I do have a hymn request to post this morning, but I loaded this on my mouse last night and I want to share it with you: choir and congregation at Halifax Minster, singing Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise. Would you believe we used to sing this in assembly at high school? Anyone who says those weren’t better times, wasn’t there.
I have learned from this video never to give a baby elephant a bath indoors.
There have been some complaints about the headlines I write for these videos. Well, maybe it’s not as easy as it looks. I suppose I could have opted for “Bath-time for Bowser” or some such thing, but I don’t see how that would be an improvement.
At a recent rally, in Austin, Texas, for “Beto” (his real name’s Francis) O’Rourke, who wants to be the Democrats’ 2020 presidential candidate, somebody brandished a sign that said: “BETO IS OUR CHRIST” (https://theweek.com/articles/832532/dont-idolize-2020-pick).
This is not the first time leftids have tried to confer godhood on some creepy politician. Remember Obama worship? Remember him being hailed as “the One”? Remember that Newsweak cover showing him with a halo? I do wish I could un-see those things.
“Beto” told Vanity Fair that he was “just born to be in it”–in the presidential race, that is. But at least one jidrool out there thinks “Beto” was born to be something very much more than that.
This is idol-worship, and it’s as old as the hills. When people turn away from the true God who created them, and redeemed them through Jesus Christ, His Son, they wind up worshiping false gods.
“And the Lord shall scatter thee… thou shalt serve other gods, which neither thou nor thy fathers have known, even wood and stone.” Deuteronomy 28:64. He always warns us, and we never listen.
Our false gods are beyond wood and stone. Now they’re made of plastic, or of flesh and blood. Like “Beto.” Just some guy, no more fitted to be anybody’s god than the person standing behind you in the supermarket checkout line.
This always turns out badly. Go ahead, tell me of one time when it didn’t.
There are those who think this only happens because America’s Christianity is evaporating, leaving a religious vacuum to be filled by Science, the state and its minions, celebrities, electronic doodads, sports, money, and whatever else they can think of. But this is not so: the sin of idolatry goes back to the beginning of time. It is inherent in our fallen nature. One of those things we need a Savior for.
And that’s Jesus Christ. Not “Beto.”
How come none of these pseudo-messiahs ever breathes in enough sanity to say, “Whoa! It ain’t me, babe!”?
Foolishness doesn’t get any more foolish than this.
This is the brand-new Tyrannosaurus reconstruction at the American Museum of Natural History in New York–complete with feathers. Scientists “know” T. rex had feathers because “closely related species” about a twentieth his size have left fossils with traces of something that might be feathers. So that’s how they “know.”
Sorry, I’m not buying this. For one thing, it looks shabby–more like a “winosaur” than a “dinosaur.” I mean, really, Turok Son of Stone would’ve laughed himself silly if he ever saw a Tyrannosaur that looked like a worn-out feather duster. Or a worn-out 1960s celebrity trying to make a comeback on a 1990s TV talk show.
Oh, well… If you can’t idly speculate about dinosaurs, what can you idly speculate about?
Make it idle enough and you just might win a chair at a prestige university.
Erlene has requested this hymn, Hold to God’s Unchanging Hand, sung by choir and congregation at the Alfred Street Baptist Church. She woke up early this morning with this particular hymn in her mind–and you know I always take that as a sign that I ought to post that hymn.
If you’re new to this blog, know ye that the hymn shop is open to all, all day, all night–and if you have a hymn you’d like to share, just let us know.
My friend–who does not wish to be identified, so I’ll call him Roscoe–can see the future by concentrating deeply and peering into a jar of Miracle Whip. “Don’t tell anyone my real name,” he says. “Otherwise someone’ll try this at home and wind up in the emergency room, and then they’ll sue me.” Hint: you have to open the jar.
I fear for the future of my country, so yesterday I consulted Roscoe and he did his thing–really, I don’t know how he finds the strength and courage. In a few minutes, he was observing the 2024 presidential election.
At first it was just brief messages. “Vote for me! I have the most tattoos!” “Vote for me! I can eat a Tide pod and not get sick!” “Vote for me! I can’t be deported if I’m president!” And then Beto Somebody saying, “We learned your language by monitoring your TV and radio transmissions.”
“I see a crowd covering the state of Rhode Island,” Roscoe begins to chant hypnotically. “No, wait–it’s not a crowd, it’s all the Democrat candidates. Sure are a lot of ’em!”
He sees campaign promises. Free college for all. Guaranteed minimum universal basic income of $15 per hour for every hour you remain alive. Double that if you vote Democrat more than once in each election. Public offices awarded to all Women Of Color, complete with pension. Free housing for all. Free food at your city’s finest restaurant. “There’s a Kamala Something out there who wants everybody to be registered as another gender, in case they want to change. Free gender reassignment for every person in America!” Roscoe shudders. “I think she means it!”
Now, he says, “The Miracle Whip’s getting all murky, I can’t make out the pictures. I’m afraid that’s it for today.”
“But wait, you can’t stop there! You’ve got to tell me who wins the election!”
But he only shakes his head and mutters, “There are some things it’s better not to know.”
I just had to rerun this post from 2011, an appalling example of what passes for science these days.
See how quickly they slide from a pure product of their imaginations into talking and writing about it as if it were a real thing. It’s like reading a natural history of the jackalope.
“Once upon a time, boys and girls, Pan Prior lived in the forest…”
You could be embarrassed for these people, if they didn’t cost so much.
P.S.–Absolutely no relation to Maddy Prior.
The only excuse I have for posting this hymn umpteen times is, I love it: Light of the World by Charles Wesley, performed (18th century style) by Maddy Prior and the Carnival Band. I’m really sorry they took down the video that used to go with it.
The “+” in front of the title was a typographical error which I thought it better to let stand–as a cross.
The only time I ever saw an owl in real life: my friend and I were walking in the woods, I couldn’t have been more than seven years old, and we hadn’t gone quite 100 yards from the playground (you could hear the horseshoes clanking)… when suddenly a little tree, just a few feet away from us, seemed to explore. And out of it flew an owl that I was sure was bigger than me. We’d have run away, if we hadn’t been paralyzed with fear and astonishment. Man, that was a big owl! You don’t forget a thing like that.
The owls in this video are a lot less alarming.
My wife has told me that the Newswithviews column that I’ve just finished writing is one of the best things I’ve ever written, bar none. She’s not in the habit of stroking me with empty praise, so what she said was a great relief to me–I was half-convinced I’d just hatched out a turkey.
So keep your eyes peeled for “I am Liberalism,” which will be published Thursday by Newswithviews and then posted here, if all goes according to plan.
I wonder if bush babies will like it.