Abundant and loving Creator, present in a sacred, given River Assiniboine, the Stone Sioux: a river, a rock that holds us here Born on one side of the river, on one side of history Born unaware: the River holds tragedy’s tears. Christian capitalists conserving cherished concepts Christian self-interest defecates idolatrous violence Desecrated cubicles leading to … Continue reading The Assiniboine, the Stone Sioux
In [educated Afghan women], we all see our own striving for authentic lives. We want to claim an authentic life that contributes to not only our own well-being but also to the well-being of our homes.
https://youtu.be/p6NNo3HIRrU What I would like to consider today is what COVID has taught us about human flourishing. What should we learn from the experience of COVID, and how ought we do things differently next time? I want to expand on Malcolm Gladwell’s idea in his talk for Google Zeitgeist in June of 2020. And recently … Continue reading Game Theory, COVID and the Good Life
*image credit: https://www.davidklassenfineart.com/about https://videopress.com/v/MyIgpYsq?preloadContent=metadata In 2020 and 2021, the cross-pressures on undergraduate education were phenomenal, and they raised so many fears and anxieties that it seemed that we couldn’t be anything but in a CONSTANT state of fear. Individually, we have worn masks and washed hands because we have been afraid to catch and spread … Continue reading Social Mobility and Liberal Education
The intermittent fast is a marvelous ritual. By fasting occasionally (in my case, once a month), we put our bodies into the sharp relief of hunger which is a driving force of life. Fasting urges a realization that our biological reality transcends the boundary between natural and supernatural.
In Christian languages, happiness gets a less honorable reputation than joy and well-being. But life would hardly be worth living if there weren’t moments of happiness along the way. A universal framework for well-being is far from universal. Here are four models to help clarify your own understanding of happiness and a bit of the … Continue reading Different Cultures, Different Kinds of Happiness
Cathy Whitecloud carried me when I was a baby.
Technocratic rationality, then, needs to be recognized as a feature of mass society and as a systemic threat to our freedom, and its oligarchic substitution of a human artifice for a real-world with unmarked graves; the original sin of assuming that man is the measure of all things, makes its appearance there. It makes its appearance in the controlling of society to restore the economy - an oligarchic and technocratic rationale so obvious that it is surprising there isn’t more protest.
...quietly observing what the conflict is doing to you before you can ponder the opposite, what you might do to it. Rather than be active, you have to slow down and see what moves in and around you. ‘A lot of it is about listening,’ says Herbert, ‘listening to people, but also listening to yourself to find your balance.’
"The self exists in the same way as a border between countries, i.e. as a social institution. Both are imaginary boundaries that have a certain pragmatic convenience to them."
"...experiences of inequality are built-in to the human artifice and are not merely happenings of our experience, but constitutive features of it - a mechanics very similar to corruption."
An hour into the experience, about 10 minutes before we began to eat, I thought to myself, “how could a dozen or so educated women talk about food for an hour without getting bored and switching topics?”
The demand to be authentic is so commonplace that it has lost its meaning. ‘Today, there is little premium placed on being authentic,’ writes the American philosopher Gordon Marino in his moving meditation The Existentialist’s Survival Guide: How to Live Authentically in an Inauthentic Age (2018). The increasing prevalence of social media constructions of ourselves, … Continue reading Performative Authenticity: Mass Society in Real Time
"...overcoming otherness is bringing our uniqueness to a situation not originally intended to accept it, and then translating and transforming the situation so the uniqueness can feel at home. "
To be saved by grace sounds simple enough, grammatically at least. We are born into sin, and redeemed by a sacrificial love which we do not deserve. Baptized at 11, I seemed to have passed the test. Sunday school stuff, really. Let’s go to the all you can eat buffet together, laugh a little, and … Continue reading The Ways of Grace
When the detained people who stormed the Capitol are prosecuted, my guess is the charges will have something to do with sedition, destroying property, or threatening lives. Democracy will be defended, but it is this terrorism that needs to be tried.
What has been expressed as widespread mistrust is not of what is around us, such as churches, universities, stock markets, and governments; the distrust is of ourselves. We distrust who we are. And I don’t believe it.
“What about this? And what about that?” Don’t talk of nourishment; let’s eat till we’re fat. We look to a promise and give up the now, We exchange our Being for furrowed brow.
"...tending to our own resilience is a vital task for living well. But that requires not only that we don’t overlook the severity of loss or the suffering that we regularly experience, but also that we experience and embrace the suffering.”
There is a persistent feeling that self-isolating at home is like being herded into a ghetto; [We] had to be prepared for domination before efficient domination could occur.
"...depression and addiction are related phenomena, and ... they are symptoms of a more general malaise of which the world-ending consequences may be of our own doing."
I thought social media loved me for who I was, with its catered advertising and photo- and video-sharing capabilities; but really, it only loved me for the attention I gave to it.
Trumpism, Prophets of Deceit suggests, is the inevitable outcome of a social, economic, and political order that generates human needs that it cannot satisfy.
"...if mass society is experienced as a force that wears us down as individuals, then our belonging to community should build us up..."
"the seeming destruction of context is the modus operandi of a more inclusive background which could provide both meaning and beauty to our lives."
"If we stand with others in their reality, rather than focusing on issues, then we are doing much more of what Jesus would do."
"An experience of "resonance" is an indicator what a person ought to be doing."
A Little Bit More Some people want just a little bit more,Not just three bedrooms, but maybe four.A view from above, from the second floor,One has a spouse, but wants a whore. A minimalist will say that they want less,To give up want, to need - acquiesce.To unclutter all the untidy excess,And most of all, … Continue reading A Little Bit More
The seeming inability of recent generations to purchase either home or land is known to be a first-order symptom of this historical system of wealth acquisition, like having shortness of breath and a fever are first-order symptoms of having acquired the corona virus. At least two full generations of people who do not know how to grow food is another first-order symptom of the failure of a system of wealth acquisition.
Part 3 This is a continuation of Part 1: https://idealsandidentities.com/2020/03/28/the-sickness-before-the-infection/ and Part 2 https://idealsandidentities.com/2020/04/10/the-sickness-before-the-infection-part-2-preservation-or-carrying-on/ I am continuing to write it, and will publish the entire “The Sickness Before the Infection” upon completion. This is the up-to-date edit of Part 3. What amazes, and sometimes perplexes, me is what will be carried on after the coronavirus … Continue reading The Sickness Before the Infection: Why we Want Social Distancing
In other words, there is no identifiable locus of the virus. It doesn’t matter whether the virus is transmitted among the community, or brought in on a plane or train. It doesn’t matter whether we have been globally exposed or locally situated, the virus is all around, and it could be transmitted by any of us. And even though I might feel well, I have been infected and have transmitted it to others before I even knew I was sick. How terrifying is that?
" by attending to the needs of himself and others, Wayne practiced eternal life here on Earth"
When someone uses capital letters incorrectly in official documents, we tend to think of the writer as having missed a lesson from their elementary school Language Arts class. They may also be conforming to the format of texting out of context. In reviewing student writing for a living, I find misused capitalization to be a … Continue reading A Deeper Cliche
"the overlooked habits in human beings’ interactions with one another will also rear their ugly, destructive, and malicious effects on the world around us and within us. Unconscious habits will emerge because we have too often overlooked them, and they will appear and be treated as hints and allegations that exist on the periphery of our conscious view, with the grand temptation to push them aside because the reality from which they emerge is too uncomfortable to deal with."
In other words, leaders who need to judge need to move away from evaluation and towards discernment.
You (Thou) and I belong to the Kingdom of God. Thou and I are very different. Thou and I share much that is the same, Thou and I may be friends, acquaintances, or even enemies. I submit myself to you, especially Thou within you. I vow to live with Thou in peace, as Christ crucified. … Continue reading Relationship
Do you feel passionate about something and want to share it? Write an essay! Do you disagree with a popular opinion and wish to convince others to join you? Write an essay! Need to write something because the college you dream of attending is making you? Write an essay! “Essay” is a form of writing … Continue reading Your Guide to Better Essays
Not only will the claim to innocence by Afghani collaborators be their greatest danger, but it will also be ours too. For out of seeming self-protection and a war of revenge, we have taken on moral obligations that we have no capability of meeting.
The shit has hit the fan. The 6th IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report was released today, and it has shown the consequences of our ways of life. Yes, global warming will rise from anywhere between 1.5 - 5.5 degrees celsius. And this will have a huge impact on us. An increase in climate-related … Continue reading Climate-Friendly Changes We Can Make
I may have made the “bucket-list” choice, yet again, and I would have poked a hole in the bucket while doing it.
Raymond Klassen - Ideals and Identities 