Thoughts and Prayers are the Inverse of the Gospel

Yes, this is "piling on".

Yes, "thoughts and prayers" has already jumped the shark.

Yes, senators and congresspeople are now saying things like, "our prayers are with...." because the phrase has moved from a joke to toxic in a few weeks.

That said, whatever will come post-"thoughts and prayers" will serve in its place, another empty platitude in the place of actual action.

And that's the point. Prayer is never a substitute for action.

Let's try out the parable of the Good Samaritan with thoughts and prayers....

A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead.^... But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. The Samaritan told the man, "You will be in my thoughts and prayers," and continued on his journey. 

Or how about this one....


 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me your thoughts.  I was a stranger and you prayed for me.  I was naked and you posted on social media.  I was sick and you felt sad. I was in prison and you felt bad for me.

Or how about one more... 

“Teacher,” they said to Jesus, “this woman was caught in the act of adultery. The law of Moses says to stone her. What do you say?”  They were trying to trap him into saying something they could use against him, but Jesus stooped down and wrote in the dust with his finger. They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “My thoughts and prayers are with this woman."

Thoughts and prayers in the place of action is the actually inverse of the gospel. It's heresy. The good news was not about platitudes and "feelings" but compassionate acts of love. 

Of course we should pray for those in mourning and for healing but when we only pray for healing and fail to actually act to prevent further pain, we make our Christian faith perverse. God works in mysterious ways, but never though the NRA.

Similarly, I have found many Christians blaming the fact that God is "banned" from schools. 

This t-shirt. This was obviously designed by an elderly person or a 11 year-old. Look at those fonts, and COMIC SANS. A prayer in COMIC SANS.

Who knew that God can be held out of a solidly built brick building? Is this like the silver bullets of theology? God is all knowing and all powerful....well, except in schools! It's bad theology and it's factually incorrect. Students can pray, bring their holy books and schools must make accommodations for religious groups and meetings after school hours. It's also a slap in the face of teachers living out the gospel with their actions. American Christianity has become a cult of fantasy and anti-science, of trusting politics and laws rather than changing hearts. Embracing "winning" over ethics and morals that were supposedly important. Evangelicals see themselves as victims, even though they are in the numerical majority. American Christianity is in its final fits of it's spiral of death. Death is ugly but the rebirth is necessary. May God save us from the Christians. 

(To cover my bases #notallChristians)

Frumpy Wintery Fragments

It's been awhile, so here are some fragments from the fam.

Tucking in 5 year-old H the other night and as he was slipping away into sleep he asks me, "Dad, what's 15 +15?"

Love that kid.

Look I know every parent thinks their kids are awesome, but our kids have won character awards every single year, every single one of them. Pretty impressive, thank you very much.

As a reward each winner gets a free ticket to a Spurs game or hockey game, look the games are usually against terrible teams but this means in all eight games I have taken my kids to over the years, we are undefeated. I also know it's a huge scam to get you into the arena, but they enjoy it and so do I.

So, H won his character award in November and we finally got to go this January to his first Spurs game (against the Kings). We were slated to be maybe eight rows or so before the last row in the entire arena, but some old man saw us walking in, asked us where our tickets were and gave us a huge upgrade down on the floor, about 22 rows up. Random act of kindness...pretty sweet.


On the way out of the game H asks me, "Dad when do you marry mom?" "I was almost 27." "Wow." "Is that old, buddy" "Oh yeah." H half whispered. "When do you want to get married?" "15 or 16". I laughed. "I don't think so, buddy you would still be in high school" "Dad, it's my life, I can do what I want. It's my life."

E was in a local church production of Annie. It was really quite an impressive production for "only a church production" she was one of the "Hoover kids" in the Hooverville. This means our whole house has been singing the songs of Annie, now even a week after the shows ended.  I have a feeling it won't be her last show, she had a great time and she showed a lot of moxie and showmanship for her first show.

C continues to do great in school and run her photography business (although things have slowed down in the winter). She's an amazing kiddo, but she was out with the flu this past entire week.

The oldest always gets a little more rewards and the last few months, C stays up with me to watch some TV on occasion. Now that she's 11, she's been able to see some classics, Indiana Jones, Gremlins and whole bunch of Star Trek: TNG. Oh yeah, I'm a great dad. We're in the middle of Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade (we skipped Temple of Doom and of course Crystal Skull crap). The other day both girls were sick and we watched Groundhog Day. So fun to share classics with your kids.

Quick Hits:

Last Jedi: Mixed thoughts, overall good but plot holes and some general blah feelings about some choices. Also, too many new Star Wars movies is a bad thing, capitalism ruins everything. Not excited for Solo. Don't care about all that crap. I thought Rouge One was technically well-executed but ultimately, horrible. I dread the idea of watching it again.

Winter Olympics: shrugs

Concert Updates: I got tickets to the The Breeders show in Austin in April. Can't wait. I missed Built to Spill a few years ago and now they are coming back on a double-bill with Afghan Wigs but I'm not crazy about Afghan Wigs and the venue will be pricey. Weezer is going to be in Austin with Pixies this summer but my plans are up in the air (India and/or traveling to Wisconsin). Speaking of Weezer.....

Weezer: Pacific Daydream - Yawn. Kinda terrible in a non-offensive way. Background music at a restaurant. Big disappointment from the White Album and even EWBAITE.

Dr. Mario: I got addicted. Holy Batman I am addicted. Up to 15 on Medium speed, trying out 17 (I skipped a few to  get up to that high)....can't do it. So hard. 

New David Letterman Show on Netflix: Thumbs Up. Wish there would be more than six.

Spurs: Sigh I literally sighed typing "Spurs".  Just not working out for them this year. The rumors with Leonard even more troubling. If Lady Luck is still a thing with this franchise, either something magically will happen this off season or the jig is up. Pretty crazy run though.

Prez Trump: A bumbling fool. A bumbling frightening fool.

Still watching a lot of MSTK 3000 on Youtube.  About half my week I fall asleep in bed watching one. Love it.

Winter: I am tired of cold weather and especially cold feet.

I should be grading papers.

So until then, take a look out your window and enjoy and don't forget to pray for world peace.

Art Post: Existential Snowman

I was sipping my coffee yesterday morning and became inspired by my coffee cup of a snowman helping a bird in a nest get (back?) into a tree.

How many nests just fall from their tree? Maybe the snowman is helping straighten it out? Or maybe, just maybe this is an evil snowman who is about to destroy the nest...

Well anyhoo, I started thinking about how snowmen (snow people?) and how they are always shown as happy, joyful and completely oblivious that they will be melting in short order. Look, it's not too much of a stretch to understand the snowman's plight.

With that in mind, I painted this in a few hours, it's titled Existential Snowman. 

Warning: This is DEEP stuff. Enjoy and then contemplate your own melting.

Existential Snowman, acrilic paint and ink, 2018. 

Stumbling, bumbling end of year fragments

Well, 2017 is ending with a bang.

That is everything is breaking including our laptop, garage door, the broiler on the oven, a dead van battery, a bedroom ceiling fan  and a few electrical problems in the house...and more to come (besides a roof that needs replacing).

Sigh.

That and we just got back from a Disney World vacation. So, ya know, money has unusually been on my mind. Still, it's all first world problems so I should shut up.

So, I'm writing this blog on my phone but all my plans of "catching up" on the blog lies in utter ruin.

Still, 2017 was quite a year. I finished a grad certificate program, traveled to Ireland and the UK, we took the kids to Disney, it actually snowed here in SA, and our kids are doing amazing things that are keeping us busy. C is first chair flute and as an 11 year old started her own photography business (and already has had at least 10 gigs), E, is always a crafty girl and has excelled in her dance class and is part of a local production of Annie, H has moved on a bit from Pokemon and loves Lego Ninjago, he's amazingly smart and ahead of his kinder classmates. He will likely start karate this spring.

I leave you with two images I recently found and love. Whoever you are out there in Internet land, have a happy New year and don't forget to not be a big jerk to your family when you're mad about something else.

Pic Dump: Fall 2017 Edition

It's been awhile so here are the best of random pics I have saved at work. Savor them and love them or at least enjoy them.

 

 

 

This is maybe the best photo ever taken.

 

 

 

BONUS GIFS (free at no additional cost):

Return of the Poet

Between the years of 1995-2005 I wrote thousands of poems. Mainly, terrible poems but that's besides the point....poetry was an important part of my life. I wouldn't have advertised it to my friends or family at the time, but I thought of myself as a poet.

I wrote poems about forlorn love, feeling lost, poems about the meaning in life, figuring out my identity, love poems, silly poems, poems about how life didn't have a meaning, political poems, religious poems, weird poems, poems, poems, poems. Between 1999-2002 I wrote almost every day, sometimes for over an hour of me just typing away.  Basically, poetry was my daily therapy session. 

Somewhere between getting married and having our first child, I lost touch with my inner poet. I wasn't an angsty, aimless, regret-filled young person any more. I was fulfilled emotionally and professionally (in surprisingly short order). Life was busy and great and I turned to other artistic endeavors.

Over the last ten years plus, I painted abstract paintings, did some collage work, painted art from comic books or children's books, created a fake band on MySpace (collage/cut and paste) and even tried to write a novel (well that still might happen someday).

From time to time I would write a poem for my beautiful and understanding wife. And even less frequently, I would find myself inspired to write a random poem down. But the truth was I wasn't a poet anymore.

Something's been welling up inside of me over the past few months and I've been writing poetry again. Not as frequently as in the past and definitely not consistently but there's been a change. It started back in Northern Ireland at Corrymeela and it's continued in part by teaching my Introduction to Peace & Conflict class.

 In Lederach & Lederach's excellent When Blood and Bones Call Out, it is revealed that poetry is more discovery than creation.

 “In the everyday poetry is in and around us, but becoming poetry requires noticing….People begin to take notice of things that have been there all along and then rise from the noticing towards something that takes shape”  (Lederach & Lederach 175).

This helps re-frame the whole idea of "writing" poetry.  If we're doing it right, poetry is really just articulating what's already there. The pressure is off "to create" and the mind and heart is open to describe what is there. All this is to say I am excited to discover the poetry that's been swimming inside my head and heart the last few years, months, weeks, etc.

So, as you might imagine, this post is about building up to more poems.

I decided to show the documentary, The Interrupters to my Peace & Conflict class a few weeks back. The day before I showed the film, I was writing my notes down as I watched the film. Something screwy happened with the closed captions. The captions became stuck on just one phrase:

"a stake that they can hold onto"

I believe the context was one of the interrupters was speaking about a group of young people who needed something to hold onto (in place of violence).  I turned the CC tab off and then back on again and that seemed to do the trick but sure enough a few seconds later, the old phrase, "a stake that they can hold onto" popped back up.  Every few minutes I would have to turn the captions on and off to get the phrase to disappear. 

Eventually, I just got used to it and watched the film with out captions. But that phrase was still just sitting there, seeming to weasel its way into my brain.

"a stake that they can hold onto"

What do we hold onto exactly? Aren't we all trying to hold onto something? That's where this poem came from, it was already there. 

A stake that they can hold onto

It seems all humans need

is something to hold onto

A something to hope for.

Something to be.

How can we find our voice?

Where is our place?

Some will

Endeavor and discover

Fight and bleed

Dying for their place

Dying for their voice

Others will read, hope and dream.

Where will you find the place where you can

just be?

Let the dead bury their dead and find that stake to hold onto.

A week later I wrote another poem at my desk. Inspired by some piano music on Youtube as I graded. It just came to me. My only comment is that sometimes I'm the artist but most of the time, I'm the drop.

Drip 
Drip 
Drip

I paint some abstract bullshit

I watch a drop of paint as it drips down the canvas.

It falls, unaware of its existence

unaware it is drawing ever closer to the end...

It’s journey ends with a thud

Off the canvas

to the floor.

A stain,nothing more.

Quote of the Day

“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” - Kurt Vonnegut