Joke?

So, David Lynch gives a talk at Berlin University advocating transcendental meditiaton, causing quite a ruckus. I thought the whole situation was a staged joke on the Berlin students. Unfortunately, it was not:



Yes, let's have an unbesiegbares Deutschland. I agree. Let's become invincible.



And then let's fly (also possible through TM):

http://www.yogicflyingclubs.org/yogic_flying.html

Yes we can.

Opps

Today I realized that I've washed my hair with body wash the past two weeks.

Reflection on the movie Oasis

Does God watch over those who live on the street, the mentally handicapped, the poor, and the severely disabled? Theoretically most Christians would answer in the affirmative - 'of course, God watches over all individuals, each person is precious to Him'. Yet, upon an encounter with one such 'everyman', our instinct is often to turn away or to fear.

Why? They are shameful to look at it, without dignity. They stumble on sidewalks, sit on street corners. They limp in the mall, moan uncontrollably, grope in broad daylight. They are poorly dressed with sunken eyes, stained teeth and messy hair. .

If they are painful to our senses, are they not also painful to God's? Are they also His children? Does he 'gladly give them all things'?

Christians readily believe that God does gladly give all things for those who 'love' God, those who look like them who are in the same socio-economic strata and have relatively the same education level. But what about those who are, whether it is verbalized or quietly thought, objectively, at least by society's standards, stupid, ugly, sputtering, dirty, hungry, without shelter or clothing...etc.

How uncomfortable we become when they - they, by the very word we create an infinite distance between their humanity and ours - walk into our worship services. We silence, keep them quite, send them back out with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a bottle of water, and a 'go in the peace and blessing of our Lord'. Or worse, we stare and smile uncomfortably.

Has God really 'numbered the hairs on their head'? Has He 'written their number of days in His book'? Does he really unequivocally 'work all things for the good of those who love Him'? Did He really come to 'declare the good news to the poor'? Has he stopped?

Yet, how terrible, we hear a secret: These, those without clothing, food, without shelter or in prison, are not only human, they are Christ himself.

The Beloved one is the wretched one. How terrible a truth. How terrible a sight. How cursed a man. Yet, we sing to Him in our ignorance of who He is - 'glory, power and honor be unto the lamb who reigns forever and ever' - the man, in jail; the women, on the street; the family, without food - Christ.

How terrible these words:

"Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me."

Yes, God does watch. His gaze burns through all pretension and division. We are them and they are us - our false distinctions collapse when He speaks and moves. Yet, God is more than a spectator. He has become us. We are Him and he is us. Humanity has become the divine and the divine, human. The Father reigns and watches, in love, over His many sons and daughters, in spite, yet also through those who are His. "God's dwelling place is with man", let us listen to his voice that we might love and serve Him in every man, women and child without distinction

Comic Relief

Today, while working on my thesis in firestone, I received a troubling email:

From: Chenxin Jiang
Sent: Friday, March 6th, 2009 2:51 P.M.
Subject: Help! : (


Eric and I are stuck in carrel C-1-H-6. The door won't open. Please come help?

.....

I didn't see this email until 3:15 P.M. Needless to say, I was surprised. My heart raced as I ran down to the abyss of firestone - the C floor (C for chenxin: coincidence, perhaps not). To my great relief, by the time I found their carrel, a carrel which happens to be tucked away in a corner in the far east side of firestone, the door was opened. Apparently, they had freaked out after not know how to open the door to the carrel and sent me an email, after which they continued to try and eventually found a way out: a small teardrop-shaped lever, which when turned opened the door.

I'm not sure how long they actually thought they were trapped in the carrel - I should have asked. Regardless, I like to imagine that it was upwards of thirty minutes as that would be much funnier then only a five minute scare.

Reading

The more I read the less I comprehend. The comprehension barrier is a product of two recent developments. First, I simply can no longer understand what I am reading. Each page with its forty to fifty sentences has become a pit of snakes – squirming, black snakes whose heads are indistinguishable from their tails. Staring at the tangle, I get the feeling that there is some horrible, elusive meaning, which I will never quite grasp within each page.

Second, I am being suffocated by words. After about twenty pages of reading, my throat constricts and a rush of nausea overwhelms me. Why? It could be a psychosomatic process linked by some secret conditioning to eye squinting. However, this seems highly unlikely. My most recent hypothesis is that these psychosomatic reactions are a product of a growing unconscious understanding of the essence of text. Given that this unconscious knowledge is producing these strange effects, it may be better that my growing knowledge of text remain unconscious. Thus, ultimately, the psychosomatic prevetion of any conscious knowledge of text is not such a bad thing.

Reflection

Heard a song at Church today that I found meaningful. I read its words in light of my many failures and disappointments of the past 4 years, the grief and regret caused by their memory, the fear I feel towards the coming year and an imminent graduation.

Be Still, My Soul

Be still, my soul:
the Lord is on thy side.
Bear patiently
the cross of grief or pain.
Leave to thy God
to order and provide;
In every change,
He faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul:
thy best, thy heavenly Friend
Through thorny ways
leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul:
thy God doth undertake
To guide the future,
as He has the past.
Thy hope, thy confidence
let nothing shake;
All now mysterious
shall be bright at last.
Be still, my soul:
the waves and winds
still know His voice
Who ruled them
while He dwelt below.

Be still, my soul:
when dearest friends depart,
And all is darkened
in the vale of tears,
Then shalt thou better know
His love, His heart,
Who comes to soothe
thy sorrow and thy fears.
Be still, my soul:
thy Jesus can repay
From His own fullness
all He takes away.

Be still, my soul:
the hour is hastening on
When we shall be
forever with the Lord.
When disappointment,
grief, and fear are gone,
Sorrow forgot,
love's purest joys restored.
Be still, my soul:
when change and tears are past,
All safe and blessed
we shall meet at last.

angry

Max Weber's Ancient Judaism is the worst piece of writing I have read this entire year. Yet, in order to write a short, three page paper, I am not only forced to read it, but to squeeze the text for meaning. His rationalization of the bizarre stories found in the Jewish Bible are elaborate rereadings based out of psychology, sociology, and economics. Such rereadings might be interesting if his rereadings weren't so hard to stomach, challenging the mythic-bizarreness of the original texts with a new plain, naturalistic-bizarreness. His 'scientific' writing is about as believable as Sigmund Freud's.

I am convinced Max suffered from intellectual insecurity when he wrote this text; that, or he was a pompous asshole. Ancient Judaism is an extremely reader-unfriendly text. Perhaps it is the translation. I hope it is the translation. But, most likely, it is not. For one, Max feels the need to accompany every point he makes about Jewish society with three clarifying points taken from other societies, namely those of India and other Asiatic countries, which might be ok if his examples weren't incredibly obscure such that only a scholar would get them (!!!) WTF. I might understand if he was Indian or Chinese, BUT he was a freaking German.
THE END
back to my papers....
so many...
so behind...
help.