From mocking him, to being intrigued as I learned more about his personal life (including his visit to the Monastery of Christ in the Desert, where I spent some time before my ordination), to a borderline fascination with the man, I am now listening to Matthew McConaughey narrate his autobiography. A real treat so far.
Three quick thoughts as I approach two months without a smart phone.
- I don't need a smartphone.
- Very few day-to-day companies on the planet believe #1 is true.
- I sometimes don't believe #1 is true.
From confused phone carriers to pick-up orders to Amazon needing to verify that I am actually me when I login on my computer, the modern world is built around the notion that every customer owns a smart-phone with email and browser access, alongside the instant ability to download an app. This was likely true before the pandemic, but is increasingly noticeable now.
The basic temptation in the Garden of Eden boils down to this:
Take, eat. This food is your path towards independence from your Creator. Towards reliance on yourself alone. In this bite lies the ability to define your own world. To reorder the universe around your own desires.
Whereas refusing to read these authors and learn about their worlds — or to do so merely in order to melt them down in the moral acids of our own unexamined certainties — is to close ourselves off both from our own past and from the possibility of living a fully self-aware life in the present.
That there are people in our time who see little value in the study of the classics is hardly surprising. There have always been those who care little for learning, or who value it only for its usefulness in advancing practical projects. But that such a crude form of philistinism has begun to gain a foothold in the very institutions tasked with preserving and passing on our classical inheritance is troubling. It's a sign that present-day political concerns and obsessions have begun to intrude on and badly distort the work of the university.
Damon Linker, Cancel the Classics?
Catholicism is a very tangible business—it's about seeing and hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling as much as it's about texts and arguments and ideas.
George Weigel, Letters to a Young Catholic
Christians have apparently been praying for AD 2020 for quite some time…
From The Great Litany, which will open our Advent services tomorrow.
introducing istherepublicstillintact.com
(This was an oddly theraputic way to spend thirty minutes.)
Someone needs to purchase istherepublicstillintact.com and update with a simple “Yes" or “No" so that we can all get on with our lives this week.
Is there an indiweb/open alternative to Strava, etc.? I also use Smashrun, but would love a site that visualizes all of my data, not just runs.
Spent most of the past month working through potential return-to-school guidelines. This just about sums up the experience thus far.
From Aesop’s Fables for Children.
From a sermon preached in 2007 by Archbishop Rowan Williams.
Re-reading Watership Down with a group if incoming high school freshmen this summer has been a real treat. Never thought I would say that about a book about bunnies…
Today’s (road trip + birthday) breakfast. Austin has its fair share of great brisket, and Valentina’s is up there.
All work email is officially blocked on all devices for the next eight days. One of the few true breaks from work in the year. Looking forward to it … especially after the withdrawal dissipates.
Ready for another season of (mostly) news-free online life.
Freedom is now setup to perpetually block all news sites other than one local site and the Economist. A few of my favorite columnist are available via RSS.
It is called saving, and, when possible, it is among the most tangible ways you can set yourself up to love your neighbor in times of crisis.
top education officials detail plans to open public schools for in-person classes this fall.
By “detail plans” they actually mean “force individual Texas schools to become experts in epidemiology and take the fall if what they come up with leads to a massive outbreak.”
But a deeper question lurks beneath this debate: are these services making you a better or worse version of yourself?
On social media and character, by Cal Newport.
A freeing principle to adopt in the social media world:
Having a reason to maintain presence on a particular social media platform does not mean that you should maintain a presence on a particular social media platform.
Everyone has reasons to stay; not everyone should.