Monthly Archives February 2015

Guide to government…..

February 20, 2015| No comments
In category Bound Will

Jesus_wept

“The coercive apparatus is the state, whose sole raison d’être is to protect its subjects, individually from each other, and collectively from external foes. It is true that a few German would-be philosophers of this venal age wish to distort the state into an institution for the spread of morality, education, and edifying instruction. But such a view contains, lurking in the background, the Jesuitical aim of doing away with personal freedom and individual development, and of making men mere wheels in a huge Chinese governmental and religious machine. And this is the road that once led to Inquisitions, to Autos-da-fé, and religious wars. Frederick the Great showed that he at least never wished to tread it, when he said: “In my land every one shall care for his own salvation, as he himself thinks best.” Nevertheless, we still see everywhere (with the more apparent than real exception of North America) that the state undertakes to provide for the metaphysical needs of its members. The governments appear to have adopted as their guiding principle the tenet of Quintus Curtius: Nulla res efficacius multitudinem regit, quam superstitio: alioquin impotens, saeva, mutabilis; ubi vana religione capta est, melius vatibus, quam ducibus suis paret.” (There is no more efficient instrument in ruling the masses than superstition. Without this they have no self-control; they are brutish; they are changeable; but once they are caught by some vain form of religion, they lend a more willing ear to its soothsayers than to their own leaders).  – Schopenhauer; The Basis of Morality.  (Bold is my own).
 
SDG

Random links that are on the narrow road….

February 10, 2015| No comments
In category Bound Will

Jesus_wept

The Gospel is always trouble and causes RageQuit!

Failure mode is an engineering term, but it is the standard by which american ‘churches’ operates.

 

Things that were drawn to my attention this past week…..

February 7, 2015| No comments
In category Critics Corner

  1. Who are the unchurched?
  2. After Texas gave New Mexico to the USG for a tax write-off, the NM chamber of commerce began to refer to NM as ‘the land of enchantment.’  Don’t get me wrong, NM has a particular familial hold on me.  On the other hand, the chamber of commerce (where ever it exists) is a nest of orcs.  Now it seems that some of the ‘enchantment’ has moved eastward into west Texas.  Small people with magic rings have come under the ‘all seeing eye of Sauron.’
  3. On the subject of Tolkien and language.
  4. What was once ‘word-smithing’ degraded ‘journalism’ is really a battle for the language.
  5. Of course, ‘journalism’ should be treated like the mouth of Sauron (watch the end of the negotiations).
  6. Churchian evanjellyfish fool!  (Great title).  I doubt this is the way the battle is joined.
  7. Since I am coming out of my winter library, it seems appropriate that there is a purpose to being well read.

Be well.

SDG

Re-Reading

February 4, 2015| No comments
In category Bound Will

Augustine_Lateran

I have been re-reading to be fortified for the world to come.  Soon there will be more to say.  For now…

SDG