The always excellent and insightful T Greer.

The Problem Isn’t the Merit–It’s the Ocracy

I don’t always agree with David French, but he is always worth listening to. Particularly here.

Politics is a Jealous God

The Atlantic on the strange position of young elite Conservatives, in a Culture that seems entirely captured by Progressives.

Rod Dreher on the very liberal JK Rowling being canceled for being insufficiently woke.

I think. I’m not sure. Maybe. I don’t know…

Saddling up the bike for a trip to the grocery store, I had an idea to stop at another store, more or less on the way.  I analyzed the idea. Maybe I silently prayed one of those informal prayers.  I didn’t have a need to go there, it’s one of those browse-for-bargains stores. But it felt like a prompting, so I decided to go.  I wasn’t sure, but it was enough to give it a shot.

Nothing happened at the bargain store, so I continued on to the grocery store.  There is a gas station on the way, and the idea occured to me to stop there.  I didn’t need anything from there, and decided it was just a random idea.  As I was about to continue to the grocery, the idea/feeling/whatever about the gas station was repeated and stronger.  So I stopped in to buy something I could use.

I got to the grocery store, and got what I needed and eventually was at the “bargain bin” which is a regular  stop for me in that store.  Another customer was browsing the shelves of reduced-price random or close-out items.  I generally make some comment to whoever is standing and browsing next to me, but only at the bargain bin, usually not elsewhere in the store.  Something like “What’s a good deal today?”

I made some comment on an  item, and the lady next to me responded with a noticeable accent.   So I asked where she was originally from, what languages she spoke, etc.  We had a nice conversation.  She spoke two languages besides English.  I made the offer of free church books in those languages, and she accepted.  I gave her a pass-along card.  And she seemed genuinely interested. We chatted a bit more.

I still can’t say with an “I know that…” level of sureness of testimony that the two “ideas” for those two extra stops were true whisperings of the Spirit. (Though the “feeling” for the second stop was stronger.)

Sometimes, the “gnats” tell me that I’m shooting at the side of  the barn, and drawing a bullseye around the hole.

But, together, the two “timing loops” worked to get me to the right place at the right time.  And a lady went home knowing that an “American church” has free religious books in two of her homeland’s languages, along with a couple phone numbers to obtain them.

Ignore the gnats.  You don’t have to know for sure. It’s okay to take a gamble — it’s called “faith.”  Alma, in chapter 32, calls it an “experiment.”

This is the story that came to my mind.

The hero is one of us. An American in our world. Probably a teenager or young adult.

Something happens, and he is called out of our world into a land of villages. It is a real world, but it is also something like a game. He is a Level 1 Hero with stats. He gets little notifications and can see popups giving basic information about the people he meets.

He starts doing small favors for the villagers, fights animal pests, and grows in level. He unlocks achievements and new skills. He becomes more capable and faces larger and larger threats. The villagers cooperate with him and eventually he even acquires the ability to recruit them as militia and watchmen. But it bothers him that so much depends on him. Granted, he is a Hero and they are Villagers, but they aren’t just props in a game, they are real people, and it bothers him that they are so oddly unconcerned about their own safety. So willing to just leave it to him.

But one Christmas Eve he is out in the lonely moonlit snow on patrol. And he looks down from the slope he’s on, and through the firs he can see one of his villages, windows lit, the people spilling out into the streets singing and rejoicing together, the little church, post out over fires cooking good things, and he feels that it is all worth it. He feels their happiness, and he wants them just they way they are.

Achievement unlocked: love.

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G’s post on being defeated by gnats got me thinking.

It’s not just the gnats. Sometimes the mere fear of gnats paralyzes me.

I fear (or get cowed/distracted/confused by) even the whispering lies of the gnats. “God doesn’t want you to do that. No one asked you or gave you a calling to do that. That’s just your silly imagination. That’s not what that scripture means. Look, no one else is doing that. You’ll just make a fool of yourself, and everyone will laugh behind your back.”

And it’s not just the devil-gnats. I sometimes even fear success.   (more…)

There are six other deadly sins.

The pond moves the scum, not the other way round.

His Majesty’s present to me this year:

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From Kevin D. Williamson, whose childhood was sometimes much worse than anything I experienced:
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We somehow managed to keep a few of our last harvest of tomatoes for the two months until Christmas.

Very wrinkled, very delicious.

Christmas is one of the merriest sadnesses that I know.

There is a real Christmas out there, but our actual Christmases never quite reach it.  There is a film between us and that perfect transcendence.  Only in memory can we see how golden the day was.  But even at the time, we are close, so close, and no one wants the day to end.  Last night we sat around, looking at  the tree, talking just a little.  We were going over the events of the day as if it were already golden memory.

We have a picture of Betsey hanging on the tree.

Most of our loved ones were far away this Christmas.  I remember Christmases as a child, when my grandparents were still alive.  “Through the years we all will be together . . . ”  Yes, very true.  But not factual.  Why can it be so sad to be so happy?  Why can it be so happy to be so sad?

The 12 Days of Christmas, after Christmas, are a way of slowly coming back up into the regular January air, lest you do it too quickly.  Most of you who take down the tree the day after, its no wonder you get the bends.

And behold, he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem which is the land of our forefathers, she being a virgin, a precious and chosen vessel, who shall be overshadowed and conceive by the power of the Holy Ghost, and bring forth a son, yea, even the Son of God.

11 And he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people.

12 And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities.

13 Now the Spirit knoweth all things; nevertheless the Son of God suffereth according to the flesh that he might take upon him the sins of his people, that he might blot out their transgressions according to the power of his deliverance; and now behold, this is the testimony which is in me.

Christ’s  mortality is the hook on which all our intimacy with him, all his understanding, all his succor, hangs.

A tremendous weight to be born by one little baby.

He bears it easily.  He draws one breath, then another.

Is it any wonder the heavens burst with light?  Is it any wonder the angels make a tumult?

Merry Christmas!

From the current issue of National Review:

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