Manalive - O'Brien et al

Kevin O'Brien invites his viewer-readers to absorb a portion of the dramatization of G. K. Chesterton's play, Manalive, here. How many professors do you wish this might happen to, God bless 'em? Enjoy this nine minute performance by O'Brien and Mark Shea.

Stanley Nutting Christmas

Kevin O'Brien of Theater of the Word brings us the whole Nutting Clan for Christmas ...

Hell is the Other Team

And now for something completely different, the classic Monty Python bow to the World Cup:

In order to improve we must have some idea of what's "good"

Hobbes: "How are you doing on your New Year's resolutions?"

Calvin: "I didn't make any. See, in order to improve oneself, one must have some idea of what's 'good.' That implies certain values. But as we all know, values are relative. Every system of belief is equally valid and we need to tolerate diversity. Virtue isn't 'better' than vice. It's just different."

Hobbes: "I don't know if I can tolerate that much tolerance."

Calvin: "I refuse to be victimized by notions of virtuous behavior."

Blue Dogs in the Bunker

Ht: Mark Shea. Apologies for the overlap.

Oh, the Humanity - All Hail Octavia

Demythologization - 2010

Appreciatively ripped from the Curt Jester:

The following hoaxes/myths will be exposed in 2010:

Manmade global warming
Atheistic evolution
Relativism is the only absolute
Abortion is "health care"
Nobody can do health care better than the government
A Catholic can be pro-choice
The government will take care of you
How Obama saved America
America no longer needs God

Come, Lord Jesus!

The Most Rev. Robert F. Vasa is bishop of Baker, Oregon.

Gimme That Old Time Religion

What will draw the absent males back to church and solve a host of ecclesiastical woes? A Lutheran in First Things has the solution:

Temple prostitution.

I know, I know. Outrageous and offensive. I can hear readers already dismissing the idea out of hand. And I admit that we may not be ready for it quite yet. But please hear me out on this.

First off, let’s address the common objections. Sure, there are a handful of Bible verses that might seem to condemn the practice. But all the condemnation of temple prostitution involves pagan practices or worship of false gods. The objectionable thing is the idolatry, not the physical act itself. Sanctified, faithful prostitution in service of the true God is a new thing. The Biblical writers never foresaw or contemplated sanctified, faithful, God-pleasing prostitution in the churches and thus never wrote about it. Attempts to find a Biblical injunction against the practice therefore fall short..More>>

Veggie Tale

Fellow convert, Francis Beckwith, tells of Doug Groothuis's gentle admonishment of that High Poobah of public discourse, NPR, here.

One Moment, Please

Photo #2 - ht: Creative Minority Report

So what? Big Deal.

Damien Thompson is sick of being pestered by “infants dressed as vampires, demanding presents.”

Aww.. Well, just shut off the porch light, draw the curtains, and hope - hope - no one plays a "trick" on you. Better yet, read The Drama of Hallowmas, get out the candy corn, and turn on the porch light. Trick or Treat, Limey!

Cinematic Genocide - Y'all Come

Most of us middle-brow Girardians know the truth of Robert Hamerton-Kelly's axiom: when the sacrificial mechanism at the heart of conventional culture begins to lose its ability to bring cohesion to its denizens, both anthropologically and psychologically, that culture will usually try to surcharge its waning mechanism in one of two ways. It will either increase the number of its victims, or increase the prestige of its victims: genocide or regicide.

From my curmudgeon's perch, it is clear that modern western man is a weenie, as noted by Australian anthropologist, Peter McAllister.

Maybe he's not even a weenie; perhaps a Vienna sausage.

Unlike his swarthy Scimitar brothers who will resort sacrificially to an occasional honor killing of a female relative, or fatwa against an author or government official (Talking point: where is the culture of the Scimitar in terms of the vitality of its sacrificial mechanism?), the modern western weenie merely likes his violence on Sunday afternoons in the autumn via the National Football League, the Stanley Cup play-offs, or, occasionally by going to the movies.

Weenie-Alert: The "genocidal" cinematic attempt to surcharge the West's sacrificial mechanism is coming up soon in a theater near you. November 13th to be exact. Here comes Roland Emmerch's mass extermination of humanity on a magical day in 2012.

And you can watch it with a tub of buttered popcorn and super-size soda. Good thing death is safely up there on the silver screen, and it's someone else doing the dying. I'm safe. Right? Right?

Kinda makes sense don't you think?

It Just Burns Me Up

Arright. You've seen it elsewhere, but never let it be said that the 4M's truculently refuse to fall for positive mimesis. I bring you The Onion's brilliant rendition of our President negotiating with wildfire.

Not such a bad metaphor for naive - check that - radical ideological hubris that won't acknowledge the Doctrine of Original Sin, eh?

Obama To Enter Diplomatic Talks With Raging Wildfire

Brown's Banal Blather

I'm with her about Dan Brown

From one who has been known to write staggeringly bad prose (and howlingly inconsequential poetry), I choose to throw a stone of disdain in the direction of an author destined to make millions more from his bad writing. I present to you, Dan Brown’s worst sentences.

I prefer Providence to destiny, you see.

Jack Webb Schools I Wun

Huge ht: The Anchoress

Make It Easier, Jesus

You'll get more followers. You know, Salvation by Consumer Lite. Get a focus group, conduct marketing strategy, refine, streamline, repackage your message. Get it now?

YooHooooo...what about me?

There is a lot that this political cartoon by Lisa Benson tells and much more just below the surface. As a "dealer" - a store owner I see our "lot" being plowed under by a mighty tide - an ideology based in socialism and the inevitable worship to the many past pagan gods.

If we think these gov't programs are just suffering a few quirks, but the sentiment behind them will show us the way back toward progress wait till we blanket ourselves in the big 'O's national health care program. Suddenly the caption in the cartoon above is not spoken by 'dealers' but individuals who will be lost in a system much more drenched in darkness and murky waters than what we have now.

Nuff Said

You've seen it elsewhere, wondered why 4Ms hadn't ripped it off before now. Blessings on those CMR boys!

I don't know who this guy is, but ...

... that road he described sounded way too similar to a road I've trodden down.

I wonder just how many of us have had such denial in our past (whether with booze but maybe not with booze - with some other addition) ... how many of us still speak in a dialogue that contains such denial in telling our current life story?