movie still looks like a painting.
According to St. Benedict of Nursia the Christian life should be a continuous Lent. And according to Sts. Wal-Mart, Target, and Starbucks the fall should be a continuous Christmas . . .
"Come and See" - this is a lovely free printable coloring sheet of a Nativity scene for kids.
"Mere Fidelity: Teens and Sexting": I listened to this podcast the other night and it was brilliant. Sobering and heartening at the same time. I think I want to listen to it again, because I so appreciated the podcasters very Christian approach to our present culture.
I've lately been discouraged by how slowly God works out his will. The evil, the rebellion is so huge. The slaughter of people right and left, the corruption, the illnesses that seem to suddenly carry people away. I wander around the church kitchen and beg God to just do something, anything. But especially for him to do something visible, something that rights all the wrongs in a grand and obvious solution. And then I stand and wait because I don't know what else to do. And then, in the waiting, it becomes clear that God is doing something, has done something, but not the thing I wanted him to do. The seismic movements and changes he is effecting are in the hearts of individual people, me included, and they can't be seen. In the swirling smoke and violence of the world, he buds and produces fruit, in secret, hidden before the tabernacle of the Lord . . .
A few interesting links for your weekend reading and listening:
"The City Podcast: Understanding the Cold War": as someone who saw the end of the Cold War, but who was too young to really understand it, I found this short podcast fascinating and educational.
Watch celebrities on the red carpet, or models on a runway, and you’ll undoubtedly see the classic stop-for-the-flashing-cameras stance: chest open, legs apart, head level, usually with a hand on the hip.
It turns out that this pose not only best shows off what they are wearing, but also might send reassuring signals to their brains that they are capable and competent.
I remember very clearly saying to the nurse standing beside me while being treated for Ebola, "I can't breathe. I am sick. I have no reserve. I don't know how much longer I can keep this up." I was working really hard to breathe. I said, "I don't know how you are going to breathe for me when I quit breathing." (There were no ventilators available.) (Elwa Hospital) had only had one Ebola survivor up to that point and he had never been really sick. So everyone I had ever seen with symptoms like I was exhibiting had died.
. . . meaning comes from the whole and informs each part. No individual bit, no matter how much you clarify it, can in isolation deliver the work's meaning.
Grandeur hooked me, but it wasn’t what made me stay. The initial mystique of traditional churches may enchant or repulse us — but we need to look deeper. The aesthetic of traditional churches appeals to me, but the substance behind it anchors me. It accommodates my doubts and eases my grief.
"Advent Books - Links & Recommendations" - This is a terrific list of resources put together by the folks over at Lent & Beyond, and well-worth checking out.
Good science fiction has never been about rocket ships and lasers, but about people. It’s about using alien settings to tease out the nuances of truth that we can’t look at head-on because they involve such quotidian realities that they fade into the background if we look right at them. Great science fiction though marries that universality with stories about grand ideas, meditations on who and what we are as a species and what our future holds. Good science fiction uses the trappings of the future to tell stories of the present, while great science fiction is one layer more: telling stories of the future that resonate in the present even as they map the future. The difference between the good and the great is the difference between simile and metaphor.
The host, Michael Porter, and I talk about
-how the church year is structured after the gospel
-how children can celebrate the church year
-how the structure of the church year takes away anxiety in our devotional life
-and much more!
The interview is streaming today, Thursday, and Saturday at 11 am, 6:30 pm, and 11 pm PST (12:00 am, noon and 7:30 pm MST).
The reality is: Things never clear up. They don’t even reliably settle down. Your in box is always full. The decks are always crowded. There is always more going on than you want or expect. Nonetheless, you can find ways to put your writing first, and make sure that it gets done. Otherwise, everything but your writing will get done.
. . . God loves you. But I don’t know how, just like I don’t know how or why or how much He loves me. He makes rain fall on the wicked and the just, and woe to the just who think that they deserve the rain.
"Jennifer Orkin Lewis": I loved this interview with an artist on her habit of sketching with paints for 30 minutes every day. (Hat tip to Melissa Wiley.)
"5 Easy Indoor DIY Succulent Ideas": Maybe it's just because I live in a hot place where succulents grow REALLY well, but I loved this post.
When I was in college and attended the big college-town churches, it was very easy to take in a sermon, get the free college kid care package, and book it back to the dorm with no strings attached. This is much harder to do in a small environment. When Isaiah has his vision of the Lord, there are lots of angels around, but Isaiah is the only human witness. When the Lord says, "Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?" there aren't really any other options. I suppose Isaiah could have refused, but doing so would have highlighted his own unwillingness as the excuse—there was no one else to hide behind. Similarly, in a small-church environment, when something needs to be done, it's much harder to trust that someone else must be taking care of it. Often my response to a need must be, "Here I am. Send me." This isn't always my preference, but it is almost always for my good.
. . . I soon came to see it as a gift that those with Aspergers or others on the autistic spectrum have to offer to the church and the world: the gift of truth-telling. Instead of being offended by the forthrightness or clarity of speech from those who have Aspergers, we can welcome it as a reminder of the way we use our words, and the power that they have. When choose beating around the bush, or gently trying to imply what feels like a blatant truth, we can learn from those who speak the truth plainly. We must always choose gentleness when communicating that truth, but we ought to pursue speaking the truth.
The way it always feels miraculous when you look down at the finished product and think "this used to just be string."
"Why You Do What You Do" - I'm still in the middle of listening to this podcast interview with Carolyn McCulley, so I can't endorse it whole-heartedly (yet, anyway), but I'm really appreciating her distinction between the idea of "women in the workplace" and "women being productive". Lots of good thoughts here.
God never meant for us to live our lives by ourselves. God lives in perfect community with Himself, and we as His image bearers are also to live in community with one another. When Christ ascended to the Father, He commissioned a community—the Church—to embody His message to the world. We need to live life with others.
I wanted their souls to be better, stronger, more determined. I had no idea at all what their brains were going through. But now I know. And I am humbled beyond words.
But for us kids, there was no incongruity: Growing up Hebrew Catholics just meant having much more FUN on Easter than anyone else. My Christian friends wore straw hats, ate jelly beans, and maybe dyed eggs if their mothers could abide the mess. We, on the other hand, whooped it up for an entire weekend as we prepared for and celebrated the Passover seder, the ceremonial feast which Jesus ate with his disciples at the Last Supper. At our seder, which we held on Holy Saturday, there was chanting and clapping, giggling over the mysterious and grisly ceremonial roasted egg and horseradish root, glass after glass of terrible, irresistible sweet wine, special silver and china that only saw the light of day once a year, pillows for the chairs so we could “recline,” and the almost unbearable sweetness as the youngest child asked, “Why is this night different from all other nights?”
This is why we need feminism. Because someone needs to fight back, to tell these people, men and women: STOP. This is not what women are for. This is now how it’s supposed to go. This is not how life gets carried on. This is no life, for women or for men.
Bill Watterson undertook a number of worthy crusades during the decade in which he made comic strip history –what fan of the Sunday Comics section can forget his epic battle to get the funnies printed at a decent size?– and he railed against “the cheapening of the comics” on a number of fronts. But it was his decision not to extract his characters from their natural setting and transfer them to “bedsheets and boxer shorts” that provides us all with an unforgettable living parable of artistic integrity.
Finally, I love this video about bullet journaling. It's such a cool concept - I'm going to start trying it this week!
Jesus was saying that there will be a day would come when God’s King will come as judge. It is a day to be feared, for all of us will be brought before him. His words assume that we live in a moral universe. Significantly, Jesus cited Noah and the flood as an example of the way God calls us all to account. We learn from Genesis that Noah was not a virtuous man, but he did believe God’s warnings about the coming crisis and responded accordingly.
The World Vision decision was a tremor that warns us of a coming earthquake in which churches and leaders historically identified with evangelicalism will divide along all-too-familiar fault lines.
In fact, when atheists criticize my religion the first thing I do is hang on the edge of my seat asking for their best shot against my religion. Many think I’m joking about wanting so badly to find a better argument or explanation than what I’ve got, but I’m serious. I so long to hear a decent, philosophically coherent explanation for the world’s problems. I get nothing of the sort. The only thing more ridiculous than Christianity’s explanation for sin and death is any alternative I’ve heard so far. Still, I’m always open to a good shot at that explanation. It makes for better conversation around a drink than what most people talk about.
ThredUP: This is a website I used recently to buy some much-needed clothes for summer. It's like an online consignment/thrift store. I loved it. I only searched brands that I already knew fit me well (in my case, mostly Ann Taylor and Banana Republic) and I was really happy with the quality of the stuff I got, and the prices.
Full disclosure: if you use my link, I'll get a referral credit. But I'm sharing it because I used it and liked it. :)
Hi folks! In lieu of a post today, I have a real treat for you: a podcast!
I had the privilege of being a guest on Houston Baptist University's podcast The City, and the treat part of it is that my interviewers were the magnificent Cate MacDonald and Dr. Holly Ordway, who have so many good things to say about celebrating Lent, and what the season has meant for them in their spiritual lives. I was really inspired by their words, and hope you will be, too!
Now that I got that first, pious reason out of the way, I have to admit the real reason: it really is the most convenient. Think about it: Christmas eve and Christmas day are already packed with activities, the kids are already buggy, and my husband and I are already up late doing last-minute preparations, and already nobody gets much sleep. As long as it's the craziest 48 hours of the year anyway, might as well go whole hog and add a van trip into town in the middle of the night. I'll tell you what's difficult: finding time the evening before, when we're supposed to be wrapping presents, or the morning of, when everyone's hopped up on chocolate and candy canes and doesn't want to be torn away from their new toys. We've tried the vigil Mass and Christmas morning Mass, and they are not a walk in the park!
So often, especially concerning sex, Christians talk as if we are asking people to nip a little here, tuck a little there. But to follow Christ is to die. To be fair, Christ gives us back a new life, an eternal life that can’t be compared to what we lost. But having borne two children in the last six years, I can tell you, birth is messy, and painful, and the best sound you can hope to hear in your newborn is a loud, terrified cry. New birth in Christ is no less terrifying and miraculous.
We see Him as a threat to all things that could bring happiness. Tiny Baby. Gentleness incarnate. And we rage. And we struggle. And yes, we kill. We destroy peace. We destroy joy. We slaughter childlike faith. All because we think we know better. We are so afraid of relinquishing our own wills, that we miss the one thing that will give us genuine peace.
One of the sad losses as Western man moved from liturgical time to secular time has been the festal season. We have shopping periods, with no special beginning or end, stretching farther and farther out away from Christmas Day or Easter, losing all connection to the feast, and bringing in their wake not festivity but weariness and ennui.
