Terry is still employed (in Dorchester), not in jail, and not dead.

***

[redacted v. Holy Saturday]

***

Carolyn (and Stephen) had me over for dinner around 6pm. Carolyn and I went to watch the fireworks from the Longfellow Bridge. We got there around 8pm. The fireworks are scheduled to start around 10:30pm. Except neither of us had thought to actually check when the fireworks were actually scheduled to start. Oh well.

I an reminded of why I don't watch the fireworks from the Bridge every year, but it was nice to be with Carolyn for her first Boston Fireworks. And we got to see them reflected in the Hancock Building, too. (And being there early it was nice to just watch the water and the skyline in the pre-sunset light.  Edit: And also the F-16s.) And at one point there was this kind of adorable little boy; during one really bright round of fireworks, he said, "It made it light! It made it morning!"

Also, I hadn't noticed in previous years, but we were really aware of how many people around us were speaking languages other than English (plus just generally it was far from being all white people). It seemed really appropriate for a celebration of America.

( gym )

When I left my house this morning, I had my umbrella in my hand because I thought it was raining, but it was only misting.  Leaving the gym, though, I opted for the tunnels as it looked to be pouring out and I just didn't wanna bother with an umbrella and everything for such a short trip to my building.  "It looks like night outside," someone said.
Apparently it has been wet.  I went to Widener (in a spot between the rain, though I brought my umbrella just in case), and Baker Lawn had patches of thin pale mushrooms.

***

I went to The Crossing tonight.  I had a lot of moments of, "Oh, this was not what I was expecting," and, "Oh, you're progressive but not CWM," and "Church: ur doin it wrong," but I actually freaked out during Communion.  Ironically, over dinner afterward, when we were talking about this, Rev.Steph powerfully articulated what it means to her for the Elements to be Body and Blood -- the life of Jesus coursing through you, etc. -- and I said, "If you had said that during the service, I would have said, Communion: ur doing it right."  Beautifully, another parishioner who joined the conversation realized (and articulated) how he reacts differently to the Eucharist depending on what's said (yeah, they're emergent rooted in Episcopal but they often do extemporaneous Eucharist prayer, and with different people presiding week to week, even the available spectrum of eucharistic theology changes from week to week, as Chris phrased it) even though he grew up Catholic and doesn't consciously register what's being said.  I said, this is why I tell people "church: ur doin it wrong," because if something's is bothering me, it's probably bothering someone else and they're just not saying anything -- well that and because I'm a bitchy control freak.

Yes, I will post at length tomorrow about all the ways in which I think they do church wrong and what freaked me out about Communion.

For now, my conclusion is that I like Chris a lot.  I was touched by how grateful he was that I (1) came to The Crossing, (2) told them they were doing it wrong.  He hugs like he means it (like whoa).  And he calls me "sis."  ♥

( gym )

On Sunday when I was making Fourth of July plans with Carolyn, I thought, "Aww, I remember the Fourth of July weekend I spent staying home doing fireworks.  I wonder if they're gonna do that this year; I don't think they did it last year."  Lo, "from now until midnight EST this Thursday (July 2nd), we'll be collecting prompts"

I took a field trip to Lamont Library (in the rain, actually using an umbrella) today -- where they could not locate the book I was looking for.  *shrug*

I found myself singing Dar Williams' "This Was Pompeii" -- not because I'm saddened by the rain at all, but because I feel like it hasn't actually been raining much at all (despite everyone's griping).

Over lunch, Katie and I were talking about how so many of our agemates or younger (i.e., age 23-26) are buying houses/condos and what's up with that.  She said, "Even if someone handed me $2M right now, I wouldn't buy a house."  I said I would, but that I grew up a renter and never liked the idea of being tied down to a place even though I also didn't plan to move around much, and that it's only this past year that I've felt like "Yeah, if I could, I would buy a condo in Davis Square right now."

Red Line after work, I saw Keith and was chatting with him, and then I saw Jason and lit up and threw myself at him.  *shrugs*  I am both easy and predictable.

***

[FirstChurch Mailing List] Like Noah, we're building an ark for Rest and Bread

Dear Beloved,

Continuing our Rest and Bread series of biographies of folks in the Bible, today, we're going to meet Noah.

We will also pray for sun, for each other, and for the world. We will strengthen our connection to God and to our community by telling Jesus' story about how to live centered in God regardless of what it is doing outside. Come, let's be community together.

Music for meditation starts at 6, our service at 6:15.

The Growth Committee will meet at 7:15.

Love,
Laura Ruth

( gym )

I wrote up my IP notes from Monday and posted about bodies and then worked on actually feedbacking and writing up recs for fics.  (I have not updated since last August!  I was like, "I am going to make productive use of my time if it kills me."  It did not so much actually happen, though I got a little bit done.)  I also bookmarked/read a few items off my Google Reader.

I ate lunch outside (it was cloudy, humid, and breezy, which all together was actually a good combination) with Nithya and Cait.  I was gonna maybe go to the retirement party for a woman I barely know in the building next door later in the afternoon, but I ended up staying around my desk to do some actual work-related things.

I went to IP section tonight, figuring I was in the area anyway and it wasn't a big deal to just get dinner at Qdoba [sidebar: my recent ability to just not-eat, esp. around dinnertime concerns me] and hang out and possibly folks would bring up interesting questions/issues.  Yeah, I fell asleep during section (which says more about the amount of sleep I've been getting than about the quality of section).

(former)RA-Nicole called me midway through and I totes left class to take the call (even though it literally didn't occur to me what she would be calling about).  Cailin had left her a voicemail yesterday and she just got it today and was totally freaking out.  She apologized for not asking after me at all and said she'd call later and actually catch up on me (I assured her that was fine).

I thought about coming home via Porter to pick up Fig Newtons and cereal but opted to just go straight home.  I have laundry in the dryer, and I think I'm going to go to bed.

non-literal infringement
- abstraction (find the level of abstraction at which they coexist)
- filtration (take out everything that cannot be protected by copyright)
- comparison

"Pretty Woman" -- Roy Orbison vs. 2 Live Crew
1993, Souter [applying the 4 points of consideration re: copyright infringement] says re: (1) is not just about if it's commercial or not but rather is it TRANSFORMATIVE
- does it merely supersede the prior or does it add something new
Souter says re: (3) that it's N/A because parody must evoke the hole so it must use most of the whole. [I don't think this is always true.]
re: (4), prof commented that sometimes the parody becomes more well-known than the original

( notes: transformative works, Free and Open Commons, patents, etc. )

Marla just emailed the listserv:

Pastor Tiffany and partner Josh joyfully announce the birth of Grady Will Steinwert Arrowood!!

Born today at 8:28am, weighing in at 8 pounds, 6 ounces!!

Shapely Prose's A Sarah posted:

One of the reasons I grudgingly remain a Christian, is because of a particular story that Christianity tells about bodies. Now, I hardly need to point out that not all the stories Christianity has told about bodies are good ones. A lot of them are crap. Maybe most of them; I don’t have an exhaustive understanding of Christian stories about bodies, but of the ones I come across, most are terrible. But there is, I think, a strand of the Christian tradition that is very body-affirming. For example: You might not know this, but there’s actually good reason for viewing the notion of a “soul” going to “heaven” as an interloper in the Christian tradition. Well, maybe “interloper” is too strong. But many theologians would say that, at best, it’s a belief that’s become an unhelpful distraction simply by being so focused upon. (Like, it actually doesn’t say in the historical canonical creeds that Christians’ souls will go to heaven when they die; it says only that Jesus was resurrected from the dead and then ascended into heaven, where he’s hanging out until he comes again.) (Er, I’m paraphrasing.)

Arguably, the FAR more consistent and long-established Christian belief about life after death is EXACTLY NOT that some immaterial vapor of selfhood will go into a happy place in the sky. Rather, it’s that our bodies will be resurrected and perfected.

Aieee! Perfect bodies. I’ve gone to church since I was a wee tot, and have now made a job of it — and yet when I hear about bodies being “perfected,” what springs to mind is not the Christian belief in the resurrection of the dead. No, it’s diets. It’s bikini season. Clear complexion products and spray tan and so forth. I fill with dread and anxiety and self-loathing.

But in the Christian theological sense, “perfected bodies” means mostly that our bodies won’t be in pain or die again. (Well, you have people like St. Augustine who also specified that everyone would be 33 years old in the resurrection, but that’s sort of an academic point.) More interesting than what the bodies won’t be, is what they will be, according to this particular flight of the Christian imagination. Namely, they will be ours. Recognizably. They will be physical bodies, the same ones we have now, just… transformed, somehow. They’ll be even more what they are now, more alive, more there. Their longings and yearnings will be fulfilled and satisfied. The delightful tangibility and vulnerability that comes with being fleshy won’t go away, but it won’t any longer be an occasion for danger and harm. It has even been speculated by at least one Christian theologian (and yes those are weasel words, and no I can’t remember who said it but I swear it’s in my seminary notes!) that our perfected bodies will retain their scars. The reasoning was that it makes sense that anything which testifies to suffering’s having been overcome will be preserved.

And what’s one image in the Christian tradition that has consistently been used to describe this new, redeemed, embodied life that awaits? Obviously not immaterial souls becoming harp-playing angels on clouds. Nope nope nope. A feast. A feast, where nobody is left out and everybody has enough. A feast where – if I may extend the image in a manner I think is faithful to it – there are no good foods and bad foods… no popular table and no nerds table… no foods that look gorgeous on the plate but are the result of cruel and world-killing technology… no need to make eating into a locus for control in the hopes of finally, finally being worthy of love. Just a beautiful, intimate, abundant, joyful, and peaceful meal with your close circle of friends. Except that the circle is extended to every creature, and the Holy One is sitting with us at the table too.

Ah, that’s where I see the whole “ordered appetite” thing come in. And, you know, I can *almost* cut my tradition some slack here. I mean, if you’re saying that both gastronomical hunger and its fulfillment, and sexual longing and its fulfillment, reveal something about the very goal of the whole cosmos… well, suddenly, it seems pretty important to put in a bunch of provisos about how there are right and wrong ways for those appetites to be ordered. Because we don’t want to say that just EVERYthing that someone might theoretically do sexually, or EVERYthing you do related to your meals, is redemptive and good. A meal can be the occasion of exclusion and harm, even accidentally. So can sex. So can a bunch of other embodied longings.

Well, better make a whole bunch of rules to make sure that people only do the right things with their appetites, and not the wrong things, right?

Uhhh, sure, go ahead. Make a list of ordered and disordered appetites. And rules. And good people and bad people. And good bodies and bad bodies. Knock yourself out. EXCEPT REMEMBER THAT a big horking part of the Judeo-Christian narrative has to do with the guardians of “order” always being tempted to use that order to shore up their own power. And meanwhile – at least as I read the Christian Bible, but I’m not alone – God has pretty consistently cast God’s lot with those who’ve been othered by the authorities of the day.

Seriously, that’s like, um, kind of the whole freaking plot of the Bible, over and over and over and over and over again. The guardians of order say, with some plausible reason, “These are the conditions necessary for God to find favor with people!” And then God says, “Aww, nice try, mates, and I can totally see how you got there… but turns out I’m not so simple. ‘Scuse me a sec… Hey, you outcasts over there! Come join the party!”

I can’t write about this without mentioning a memory that I shall cherish for as long as my memory functions. It illustrates everything I’ve just been trying, in fits and starts, to describe.

In the early ‘aughties I lived in a sort of pacifist anarchist Christian commune. One of the things we did — in addition to dumpster-diving, protesting war, and gardening — was provide a place for families with children who needed somewhere to stay. (At the time, in the city where I lived, most regular shelters and agencies wouldn’t place parents and children together.) One young woman, a high school student, stayed with us for more than a year. She’d been kicked out of her house when she got pregnant and decided to proceed with the pregnancy.

One day – when she was getting near her due date – she and the baby’s father announced they would be getting married. “WHAT!? CONGRATULATIONS!” we exclaimed. “WHEN?!” Whereupon this woman said somewhat dejectedly that they’d just get it taken care of the next day, because it’s not like they’d have any family who’d want to come.

At this point the matriarch of the community BEGGED her to let them try and give her a beautiful wedding. The bride happily said yes. And what I saw come together in the next twenty-four hours… I just don’t know how to describe it except that it felt like God was a sprightly and eccentric auntie throwing a wedding for her favorite niece. Somehow the news spread throughout the whole neighborhood. Little things just came together. For instance, the next morning my friend Christy and I found gorgeous entire bouquets of fresh flowers in the dumpster behind a florist, which we used to decorate the basement chapel. The intentional community down the street baked a wedding cake using, for the toppers, boy and girl chocolate Easter bunnies that they happened to have gotten on clearance. One of the other moms in the house worked as a caterer, and she made piles and piles of pupusas and heaps of black beans. Other neighbors brought chicken and I don’t even remember what else. A very psychologically troubled friend of ours who had some musical gifts sang “Danny Boy” as a solo. The preacher from the storefront church half a block away offered to do the ceremony. And the eighty-five-year-old grandfather who lived up the street — the sort who’d sit on his front porch in all but the worst weather so he could greet everyone as they passed – asked the bride if he could give her away.

ALL THIS HAPPENED IN ONE DAY.

It was both a feast, and a wedding night. And to me, it was a very scripturally-appropriate foretaste of the future of justice and peace that I try to work for. But I’ve often reflected how it satisfied exactly nobody’s rules for proper behavior or ordered appetites. Nobody. Certainly not wedding experts. Certainly not most religious people, who would have frowned on the bride (and perhaps only her) for having sex. Not the young woman’s family, who were angry she proceeded with the pregnancy. Not the vegans in our community, because of the chicken. I mean, they handled it with good humor and everything; I’m just saying if *they* had been in charge there probably wouldn’t have been chicken, you know? The wedding probably wouldn’t even have satisfied the government, seeing as how the groom didn’t speak English, couldn’t understand a word the preacher said, and didn’t actually repeat any vows. Hell, as a feminist I wasn’t thrilled in principle that she was being given away!

Didn’t matter. There was some power that had gone out ahead of us, ahead of all our rules, and brought us together in a place of peace… in a way that none of us could have anticipated. It was a gift *precisely* *because* it didn’t just spring up out of our fastidious adherence to rules.

Well, that’s my take, anyway. It’s also a long way of telling how I eventually found my spot in a liberal Christianity where a love of embodied life (in its lumpiest and bumpiest and earthiest sense) is at the heart of my faith… a Christianity that expects God to be especially at work in the lives of people with the “wrong” kinds of bodies, who have or are believed to have the “wrong” kinds of yearnings, longings, appetites.

[redacted v. 2 -- vegetarian, !update]

+++

( gym )

+++

Intellectual Property class has In-Person Section on Tuesdays from 6:30-7:30 (when I am likely skipping World Religions class).

Harvard Summer Activities Language Table (at on-campus dinner, which I am probably ineligible for) is also on Tuesdays -- Spanish from 5-6 or 6-7 and Portuguese from 6-7.

Ooh, Rev.Steph from The Crossing is preaching at Memorial Church this Sunday.  Though actually, I could go to The Crossing this week and skip Early Buddhism.  Though I think she might not even be preaching this Thursday.  (Oh, and The Crossing has Centering Prayer on Tuesdays...)  Of course, I could just wait until August when Summer School is over and CAUMC is still in recess.

+++

I totally forgot that one of my friends works for a church until she asked if I wanted her to put B's family on their prayer list.

bff said, "half of my prayer list is your prayer list, which I think is kind of awesome"

The surprise bonus care package I sent last week arrived.

+++

Ben ordered his second favorite Finale cake by accident, which was fine by me as I prefer it to his actual favorite.  Al provided sparkling red wine from Italy.  I chatted with two new(ish)-to-me doctoral students and also with a bunch of the junior faculty.  It's really nice to not always be made of awkward.


Sidebar from lunch discussion: Sofra in Watertown apparently has a Chocolate Hazelnut Baklava.

I am so so grateful to God for the fact that the past, oh, three weeks have passed without my being anxious really at all about the fact that I haven't gotten to connect with certain people I know and love.  I think it is possibly starting to wear off a bit. 

I decided to not go to LizL's installation.

SCBC

I got to SCBC at like five minutes of nine and rang the doorbell.  I stood outside reading my book.  Once it hit 9am, I considered just going home, but then someone showed up and let me in, and moments later Ross and Emily walked in.

We opened with prayers of thanksgiving.  I appreciated that Ross explicitly articulated that silence is good, too.  The only thing I could think of was that I am so grateful for the patience I've had (by the grace of God) this past month or so re: various interpersonal things.

Next we lifted up prayers for the church -- and Ross turned to me and said, "You can also lift up prayers for your church, it doesn't have to be for this church," which I appreciated.  But (a) I'm not used to praying for my church(es) specifically, (b) when I try to think of prayers for the Church, what keeps coming to mind is stuff like the "All Means All" initiative, (c) it would feel like a betrayal to gripe about one of my churches in this outsider space.

And lastly we lifted up any personal concerns that were particularly weighing on our hearts -- during which part I did lift up select prayers out loud.

People kept saying "Lord" and "Father" and "He."  I don't want to co-opt the term "double-consciousness" (esp. since I think I wouldn't really be using it correctly), but I was very conscious simultaneously of how the speakers intended the language and how it failed to resonate with me.  I've been inclined recently to use female language for God (e.g., "Mother," "She"), even though any gendered language for God makes me uncomfortable to some degree because God is so beyond our conceptions of gender.  "Mother" in particular often make me uncomfortable because I feel like the speakers are intended to conjure up this happy fluffy "if only women ruled the world we would live in socialist harmony" idea.  I was thinking about how recently I've had that fierce protective "place myself between you and the powers of darkness" urge, and how that feels to me really true to who God is and also echoes the Mama Bear response I've seen from my own mother.

"Mother is the name of God in the lips and hearts of children" [Google tells me (1) that originates with William Makepeace, (2) it was quoted in The Crow -- which is probably where it was initially familiar to me from.]

CHPC

2 Corinthians 8:1-15
Mark 5:21-43

Sermon: "Generosity Heals"

I continue to feel like we're just going through the motions.

I liked that we sang "O How Glorious, Full of Wonder" and "Take These Gifts" (though why only verses 1&3 I dunno), and "May You Run and Not Be Weary" is growing on me as a closing responsory hymn.

Various people chatted with me at Coffee Hour.  I kept expecting people to call me out on the email I sent to Session, but no one did.

CWM

I think it was in the Welcome that Tiffany said something about how we are gathered around this table, and I realized that by gathering around the Communion table, we literally mirror the Last Supper -- Christ gathering together with his friends.

Carolyn went off lectionary and preached on: Psalm 29, 1 John 4:19-21, Amos 5:18-24

She talked about how Amos' audience believed that their prosperity (though I don't think that was the exact word she used, but I totally thought, "Wow, that really undercuts the idea of the Prosperity Gospel") was the result of God's favor on them.  Retribution will come at the time it is least expected.  She also talked about how this idea of divine retribution is problematic (though I think she might have been overgenerous in stating that we liberals are uncomfortable with the idea of divine retribution raining down on our adversaries ;) ).

She said that the word translated "stream" in Amos is a word from the Noah flood story, so it's rather more intense than just the literal translation of "permanent stream that will never run dry."  She talked about how the water language of the Psalm recalls Creation and Noah -- order out of chaos.  She suggested that one lesson we could take from this is that God helps us find meaning.

Three things we can learn from this Amos passage:
1. Justice is important to God.  (On the Day of YHWH, YHWH's justice comes to fruition.  Even God's people can act counter to what God wants.)
2. God is there with us.
3. Perhaps we are called to be the prophets.

Every time Carolyn said "Yahweh," I pinged a little.  I used to really like the name "Yahweh" for God, but Ari and I have had conversations about the Tetragrammaton, and so now my immediate reaction is to find it problematic that we are pronouncing a name which was purposely unpronounceable/unpronounced.

--

Carolyn and I made plans for Fourth of July.  \o/

I remain unimpressed by this class.

If the first class session was an intro to the class, the second session was an intro to the study of comparative religion. I didn't feel like I actually learned much, and I also felt like a lot of the "history of thought on religion" was unnecessary for this course (and L. pointed out when I was talking to her a few days later that there weren't really any theologians included).

( notes )

The last time I posted about Iran, I felt like I was way behind the curve (and I was ... though waiting before weighing in is my usual m.o.).

That was over a week ago, and I haven't seen much in recent days. Admittedly, anyone who's following Andrew Sullivan's liveblogging probably doesn't have any time to post anything of their own, and there have been plenty of other hot topics recently, and I haven't had the brain capacity to really synthesize a whole lot of substance myself so I'm not exactly in a position to criticize anyone else -- and yes I know people can be reading stuff and actively engaging with it and just not posting about it.

( stuff I have been reading over the past week or so )

Cate and I went to "Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese: Rivals in Renaissance Venice" at the MFA.  We read almost every single word of wall text, and Cate critiqued some of the exhibition display choices, and I tried to identify the Bible stories before reading the blurbs (apparently the Susannah story in the Book of Daniel is considered apocryphal by Protestants, which explains why she was only vaguely familiar to me).

Cate actually formed opinions on each of the painters, but I couldn't keep them distinct in my head sufficent to have opinions.  I do prefer Tintoretto's Baptism of Christ over Veronese's in many ways, though.  In Veronese's, the figures are weirdly positioned, whereas Tintoretto's are much more organic.  There's also neat stuff like the water running down steps next to John the Baptist.  But really it's that above the dove above Jesus is, not a whole handful of angel faces (which is just weird to my Protestant sensibilities) but rather three -- which I can read as echoing the Trinity (even though if I think about it too hard that's weird, since Christ and the Spirit are already depicted).

I dorked out on the Venice stuff in the gift shop :)

We got lunch (outside) at the Pizzeria Uno at Symphony and then did some clothes shopping at the Pru, which was remarkably painless (considering how quickly I usually burn out on any sort of clothes shopping), though there may be some returns in my future as Ann Taylor is espensive.  (I also got a top -- on sale -- at Chico's.)

I came home and washed dishes and did laundry and ate a bit of food and called L. (I had a missed call from her this afternoon) and decided to lie down for a bit ... and that turned into a nap.  I called Ari to check in and am going to try bed for real now.

I think I won't be able to go to LizL's installation tomorrow as any T trek takes 1.5-2hrs and it's at 3pm and I have CWM at 5pm.

I opted to take the #66 out to Amy even though it would take about the same amount of time as walk/Red Line/Green Line and I'd be more likely to get to read on the subway.  I did actually get to read a fair amount and I snagged a seat partway through.  I remember being awake at Coolidge Corner.  And then it was Malcolm X Boulevard and I wondered if this was too far.  And a couple stops later we were at Dudley Station.  Oops.  Almost immediately I saw a #14 bus to Heath St./Huntington pull in, so I hopped on that, saw a bit of scenic Roxbury, and then hopped on the E Line.

I picked up books for Ari, and a metric fuckton of alcohol for our party (housemate says now the only alcohol we need to buy for the party is some more rum).

On my way back on Longwood Ave., I saw an M2.  \o/  So I took that back to the Red Line, then got out at Davis, had dinner (outside) at Mr. Crepe with L. (who drove me home afterward), called Ari, and now I get to go to bed before midnight :D

***

( joy sadhana )

( joy sadhana )

Titles and short phrases cannot be copyrighted.
Series is protected by copyright because people might be deceived (protecting the marketplace from fraud). So "The Best Game Ever" is fine, "Harry Potter and the Best Game Ever" not so much.

Prof isn't sure that Salinger should be allowed to own Holden Caulfield -- "cultural icon." You can write books about nonfictional people... I can write a work of literary criticism about Holden Caulfield...

"If you wanted to write a book about Harry Potter at age 76, you couldn't do it in a way that suggests you're writing a book in the Harry Potter series. But if you titled your book, The Hogwarts Reunion: Harry Potter at Age 76, as imagined by me, then at least you're telling the public that this isn't J. K. Rowling."
He then talked about the Harry Potter Encyclopedia (i.e., the Lexicon -- which was what I had suspected when on Monday he mentioned a recent Harry Potter copyright case).

"Copyright is, as we said on Monday, attempt by the law to draw the line between giving people incentive to create by denoting their creation as property and giving them certain property rights and on the other hand, not restricting the free flow of ideas, argument, etc. which advance society."

The Idea-Expression Dichotomy
(Copyright protects the expression, not the idea.)
[Could also be called the "Fact-Expression Dichotomy"]

( Read more... )

So, Tuesday's World Religions class.

A friend of mine had criticized one of the main texts we're using, saying, "she [the author] makes some cringingly simplistic statements, and her bias against traditional Christianity was so apparent (to me, anyway) that I didn't fully trust her appraisal of other religions I know less well. I wish I knew of a better comparative religion text to recommend."

Early in class, the prof spoke praisingly of the author (whom he has become friends with). I'm only about ten pages into the text, though, so I didn't have an opinion of my own to make me hesitant.

[Sidebar before I start complaining in earnest: I will give the prof credit for recommending to us that we get to know people from other faith traditions -- and other countries, other ethnicities -- and sit down and have a drink with that person, that you'll learn more from that than you will from a class. Though it came across a little uncomfortably tokenizing, with an implication of "tell me about your faith tradition" without an understanding that everyone's experience of a given faith tradition is going to be unique and often very different from someone else's ... though he did sort of touch on this at other moments ... and he's traveled to lots of places around the world getting to know different Buddhist practitioners, so I think he really is aware of the diversity that exists within a given faith tradition.]

Later, he told a story of saying to his parents, "Isn't it interesting that two out of your three kids became Buddhists" (his parents were Methodists, possibly ministers), and his sister turned to him and said, "You're not a Buddhist." He said he was -- he meditates some, the Buddhist philosophy is very important in his life. She insisted that he didn't actually practice it (she gets up every morning and chants, has an altar, etc.), sure he goes all over the world and writes books, but "it's a hobby for you." (As the class went on, I returned to this as an articulation of my problem with him -- that he's not a practitioner of religion but rather an outsider ... though admittedly my problem may simply be that he's an outsider talking about my faith tradition.)

A friend of his suggested he take the Belief-O-Matic quiz to settle the question. So he read us his results, mentioning an important belief of his (concern for social justice, the environment, church that doesn't have lots of talking) that explained why he had scored high for that faith tradition (until he finally got to a kind of Buddhism, which I think was #8).

Later in the class, he talked about how we're going to focus on elements common across many religions, but that he's not trying to say that all/most religions are at heart the same. For example, he said, suffering is a central theme of Buddhism, Judaism, and Christianity, but if you actually dig down, the way that suffering is central to their faith traditions are very different. Buddhism: everyone suffers, this is the first Noble Truth, doesn't matter how much material wealth or anything you have you're still as susceptible to suffering as anyone else. Judaism: a people who have faced threats of extermination over and over again (the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians, the Nazis), so suffering is understood in community. Christianity: Jesus on the cross is a central image, but that's an individual suffering, albeit suffering to atone for the sins of the whole world.

I couldn't point out to anything he said during class that was factually wrong [maybe "untrue" is more the word I want?], and I tried to remind myself that of course in an introductory overview you have to oversimplify and you can't necessarily be constantly caveating (e.g., "Substitutionary atonement is the traditional understanding of Jesus' death on the cross, but there are many different ways to understand Jesus' salvific work, and many progressive churches in particular reject the idea of substitutionary atonement") but much of what he said still really rankled.

Plus, of course, "suffering" is not something I would posit as a central theme of Judaism or Christianity (or Buddhism).

I told Cate that if I were asked to list major themes of Judaism I would say: enslavement, exile, liberation, being a people set apart, having a covenant with God, a legalistic understanding but along with that a tradition of arguing with God ("see the fine print here... oh you didn't specify that... what if there are only ten righteous people in the city? etc."), holidays of "They tried to kill us but they didn't succeed; let's eat!"

I then went to say, "If I were asked to list major themes of Christianity... actually I'm not sure what I would say. Maybe because it is my tradition and so I'm very aware of how much disagreement there is?"

Cate said she was never particularly observant even when she went to church with her family, but that her main takeaway from church was: "Jesus loves you, so go and love everyone else." She later said that she would also list "hope" as a major theme of Christianity.

***

Back in April 2002, I took the Belief-O-Matic (as did my mom).

I took it again today and ugh, my beliefs do not fit into your options... I can pick an approximate, but your statement has resonances I don't intend and elides certain things that are important to me. Yes, multiple choice quizzes are inherently problematic. And this does help the prof's commentary on his results feel less offensive. "Concern for the enivironment" would not be the key phrase I would pull out were I asked to talk about Neo-paganism, for example, but given the questions and answers in this quiz I can see how someone like him could score high for Neo-paganism in large part because he has strong concern for the environment.

Anyway, my scores this time:

1. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (100%)
2. Liberal Quakers (83%)
3. Orthodox Quaker (80%)
4. Unitarian Universalism (72%)
5. Reform Judaism (70%)
6. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (62%)
7. Seventh Day Adventist (61%)
8. Eastern Orthodox (48%)
9. New Age (48%)
10. Roman Catholic (48%)
11. Baha'i Faith (44%)
12. Neo-Pagan (42%)
13. Secular Humanism (42%)
14. Orthodox Judaism (42%)
15. New Thought (41%)
16. Sikhism (41%)
17. Taoism (37%)
18. Islam (36%)
19. Mahayana Buddhism (35%)
20. Theravada Buddhism (35%)
21. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (34%)
22. Scientology (32%)
23. Nontheist (31%)
24. Hinduism (31%)
25. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (26%)
26. Jainism (25%)
27. Jehovah's Witness (18%)

[FirstChurch Mailing List] I can see clearly now, the rain is gone! Come and praise God for Sun!

Dear Beloved,

I saw the sun, I saw the sun! Come to Rest and Bread tonight to praise the Maker of sun (and rain)!

Our service is at 6:15 tonight. Music for meditation is at 6.

Our biography is about the builder who build a house on sand and the rain washed it away. It is about the builder who built a house on stone, and even floods couldn't wash it away.

Keith is away this week. Please say a prayer for him while he works. We will also pray for Molly, of course, who is away, and for our four who are off to Synod this week: Jason, Ian, Joe, and Brandon.

I hope to see your shining faces at 6.

Love,
Laura Ruth

HBS did layoffs today (as did the rest of the University, I believe).  I gripe that we are nearly unfireable and the incentives system is poor and I gripe about particular people I work with, but actually looking at someone having gotten laid off... it's a human being vulnerable and in pain.  (Yes, I was actually surprised that I had this reaction -- I have a self-identity as a misanthrope in certain contexts, what can I say?)

Edit: I hadn't found any official press release on the HBS webpage, but it occurred to me later to check the HBSNews Twitter. Huh. /edit

***

I am unimpressed by my World Religions class (the prof just doesn't quite do it for me) and think I will just listen to the lectures during work from now on, reserving Tuesday and Thursday evenings for things I will get more out of.

At one point during our phonecall tonight, L. was like, "Oh, there was a religion-related class this fall that I was supposed to tell you about but now I can't remember what it was."  She mentioned "Dreams and The Dreaming" but couldn't remember if that was the class she had been thinking of.  Poking around the website some, I'm actually tempted by "Race in the Americas" (thanks, RaceFail).

***

( joy sadhana )

From "The Soundtrack to Your Life: Celebrating 30 years of the Sony Walkman" by Greg Beato | June 23, 2009:

Despite the high price, the Walkman was ultimately a leveling device. A few years earlier, portable stereo systems—boomboxes—had liberated those who wanted to take their music with them everywhere from the tyranny of Top 40 playlists. But boomboxes offered sonic freedom only to those who were strong enough to lug a battery-eating briefcase around and intimidating enough to impose their love of The Village People on others without censure. For anyone with $200, however, the Walkman delivered the same aural sovereignty.

( Read more... )

Today I mirrored most of the substance I've recently posted here over at my pro-blog. One post I'd been compiling but hadn't yet posted over here is as follows:


In response to cereta's post "On rape and men" (which I previously posted about here), shewhohashope posted [on LJ and DW] "On rape culture and civilisation"

( Read more... )

Also: Anti-Oppression Linkspam Community

And as always, sparkymonster's links for clueless white people.