grow up or die
In Parable of the Talents, Octavia Butler writes: …Kindness eases Change.Love quiets fear. …Change is the one unavoidable, irresistible, ongoing reality of the universe. …(T)hat makes it the most powerful reality, and just another word for God.…It’s a hard truth. Too hard for some people to take, but that doesn’t make it any less true. …
pandemics make poor fodder for 42: a brief history of All The Things since March 2020
When I last left this blog, I was in the middle of Atheism for Lent, bleeding my thoughts onto the digital page as I processed everything I was reading, watching, listening to. I remember feeling as though I were in a good place in life. My writing was going well; we had recently gotten our …
atheism for lent, day fourteen: sayings of an urban white mother
On DAY FIFTEEN, Atheism for Lent turns to the early, early mystics, a bevy of hermits, ascetics, nuns, and monks from around the 3rd century C.E. These folks had a huge impact on Orthodox tradition and neo-monasticism. According to Dr. Rollins, they took a “theological approach that constantly deferred, delayed, destabilized, and disarmed our understanding …
atheism for lent, day thirteen: via eminentia
Hey, Icarus, how high will you fly? For DAY THIRTEEN, we turn to a fella named Pseudo-Dionysius, who lived in the late 5th or early 6th century and was apparently the first person to get mystical reflections into real philosophical discussion. I’ma call him Fake-Dio for short. For AfL, we read an excerpt from Fake-Dio’s …
atheism for lent, day twelve: apowhatsitnow?
Okay, so DAY TWELVE’s material kinda gave me fits. Because I like to know what words mean and where they come from and how their use morphs over time. And there’s this word that kept popping up in DAY TWELVE’s material, and that word is apophatic. I recall my Greek (me *yelling*: my greek! hey, …
atheism for lent, day eleven: the invisible gardener loves you
As predicted, I’ve missed a few blogging days. That means this and the next couple of posts will probably be pretty short. Meh. Oh well. This is how we roll. Plus, honestly, my brain’s kinda preoccupied with our world-wide question of “is it Captain Trips or isn’t it?” So my attention span for philosophy isn’t …
atheism for lent, day ten: how the gods grow
DAY TEN’s material comes from Lectures of Colonel Robert Green Ingersoll, Vol. 2. Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899) was a political leader, orator, and Civil War veteran known as “the Great Agnostic.” Ingersoll contends that priests invented “blasphemy,” which (in my understanding) he defines as “the belief and statement that God doesn’t exist.” In today’s selection from …
atheism for lent, day nine: darwin and i are worried
I suspect this is going to be a very stream-of-consciousness post. Y’all have been duly warned. It’s so interesting and peculiar that a guy who died almost 140 years ago still gets other humans’ panties in a bunch. Yes, I know, on the surface you could argue that it’s not the guy who upsets people …
atheism for lent, day eight: converting an atheist (do you smell the mint?)
DAY EIGHT’s material comes from the show Fear and Faith by illusionist Derren Brown. As a magician, Brown mixes traditional magic with psychological techniques and the power of persuasion — all to warn people against the power of manipulation and the dangers of groupthink. His personal position is atheist (after having been raised in a …