kaffy_r | Entries tagged with god

Things I Learned This Weekend

1. I'm really not Buddhist, not in the least. I tried to read a book I picked up at the library, which had been recommended by a friend. It was written by a Buddhist nun, and it was about how to try to approach, or in some way deal with, difficult times. It's something I need to learn how to do, so I wanted to read this book, this very slim little book.

I managed about five pages of it and ended up yelling at the book. There was no way I was going to make it to the end, slim or not. The language made me roll my eyes, I kept arguing with individual sentences. Individual sentences, people; I was arguing with words on a page.

BB, who has a much more Buddhist nature than I have had read a bit of the book; when I told him the book made me extremely angry (and that's the thing I'm trying to deal with), he sighed and said "This isn't the book I'd have suggested for you to read." He was right.

And more generally, I was reminded that I'm not Buddhist in the least, as I said. I know that the dark is part of this world; I know that death is part of this world, but I'll be goddamned if I have to like it, or accept it. I'm with Dylan Thomas; I'll rage against the dying of the light.

2. I was reminded, once again, of how much I love BB.

Current Mood: indescribable
Current Location: Going to bed
Crossposts: http://kaffyr.livejournal.com/446503.html

Prayer Shaming, My Aunt Fanny!

Within the first 2 seconds after I saw the front page that the New York Daily News* planned to publish after the San Bernardino shootings, I also saw messages from people wailing that this was "prayer shaming." (Full disclosure, I was seeing all of this in what passes for real time on Twitter.)

The responses came so fast and were so alike that they raised a red flag in my head, and I was pretty sure that there were large numbers of people grabbing onto "prayer shaming" in an effort to blow smoke and obscure the real problem after yet another mass shooting - too many fucking guns and not enough intelligent gun control.**

Now, with thanks to

supergee , I've been able to read Charles Pierce's measured response to the "prayer shaming" concept and the people who use it; if you wish, you can, too.

* Which is a rag, but it seems to have the right idea occasionally.
**By intelligent, I mean, no, not people coming to take your guns or your liberty. I mean, simply, what the words say; just a bit of control, if you please, Mr. LaPierre.

Current Mood: impressed
Current Location: The livingroom
Crossposts: http://kaffyr.livejournal.com/391599.html

Because It's Tuesday (and my own thoughts are uninteresting)

One of the wonderful things about social life online is that you can look to a world's worth of intelligent and observant friends and acquaintances with whom you can have stimulating conversation.

Equally satisfying is the knowledge that, when your own brain has the intellectual power of a kitchen appliance, you can turn to those same friends and acquaintances and know that they will have at their fingertips nutritious morsels of thought, opinion, humor, political satire and much, much more. You can then pass those morsels on and appear as if you are actually operating with a working brain.

I love the internet. (And good lord, I and BB have been online now for 20 years. Think about that, children ....)

But enough rambling. I offer you these two links, courtesy of that brilliant Discordian Gnostic

supergee , who in his turn passes them on from others.

I am a person of faith; some sort of faith at least, and certainly on alternate Wednesdays. But as someone who comes out of the Judaeo Christian cultural landscape, I looked at this and nodded my head. While giggling, and saying, "yeah, this is one of the big reasons why I restrict myself to "some kind of faith on alternate Wednesdays." I successfully kept it to a giggle and not a snarl.

And this, courtesy of

graydon2 via

supergee - I'm a writer, someone who uses and occasionally abuses words for a living. So tomorrow, I may be able to use words in phrases of admirable subtlety and clarity to show how much I agree. Today, because my brain is, in fact, a toaster, I will only say "THIS!!!"

Current Mood: amused
Current Location: the home office
Crossposts: http://kaffyr.livejournal.com/327426.html

Putting Their Mouths Where Their Hearts Are

I was once a Christian believer. I haven't been for decades. But I still have family, friends and acquaintances who are strong believers. Perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not, they all seem to be pretty honorable types.

They may already know of The NALT Christian Project, as many of y'all out there might already know. In case you don't, however, the Not All Like That project is worth taking a look at.

It's a project in which Christians who don't believe their God thinks homosexuality or non-heterosexuality are sins post videos testifying to that belief. It's their way of standing up against the publicly held perception — one nurtured by too many people — that all Christians do think non-hetersosexuality is a sin. It's done by people who, as Dan Savage says in his introductory video, believe they have to do more than whisper to their LBGTQ friends that "We're not all like that" in the face of religiously-branded bigotry and hatred.

It's a damned good idea and well worth the effort, at least I think so. If you fit the bill as a NALT Christian, and if you want to help boost the signal, this may be for you.

Current Mood: hot
Current Location: the home office
Crossposts: http://kaffyr.livejournal.com/269038.html

Preparing to Leave

Have seen my mother this morning, and will see her again in about an hour, for about an hour. That will be it for this visit, since I spend tonight 60 miles away in Halifax with my brother.

But we have spoken, and I've held her hand as she slept, and I have assured her that whither she goes, I will go, and that I am fully confident that I will see her again. And that when she closes her eyes on this world, she will open them again on another one.

She was happy with what I said. I am not a Christian, but the words I gave her have satisfied her. That I believe them in a completely different way than she does - that I don't believe that her savior is the gate, but just one gate - she either need not know, or she does know, and is happy to ignore. What is important is that we both believe we will meet again.

Martin Gardner talked about the leap of faith that must be taken by a human who believes in logic, when that human also believes in some sort of god. I'm paraphrasing him badly here, I know. Well, I, too, take that leap of faith. I choose both the irresistible and immutable world of physics, and the numinous. I refuse "either/or" and therefore my mother and I will meet again.

That we both know it makes this visit a success.

Current Mood: content
Current Location: Just Us Cafe, Wolfville
Crossposts: http://kaffyr.livejournal.com/267777.html

Taking Up (Politely Issued) Orders
This made me smile, something I needed today, after having been x-rayed and poked and prodded with needles and electric shocks, all in an effort to learn more about just what's going wrong with my hands.

As someone who believes strongly in rationalism, but who is rational less often than she might be, and who is also intent on shoe-horning some sort of belief in the numinous into my ship of rationality, I can take pride in my new religious title:

My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Sibling Katana of Warm Humanitarianism.*

Get yours.

*Which, I think, is perhaps a little more accurate than the one I was originally issued: Sister Nail Gun of Enlightened Compassion. Enlightenment has never been a failing of mine.

Current Mood: amused
Current Location: work-ish
Current Music: the air conditioner

My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Sibling Katana of Warm Humanitarianism.*

Get yours.

*Which, I think, is perhaps a little more accurate than the one I was originally issued: Sister Nail Gun of Enlightened Compassion. Enlightenment has never been a failing of mine.

Current Mood: amused
Current Location: work-ish
Current Music: the air conditioner

Angels Unaware

I've pondered this for a while, long enough to be unfashionably late to the dance at Meta Essay Hall. For those who are interested, though, this is a poor explanation of why I loved one aspect of "Flesh and Stone" (and "The Time of Angels" as well) so very, very much.

*******************************
( Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels' hierarchies? )

Current Mood: indescribable
Current Location: the living room
Current Music: the air conditioner

External, Internal

The Externals

The plumbers are gone, their deeds of heroism done, their rodding and sewer caps having comforted me and mine.
I've put all the rags used to hold back the waters last night through the wash, and the next step is to clean the floors tomorrow. And these plumbers? Oh, about nine gazillion times better than the last ones, I'm thinking. Hell, they even gave us a free jacket. No, really. One of them left their Official Plumbing Company hoodie jacket here. When we called the office to alert someone, they asked if there were any things in the pockets. No ... and hey, presto, it was bequeathed to us.
Also, they revised their initially worrisome (she said, with astonishing understatement) "This. Is. Raw. Sewage." analysis. It wasn't raw sewage. It's just that regular waste water that has aged grease and unidentified biocrud marinating in it - rather like our own lower g.i. tract biocrud marination system - well, let's just say the resemblance between the two products is breathtaking. No. Really. It got hard to breathe in here. But, technically speaking, while it may have walked like a duck, it wasn't duck shit.
I have had a shower. Let me say that again, because it was so good to think about. I have had a shower.

The Internals
( It's all infrastructure of one kind or another. )

Current Mood: exanimate
Current Location: going to bed
Current Music: FB's guitar playing

I Am Not Nice
( I'm serious. And tonight? It's "Make fun o' Faith" Night. You've been warned. )

Current Mood: amused
Current Location: going to bed
Current Music: "Little Light of Love" Peter Gabriel

I Am Not Nice
( I'm serious. And tonight? It's "Make fun o' Faith" Night. You've been warned. )

Current Mood: amused
Current Location: going to bed
Current Music: "Little Light of Love" Peter Gabriel

I Love This Woman.
No, really. She rocks. Courtesy of HuffPost, via BB.

Current Mood: amused
Current Location: living room
Current Music: Warehouse 13

I Love This Woman.
No, really. She rocks. Courtesy of HuffPost, via BB.

Current Mood: amused
Current Location: living room
Current Music: Warehouse 13

Urge. To. Kill.
Reason #1,436,085 I am glad I do not have a gun or frequent flier miles. It's also reason #9,572,009 I am ... diffident ... about religiously-based gender roles. The laff riot really gets rolling around paras 7 and 8.

Current Mood: enraged
Current Location: dining room
Current Music: blood beating in my brain

Current Mood: enraged
Current Location: dining room
Current Music: blood beating in my brain

The Moon is Pale, The Moon is Dark
But there's the sun out there, all unimaginable size and light, explosion and heat, gases and gouts of fire, with deep pools of dark moving across its surface. And here we are, at the center of it all, looking at the moon and the sun, at the two of them on their appointed rounds.

Sometimes it all gets a bit confusing from where we stand. A bit frightening. A bit fascinating. A bit...blue smoke and mirrors, confusion and magic and cosmic prestidigitation.

Sometimes the pale moon turns into a dragon and eats the sun. Sometimes the dark is there when it's not supposed to be, and the birds start singing themselves to sleep because the twilight's telling them to do it. And we're in the center of all things, telling each other about the dragon, and how to defeat it with prayer or promises. And we sing songs about it. We prepare legends, we wonder, and we explore. We write about it, and right ourselves with what we create, after the corona flares and subsides, and the dragon moves away, defeated, and the gouts of gas that would incinerate us passionlessly if we got too close, well, they come back and everything's just fine again.

All the myths and legends, all the beauty and terror of seeing the pale moon triumph...it all depends upon us being at the center of it all.

All the knowledge, though; all the true, beautiful, depressing and uplifting knowledge about the pale moon and the dangerous sun? That all depends on us knowing where we really are.

It's a bit prickly and depressing, that knowledge. It's a bit like something precious and cold - or hot, I'm not sure which - that we have to hold, even though it hurts us. It's like a gift that we didn't expect, that's two sizes too big, a mirror that makes us too small, a picture we're not able to look at, or look away from, a little statuette of disquieting power, a book with uncomfortable poetry on leaves of paper that cut our fingers. It's something that's all angles and edges and brilliance and immediacy.

We love all that, we humans. We hate it with a passion.

(Center of the universe? She can't mean that, can she? Of course I don't. And of course I do. We are at the center, you know - just check that GPS in your head or your heart and it's telling you the universe is centered right on you, so don't quote science at me. Science is right, but I'm true. And that's perfect rubbish, of course. I'm a modern girl, I am, and I know where I live in this universe.)

And here I am, at the end of it. Don't mind me. I'm in a bit of a mood tonight. Most of you probably have already enjoyed this, but I thought I'd invite you to watch the dragon and the pale moon, if you hadn't.

Current Mood: pensive
Current Location: living room
Current Music: Bruce Cockburn "Love Song"

Current Mood: pensive
Current Location: living room
Current Music: Bruce Cockburn "Love Song"

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kaffy_r

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Dept. of Sunday
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Dept. of Faith Like a Mustard Seed
Dept. of Ever So Quickly, Part Deux
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Dr. Who: Flesh and Stone (delayed)
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Grasping at Grace (and Growth)

Transformation is Inescapable

Entries tagged with god

Dept. of Sunday

Dept. of That's Good Readin'

Dept. of Links

Dept. of Faith Like a Mustard Seed

Dept. of Ever So Quickly, Part Deux

Civilized Humor

Civilized Humor

Dr. Who: Flesh and Stone (delayed)

Infrastructure

Mean Girl