Emptiness confounds itself with the thought that there is, or should be, something more to it. It presumes to derive from something or somewhere, as if the presence of this something or somewhere thus evoked could banish the void of its being. But though the heart should tarry back and forth, frantically seeking some refuge, some rock, the despair remains. Once caught in the vortex of the abyss, always caught in the vortex of the abyss; intermittent periods of peace are checked again by an unknown angst. The world of referents falls away as vague and imprecise, a shallow escape from the terror of the moment not buttressed by the familiarity of resonance.
Ineffable, enigmatic, mysterious, tremendous--all seek respite in the explanation away. But these words are words and remain justly words. They are no key to themselves unlock the secret, merely the reprieve to know the door is locked. Together, repeating, some sort of consolation is achieved; the negative void is translated into a positive emanation desiring interpretation and chatter. So do we pass the time, positively discussing the negative in which we are.
20.11.07
5.11.07
If You Want to Win a Religious War You Had Better Learn about Religion
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/IK06Aa01.html
"Modern democracy is a Christian phenomenon, born of the Dutch rebellion against Spain in 1568, and borne by the Puritan migration to the New World. It arose as a religious response to Europe's crisis, not as a political scientist's cookbook recipe. That is why secular political philosophy fails so miserably in the context of religious war."
http://www.firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=5482
"In these and many other ways, the Heroic Generation’s zest for creative, exploratory theology led them to neglect—even dismiss—the need for a standard theology. They ignored the sort of theology that, however pedestrian or inadequate, provides a functional, communally accepted and widely taught system for understanding and absorbing new insights."
The above links point to seperate reviews of Dominican Fergus Kerr's latest book, Twentieth-Century Catholic Theologians: From Neoclassicism to Nuptial Mysticism. The first examines the 20th century theologians taken up in light of the unique claim the Roman Pontiff can make to speak for the West to a geopolitical field shaped increasingly by forces of religious valence. The second examines these theologians in respect to the Catholic tradition of theology in which they write, critiquing in particular their inability to systematize their own work within the Thomistic school, and thereby denuding the Church of a coherent theology for the 21st century and beyond.
"Modern democracy is a Christian phenomenon, born of the Dutch rebellion against Spain in 1568, and borne by the Puritan migration to the New World. It arose as a religious response to Europe's crisis, not as a political scientist's cookbook recipe. That is why secular political philosophy fails so miserably in the context of religious war."
http://www.firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=5482
"In these and many other ways, the Heroic Generation’s zest for creative, exploratory theology led them to neglect—even dismiss—the need for a standard theology. They ignored the sort of theology that, however pedestrian or inadequate, provides a functional, communally accepted and widely taught system for understanding and absorbing new insights."
The above links point to seperate reviews of Dominican Fergus Kerr's latest book, Twentieth-Century Catholic Theologians: From Neoclassicism to Nuptial Mysticism. The first examines the 20th century theologians taken up in light of the unique claim the Roman Pontiff can make to speak for the West to a geopolitical field shaped increasingly by forces of religious valence. The second examines these theologians in respect to the Catholic tradition of theology in which they write, critiquing in particular their inability to systematize their own work within the Thomistic school, and thereby denuding the Church of a coherent theology for the 21st century and beyond.
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