Christian fantasy literature, and commentary on assorted subjects
From August 22, 2015
I have been dipping into R.J. Rushdoony’s The Philosophy of the Christian Curriculum (Ross House Books, Vallecito, CA: 1981, 2001 reprint–available from http://www.chalcedon.edu ), and it has set my mind on fire.
Culture, said Henry Van Til, “is religion externalized.” In light of that statement, one good, hard look at our culture of today should send us running madly for the exits. And one of the chief determining factors of a culture is, of course, the education provided to its members.
And here’s the thought that blows my mind:
Our consumption of “entertainment”–novels, movies, stories, television programs, etc.–is a form of self-education.
This entertainment is what we pour into our heads when we are not in a formal “educational” setting. As a society, we have more leisure time than we used to have; and much of that time is spent consuming entertainment.
The horror! The horror!
Take a good look, kimosabe, at what we’re stuffing into our minds. Is it any wonder we’re in such a mess? Given what we educate ourselves into, of course we’re going to redefine marriage, excuse all forms of lawlessness, lie and cheat six ways from Sunday, and in general behave as if there is no God.
Because so much of our entertainment, our self-education, is absolutely, positively Godless.
Think it over–long and hard and carefully. What are we learning from our entertainment?
Our elite “educators” have labored mightily to wean our nation away from Christianity. But their efforts are a drop in the bucket, compared to the weaning-away accomplished by our entertainment.
The point is so subtle as to be well-nigh invisible. We thus defend ourselves: “It’s only a movie, it’s only a novel, it’s only a TV show”–as if our steady diet of it had no effect at all.
I thank Rushdoony for this insight.
From March 7, 2021
Who has time to worry about medieval curses when roller derby is coming to your town?
In Chapter CDIX of her epic romance, Oy, Rodney, the populace of Scurveyshire has worked feverishly to set up a roller derby rink on the village common, where the Plaguesby Headhunters will take on the Vichy Poisoners, France’s number one roller derby squad, in a match that promises to be an all-out war.
Meanwhile, the ancient curse, activated by Lady Margo Cargo when she dug up a prehistoric plate with an inscription which she has wrongly interpreted as a recipe for Store Brand Corn Flakes, has been taking its toll: a hangnail here, a dislocated coccyx there, a bad set of involuntary ear-wiggling somewhere else.
But Lord Jeremy Coldsore is otherwise occupied, re-wooing Lady Margo and trying to get their upcoming marriage back on track.
“I can’t help having second thoughts,” says Lady Margo. “You’ve been acting very queer lately, when you’re Willis Twombley. Threatening to shoot me–what kind of fiance does that?”
Ms. Crepuscular intervenes. In an aside to her audience, she writes, “I have a letter from a reader in Palookastan, Mrs. Amy Tanystropheus, who asks, ‘Wouldn’t it have made more sense for Lord Jeremy to have explained to Lady Margo, months and months ago, that he and Mr. Twombley are not the same person? Wouldn’t that have eliminated all this confusion?’
“Well, Amy,” Violet replies, “I’m afraid that ship has sailed! It’s much too late now to clear up that matter. Lady Margo is entirely convinced that Jeremy and Willis are one person, albeit with two totally different personalities. And did I mention that multiple personalities are kind of a tradition in Lady Margo’s family? Her father, Lord Largo Cargo, had four personalities, none of which was functional.
“But even matters of the heart must take a back seat to roller derby!”
Ah! But will the curse adversely affect the roller derby match?
Stay tuned!
Victorian roller derby uniforms were much less revealing than these.
Today it was nice and sunny, but on the cold side with really high wind gusts (which made it feel even colder).
Still doing a lot of sorting of Lee’s papers, but truthfully was not all that ambitious today as far as any other tasks go. And there are tons of tasks.
My friend in Florida didn’t have any more news about the fellow who was shot, other than that he is in stable condition. He was shot in the neck and shoulders as far as she knows. Hopefully, he will recover enough in a few days to be able to talk on his own.
I feel a little bit like I’m stuck in neutral. Not tired exactly, but without any real sense of ambition or purpose. That’s probably par for the course.
Monday I will attempt to go pick up my glasses.
Tuesday is election day, so I will be going over to the school to vote. This being New Jersey, I have very little hope for anything positive along those lines. New Jersey really belongs to the teacher’s union.
The fawn was back again today. That makes me a little nervous, because our landlord is due to mow the lawn and that would really upset the little one.
That’s it for now.
See you tomorrow.
God bless everybody.
Patty
Finally, free at last to a real life of being an elephant.
From August 3, 2013
A government that engages in frivolous mischief has way too much money and needs to be cut back until it can’t afford the mischief anymore.
Case in point: a little item in the Drudge Report yesterday, “Seattle officials call for ban on ‘potentially offensive’ language.”
Uh… isn’t all language “potentially offensive”? But the city’s Office of Civil Rights–if your city can afford to have an office of civil rights, human rights, whatever, your city government has too much money–wants to do away with the word “citizen” because it doesn’t include everyone physically present in Seattle, and people who are not citizens might be offended, or fall down foaming at the mouth, or break out in hives, if they hear or read that word.
They also don’t want anyone to use the term “brown bag,” as in “a brown bag lunch,” for that will be offensive to African-Americans who make a career out of being offended.
This city needs its budget reduced until all persons engaged in such inane meddling are unemployed.
Meanwhile, in New York City, the municipal department of education has eschewed a number of common, everyday words.
For instance, the education muck-a-mucks now don’t want to use the word “dinosaur” because it might upset “fundamentalists” (lib-speak: a derogatory term for any Christian who actually believes in Christianity).
This is incredible. First, I know of no “fundamentalist” who insists that there were no dinosaurs. Secondly, coming from the edu-blockheads who run the city schools, and every day club fundamentalists’ children over the head with commercials for sodomy and gender-bending, and sermons on the rightness of abortion, it’s a bit rich, soft-pedaling dinosaurs because they don’t want to hurt Christians’ feelings. These morons have never kept it a secret that they despise Christianity and Christians.
But they also want to get rid of the word “birthday,” because it just might inspire “negative emotions” in some oddball somewhere. Again, this applies to any word in any language.
These “civil rights” language police won’t be happy until we’re all going around with duct tape over our mouths, free to speak only when they give us leave.
Let’s start with a 25% across-the-boards cut in government revenues–city, state, and federal alike–and see where we ought to go from there. Keep cutting until there’s no more diversity, human rights, inclusiveness, yatta-yatta, all the rest.