Another unwitting guest blogger!

 There and back again, we've heard it a hundred thousand times before, but this is a wonderful article featuring 'The Hobbit' and incorporating it into your life's journey!

The great longing and why everyone, even the cynics, grinches, and scrooges want to celebrate Christmas (even if they won't admit it to themselves)

I was just perusing lists of 'best' and 'worst' Christmas songs, and strangely the same songs seemed to be on both lists, depending who the lister was!  Which put me in mind of an article a few weeks ago about Christmas music, which I can't now find otherwise I'd link to it, that was an intriguing reflection by the author on his former disgust of the secular world and their determination to make off with an obviously Christian holiday and the eventual softening of his heart towards the lost, wandering, and lonely.  Here's an article that beautifully captures that very longing felt by everyone born of woman.  Of course none of the songs on those lists were even remotely Christian and barely dealt with any of the 'religious' trappings of the season, but I find it fascinating that we'd put so much effort into creating a secular hymnal for this particular season.  Nobody does that for Easter.  Why Christmas?  What is it about this babe in the manger two millennia ago that has we moderns trying desperately to cook up something just as wonderful but centered in the materialistic world?

Ugly Christmas sweaters, Mariah Carrie, swanky office parties, Hallmark movie marathons, a pantheon of pop culture gods from the Grinch to Rudolph and Frosty, secular carols by the truckload, the school concerts brimming with tunes about snow and bells, over the top cooking, houses lit up like a runway, gifts galore, but nothing seems to satisfy.  Our hyped up secular version of 'peace on earth, goodwill towards men,' feels more like a dinner of cotton candy and Mountain Dew while having to force yourself to smile while putting up with your least favorite great aunt as she talks about her cat for three hours: fake, shallow, all glitz and no glory.  There's no room for grief, sorrow, frustration, impatience, depression, financial trouble, loneliness, physical or mental health issues, loss, disappointment, no wonder everybody sort of secretly loathes this season as well as longs for the fulfillment of all its promises.

But that's only the manmade monster that isn't anything near human, wherein you'll get fired if you don't force enough holiday cheer whilst out in public, rather the real story of Christmas is raw, brutal, cold, lonely, despairing, shameful, and dark, wherein finally a long sought light shineth and lo, there is hope upon the earth.  That's why I love the old hymns, they don't flirt with Santa or moan over an old fling but rather marvel at the wonder of God indwelling flesh, living amongst us, and bringing true Peace upon the earth.  There's room at the manger for death, sorrow, disease, fear, doubt, grief, poverty and every ill that mars creation and He is the cure to them all.  Christmas is big enough for your sorrow, for it hails the advent of the One Who has borne them.  One of my favorite choruses out of the Messiah is the passage out of Isaiah wherein in, 'surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.'  Come real, come broken, no flash or glitter or false joy required, and He shall give you Peace.

The longing is real and so is the Answer, but not liking the answer, the world desires to brew its own cure, which only makes that longing worse, as we feel somehow guilty in not being frivolously jolly this time of year, but you don't have to drink that strange patent medicine or indulge in faux guilt, rather be real, be broken, and seek the wisdom and wonder and glory of ages past and those yet to come.  Have an O Holy Night instead of a Holly Jolly Christmas, celebrate a Silent Night rather than rock around the Christmas tree, instead of crooning Blue Christmas remember what happened in that Little Town of Bethlehem.  Hark the Herald Angels Sing instead of Mariah Carrie or Nat King Cole.  Chestnuts and silver bells and reindeer or the ideal fling aren't going to bring the peace they promise, only the Prince of Peace can do that

There's nothing wrong with all the secular seasonal fun, but it is like cold, hungry kids tired of playing in the snow looking in at the lamplit windows and pretending they are warm and fed and surrounded by love when still outside in the lonely dark and cold.  Open the door child, it isn't locked, step into the Light, truly find Home this Christmas and everyday thereafter!

Hopeless when it comes to Romantics?

 After being held captive by a villainous virus and confined to her comfy chair for weeks on end, the recumbent heroine sought refuge in her local library's ebook empire, and falling prey to extreme boredom and mental fatigue (pronounced fat-ti-gue), she finally gave in and perused a significant number of works vaguely classified as 'christian romance novels,' and her reaction can only be described as curious indeed.

I read a little Georgette Heyer some years back, complaining afterwards that they were all the same book, just with the hero having different colored hair and driving a different number of horses and the heroine having a variable number of siblings to differentiate them.  I also had several bad experiences with Jane Austen spin-off novels, expecting such sequels to be as chaste and classy as Miss Austen herself, oops!  But I had run out of things to read when influenza decided we go on whirlwind courtship, and being barely cognizant, wasn't up for my usual preference for tales like Les Mis, Tale of Two Cities, or anything Austen or Chesterton, I didn't have the mental energy to think so I thought a little Christian romance might be just the thing to wile away the hours, forget my discomfort, and explore a rather foreign genre.  Secular romance novels are downright trashy and nothing I even dare explore.  But apparently modern Christian romance, at least from the several authors I sampled, isn't all that different from Georgette Heyer or anything offered on a classic Hallmark playlist, save perhaps in the time it is set.

The books and stories weren't bad, they just weren't good, being rather boring, predictable, insipid, and had very little of either romance or true Christian faith.  Strangely, any of the classic novels listed above are far more romantic and Christian than anything of modern make I have yet waded through though hardly being classified as Christian romance!  C.S. Lewis and Tolkien are the most modern authors I have found to be both competent storytellers and truly Christian writers.  This modern fluff has all the theological depth of a Joel Olsteen greeting card and the stories all the intrigue of a Hallmark Christmas special or the nineteenth Spiderman movie in as many years.  Is that all modern Americans expect from either faith or literature or even romance?  I knew our country was in hot water but it seems to be willingly drowning in an inch deep pool of insipidity if what I sampled was considered 'good' reading or theology!  Just because something is 'clean' doesn't make it good.  And just because you throw in a few christian fortune cookie one-liners like 'God directs your path' and "He'll turn your problems into blessings,' doesn't a christian text make.  But I guess if you are living that sort of shallow faith or insipid interpersonal relationships or have never delved into serious literature, thinking anything more daunting than the latest Marvel remake is beyond your intellectual abilities, I shouldn't be surprised people love this sort of thing.

Nobody wants to think, especially about their own lives, relationships, and the true meaning of life, the universe and everything, that's why we have an answer (42) but we still can't comprehend what the question is.  It is so much easier to type something into google and accept the first line of text that pops up as the ultimate answer to the pertinent question rather than to ask is it true, is it from a reliable source, what does it actually mean, is it biased, or do I need to delve deeper into this issue?  You wouldn't believe all the people that walk into my office and tell me what is wrong with their pet and what treatment they expect, rather than letting me do my job and figure it out and do what the pet actually needs, everybody is an expert nowadays in everything except the actual experts!  They'd happily take my advice on rewiring their house or replacing the transmission in their car (things I know nothing about but I'm sure YouTube would love to advise me) but when I don't want to treat their dog for distemper (not that there is one) when it is obvious it has liver cancer, well what do I know?

C.S. Lewis got it right when he said, "the world does not need more Christian literature. What it needs is more Christians writing good literature."  A vibrant Christian faith will shine through any well written tale even if that book isn't overtly Christian, books like Pride and Prejudice, Lord of the Rings, Les Miserables, A Tale of Two Cities, never (or only rarely or in passing) mention "churchy" stuff but glimmer and gleam with a Christian worldview and doctrine, hope, faith, purpose, and love without ever being preachy or boring, which those modern romance novels tended to be even if they mentioned God a mere half dozen times in the whole tale.  Where is the unrelenting, unremitting, unconquerable Love that drove God to become Man and die in our stead?  Where is Darcy throwing pride to the wind to save the woman who may never return his affections?  Where is Jean val Jean, the hardened, bitter criminal cruelly wronged by society and fate, yet offering forgiveness and kindness though it may doom him?  Where is the faithful Sam that would follow his master into the fires of hell with no hope of rescue or return, but determined to do what is right?  Where is one man willing to die in place of another to spare the sorrow of the woman he loves but will never be his?

We moderns define romance as merely romantic love, but we are as ridiculous as Eowyn riding off to war, seeking relief via death in battle over conquering her disappointment because Aragorn will not look on her with a tender eye.  That is my one complaint about Tolkien, most of his heroines are rather sulky, which I suppose is why Rings of Power needs to portray Galadriel as some sort of Xena wanna-be, which is odd since she is the one strong female character that isn't moping around in the books over thwarted expectations.  But romance is so much more that romantic love, or rather lust as most modern writers have it, it is the very adventure and poetry of life, the substance that makes existence worth enduring, that turns the mundane into the miraculous: sunsets, old jokes, fuzzy blankets, snowball fights, good friends, a crackling hearth, candlelight, spying your first moose, new life, long goodbyes, Spring, the call of geese on the wind, snow days, toddler commentary, good books, gooey cookies and steaming hot chocolate, hearty stew on a bitter night, starlight over snowy fields...none of that requires a love interest, only a child like heart and a sense of wonder, real humility and a readiness to embrace whatever the Author of your own personal romance is going to throw at you.

Don't settle for meek as milk toast modern theology or romance or literature, delve into the old classics, be they books or the songs of the season, forget Santa Baby and actually look at the lyrics of O Come O Come Emmanuel, What Child is This, or Hark the Herald!  Maybe the reason I find modern books so insipid is because Man himself has become so in this world of easy information wherein true wisdom has become scarce.  Nobody wants to be offensive, but the Gospel is offensive, it defies our natural selfishness and challenges us to be better, to live a life of meaning and adventure and purpose, but we'd rather just be a pointless ball of atoms and energy floating along a meaningless but pleasant course until we vanish into oblivion, of no more consequence than any of the numerous stories I just read, as soon forgot as finished, nothing memorable or significant about any of them.  Now is the time to choose your own adventure!  Now there's a genre I should go back and explore as an adult, they were kind of fun as a kid but that's a whole other post!

A metaphysical dilemma

 I tried to read an intriguing book (The Invisible Library) the other day, and while I did manage to finish it I'm afraid I'm not upset the library doesn't have the whole series.  It was a fun little story with an intriguing concept but it just seemed rather flat and two dimensional.  The plot was interesting, the characters well done, the setting curious but I was never thoroughly drawn in.  In "Pride and Prejudice," Elizabeth asks if general incivility is not a sure sign of being in love when the lover ignores all societal demands to focus solely upon the beloved, and my answer to that is a certain sure yes when it comes to literature, if I can't go to bed or make supper because I'm reading something, it must be love, right?  This one I could put down and went to bed at a decent hour.  It probably wasn't the fault of the writer or even the story, but rather a quirk about my own taste in literature.  I had the same problem with Harry Potter (still haven't finished the series) and Odd Thomas: the world doesn't make sense.  Reading an agnostic view of the cosmos for me is like baking a dessert recipe beloved by someone who doesn't like eggs or sugar or butter or chocolate: I'd rather chew rocks!

Books like "Pride and Prejudice" or "Les Mis" are set in a real, functioning cosmos (our own) so they don't have to worry about much world building and can focus on the story, but a book set in a new or variant cosmos requires a lot more in the way of world building to make it a place the reader can be comfortable, or thoroughly uncomfortable, depending on the genre, but not bored or incredulous.  "Wheel of Time" did a good job but I gave up on that series as the plot lost itself in a boundless quagmire.  Star Wars did a good job until they rewrote reality with the Disney purchase thereof.  Tolkien might take it a little too extreme.  Maybe the Invisible Library and Harry Potter and Odd Thomas work well for the majority of readers looking for a fun, intriguing story who haven't put much thought into their own cosmology, theology, philosophy, ethics, morals, and worldview, but for me, it feels like driving a car with a flat tire: it goes but the ride isn't smooth.  Some inner sense isn't happy with the philosophical dissonance within the book or world, but if you are used to that in your own life or not attuned to it therein, you probably don't even notice it in said stories.

I love the idea of other worlds, alternate realities, a Language that shapes reality, Victorian England, dragons and dirigibles (a so much cooler word than zeppelin), but there really aren't any immediate answers to the Big Questions, maybe more is revealed in later books but I came away little understanding the physics and metaphysics of the world, which to me are almost as interesting as the overarching story and characters.  What makes this world tick?  What are its ethical and moral standards?  How can a world based on a balance between order and chaos exist without Someone to introduce order?  Is the Library simply a mere bureaucratic entity run by utterly selfish individuals without doing any actual good in that reality, do I really want to read a fictional work about the federal government?  Lazy or ignorant spirituality/theology/cosmology really turns me off, but maybe it is fine for those without a highly developed philosophical side?  I demand a sensible explanation for our own reality and I see no reason not to demand the same of my literature, otherwise the story is pointless, how can I learn more about the 'human experience' from a story that isn't fully human, including a highly developed spiritual/theological/philosophical aspect?  It is sort of like modern psychology that only treats the physical aspects of mental health but pretends there isn't a spiritual aspect or people who try to treat their physical or mental ailment solely with spiritual practices.  Like it or not, humans are both spiritual and physical beings and both sides of our nature must be addressed, but addressing only one side or the other it throws the entire person, and even culture or nation, out of whack.  How else do you explain a society obsessed with denying the physical reality in hopes of appeasing their spiritual/emotional/mental dissatisfaction?  It is the same for books.  

I can't be happy with a tale unless it is nicely balanced, it doesn't need to be perfect or answer all the questions or even agree with my own theology but it must make sense within itself.  It needs to answer the Big Questions of where we came from, why are we here, and where are we going, otherwise it leaves me hungry, sort of like dining on rice cakes at a dinner party and nothing else because someone burned the steak.

A Merry Spirit

 I just wrote a ginormous little article over at my 'mommy blog' about laughing at the tragic irony of the narcissists in my life, and today I ran across this article about charitably using humor against foolish or evil ideals.  I'm a huge fan of G.K. Chesterton, Jane Austen, and the Babylon Bee/Not the Bee, as all of them have true wit, expose folly, and never use humor to attack or personally harm another living soul, rather they ridicule the runaway ideas of their day and encourage people to take a second look at the nonsense they are espousing.  I vaguely remembered a couple Proverbs about just that and thanks to the interweb, I can magically provide them: 15:13 and 17:22, but they can be summarize with a merry heart heals while a broken spirit shrivels.  I can't undo the wounds of the past, I can only laugh at the behavior and ideas of those inflicting them, that they take a less central part in my soul and history, allowing me to move on and heal rather than dwelling upon them ad infinitum.  Too many of those who are highly outspoken about their particular crusade, on whichever end of the spectrum, will not be reasoned with, will hear nothing a heretic will say, but perhaps they might be willing to laugh at themselves, if so there is hope, if not, I fear their cause and soul are doomed.

The Book of Jonah is one such example.  We all know it as a children's tale about a guy who gets eaten by a large aquatic organism.  But have you actually read it?  It is a wonderful example of satire warning against our presumptions about God's character and actions, modern day Trumpian Prophets would do well to take heed!  The Bible isn't a dry, repetitive book of impossible children's tales, rather it is as chockfull of one-liners, zingers, and pointed humor as Hamlet or Pride and Prejudice.  Job, Esther, and Proverbs all have their humorous or ironic parts to say nothing of scenes like David acting the madman, Mary Magdalene mistaking the newly risen Jesus for the gardener, Rhoda leaving Peter standing at the door while everybody else is praying for his release from prison, and angels asking the mystified disciples why they are standing there staring at the sky.  It is a very human book or rather The Human Book written specifically for our good and edification and dare I say amusement?

Many of our modern zealots (for whatever cause) have lost their sense of humor and thus their purpose, the Bible has not, neither should the church.  Humor and mirth are as much a part of life and your soul as sorrow and sin, and woe to the man or nation who forgets how to laugh, grieve or repent or believes himself above such paltry concerns.  Wit can be a powerful healing tool, but like any weapon or tool, it can also be used to inflict great harm, enjoy with caution! 

Big Story and the Death of an Artform

 American media is always abuzz about 'Big' whatever be it pharmacy, business, oil or whatever the trendy cause of the day, I'd also like to add media and medicine to that, but obviously that won't play well in our 'democratic' media outlets so I'll refrain and talk only about 'Big Story.'  Story is an art as old as language, as young as childhood, as immortal as life and it too has been coopted into a multi-trillion dollar corporate enterprise.  While 'indie e-books' are certainly thriving and YouTube has its niche successes, the overall popular and successful 'stories' of our day are all produced by big business and/or big media and they back each other up as necessary to continue the farce that they actually produce great tales people flock to see, rather than offering tasteless pablum we eat only because we've been starved of all other options.

I first discovered I was racist when it took me over a year to admit that I didn't like Star Wars VII.  I went, as a good and faithful acolyte, to the altar with the rest of the faithful, paid my tithe, and hoped to enjoy the show.  I had read all the books (now banned and non-canonical) and had even sort of liked the prequels and was hopeful for the next addition to the tale.  Visually it was lovely but the plot and characters left me flat, sort of like leftover room temperature soda but with no sugar or caffeine to ease the misery.  I left stunned, not at how great it was, but at how great it wasn't, but unable to admit, even to myself, that in that moment I had become a heretic.  Then the next one came out and I hoped it would make up for things and maybe absolve my heresy, but it was even worse and no, I haven't seen number nine.  And yes, it is because I am racist that I didn't like either new movie.

If that last sentence makes sense to you, please indulge in binging either The Babylon Bee or Jane Austen immediately, for your own sake as well as those that must put up with you!  The latest travesty to strike is obviously Amazon's Lord of the Rings spin-off.  I hardly survived the Hobbit in triplicate so I'm not planning on seeing how someone could make Tolkien even worse, but what really gets my goat is that nobody is allowed to not like it or else they are racist.  I don't care if they have black elves or pink hobbits or winged cats, and yes, there are some of Peter Jackson's elves that might qualify as transgender, but I really don't care, I care about the quality of the tale, the believability of the characters, the cohesiveness of the plot, not the diversity quotients required by modern film execs.  The whole venture was panned by Tolkien fans immediately and Amazon and its flying monkey media friends immediately labeled the whole kit and caboodle racist without even listening to their concerns.  Are there some racist weirdos out there, certainly, but painting everyone with that brush because they don't like your show seems a little egregious to me, but what do I know, I'm racist as anybody!

How does Big Story plan to keep people interested in paying money to see or read stuff if they must lie, manipulate, and coerce them into 'liking' it?  This is why it took me a year to admit I didn't like the new Star Wars!  Turning out pretty but pointless spinoffs, remakes, sequels, and prequels of a onetime hit and ruining favorite 'brands' just to momentarily attract new eyes seems like longterm suicide to me and then ignoring your would-be audience when they offer suggestions on how to actually improve the experience and insulting them in process is even worse.  I'm still hoarding my old Star Wars books and occasionally rereading them, even if I'm now a heretic; the same with Tolkien.  But then I'm racist, why should that surprise anyone?  I especially love the criticism bestowed on pretty much everybody that they are homophobic if they didn't go see the new gay romcom on opening night!  I don't like heterosexual romcoms, why one earth would I go see one of any sort, but what do you expect of a racist?

Bullying me into paying you money to see pointless drivel really isn't my idea of entertainment and I'm guessing won't breed longterm success, hence the success of indie content producers and alternative media outlets.  Netflix is already starting to crumble, take heed Disney, Amazon, and everybody else that thinks we're all just mindless sheep willing to huddle in a corner and pretend the danger will just go away, there are enough rascally goats in the mix that the whole herd may just bolt in a direction you hadn't anticipated.  It is not racist to call a story out for being lame, pedantic, boring, uncreative, preachy, incomprehensible, or whatever the case may be.  Refusing to see something because it has a diverse cast is one thing; refusing to see something that is poorly written, acted, produced or whatever is not.  And what are you going to do when actual racism rears its head if you cry wolf so often in defense of everything else?

Story thrives when it is free, uncoerced, isn't overtly pushing a certain agenda but still has a point, where it grapples with immortal truths, where the characters are real people with all their flaws and beauties, where magic and wonder and mystery can exist, where surprises can happen.  If it is merely a matter of taste or fashion or money or political trends or enforced or imitation, the result will fall flat on its face, no matter how the gods over at Big Story spin the fallout.  The only thing worse than writing a bad story is blaming the poor quality on the listeners, who will then never listen to you again.  You can spend your billions to produce eye catching splendors but my worn paperback is by far more satisfying on every other level because at heart a good story is really human which is the race we all share, the tale in which we are all enmeshed, and if you forget that, you'll never tell a truly good tale!

The Uses of Diversity: 1920

 I was replenishing my G.K. Chesterton collection off project Gutenberg, as iBooks seems to forget previous volumes after a while or perhaps it was an incident peculiar to my device, but I came across another volume of his essays of which I was previously unaware, title in the title of this post.  I'm only halfway through, but rather enjoying it, if mostly baffled and highly amused, as ever I am reading his works, but it really strikes me that he is both prophet and clown and his writing is strangely cognizant of an age he would never live to see, but then that is probably unsurprising as he writes about Man, the human condition and heart, even if clothing some of his suppositions in the color and fashion of his day, which is why his metaphors and analogies often elude me, a hundred years later and in a different empire entirely, if not the timeless meaning of his words.  While the political, literary, and historical references he uses means little to me, his eternal truths echo down through the ages as clear as ever they have for they echo the words of the Word Himself.  And no matter your time or place or culture, those are Truths and Realities with which we must wrestle, not against spirits or powers or principalities but rather against the human heart, wild, unfettered, untamed, like a wolf at the door, ready to rend at will rather than a trusty dog on the hearth rug, courageous, unflappable, and true.

It is interesting to note that in Chesterton's day they had all sorts of fads, fettishes, and fashions just as we have today, and apparently so has it been since civilization began and will be until something better comes along to replace it.  I wish he were still around today to write a jolly retort to the untenable quirks of our day or perhaps Miss Austen might be inclined to write a novel thereupon?  But perhaps it is better that they are not, for it seems we have forgotten, or are afraid, to laugh, most especially at our own foibles.  There was a day when a man in woman's clothing was a joke, now this sort of person seriously demands a routine medical examination of anatomy they don't possess by a neutral-faced medical practitioner who daren't tell the emperor he's naked, and a man at that!  I used to joke about being in such a predicament professionally, never imaging there would be a day when sane and licensed physicians would be ordered by ethics boards and lawyers to give prostate exams to those possessed of XX chromosomes but nary a hint of a prostate!

I thought the realm of animal medicine would be safe from such insanity, I used to think transgenderism would never gain a credible foothold in the public purview, oops!, and now I do not doubt the 'otherkin' will soon be equally legitimate, but where does that leave the medical community, human and not?  Human physicians are not licensed or trained to treat animals; veterinarians are not licensed or trained to treat people.  Human physicians have had to treat biological males as if they possessed XX chromosomes, do you really think there won't come a day when a man who thinks himself a dog will not demand to be treated by a vet or that the dog-man will sue a human physician for trying to treat him as if he were a human patient?  I really want to submit this conundrum to the powers that be in the veterinary community, who are gladly embracing all the other tenets of wokism.  What is my moral, ethical, medical, and professional responsibility here?  They won't tell a man he isn't a woman, can I tell him he isn't a dog?

Will I lose my license for treating a biological human or will I get sued for not treating him?  Our profession is based on the physical reality of the world around us but we want to be trendy and not hurt anybody's feelings but it only causes chaos!  Cancer has no trouble interrupting someone's vapid reality and oncologists don't usually pretend it isn't there because obviously that would be everyone's preference; you can't pretend not to have cancer and make it a reality any more than a man can be a woman or a dog just because he thinks he should be and forcing physicians and everybody else to sing the same refrain doesn't make it any more of a reality: the emperor is still naked even if everybody but one little boy pretends otherwise.  Do I vaccinate him for canine distemper and leave him vulnerable to measles and tetanus or am I allowed to say he should see a doctor who specializes in his biological species?  Where do you draw the line?  We jumped off that slippery slope and nobody seems to want to answer the tough questions that are cropping up because of it, we just pretend the cancer isn't there and villainize anybody who says differently while it wreaks havoc as we play pretend.  O Chesterton where art thou?