Open Blogging
It’s the time when we get all the “best of” lists for the year past.
I’m not much help with these as I don’t watch movies, read fiction, or listen to many songs recorded after the turn of the century.
I do read books, but that’s becoming similar to those who still use 8 track tapes.
I have wasted precious hours watching “sovereign citizen” videos on YouTube…there is something reassuring about seeing delusions shattered in real time.
Anyway…I digress.
If you want to share what you think was special about this year, here’s the space.
I may do one for books later…
Easily the best message and video I watched in 2025 was Paul Kingsnorth’s 2024 Erasmus Lecture, titled “Against Christian Civilization”. I copied link just after a 7-minute introduction:
https://www.youtube.com/live/Y3hMSZqatHI?si=QnZTF62ui6U3xw6V&t=420
Terry,
Thanks for that…he’s an interesting man. I’ll give it a listen.
My best of is how , despite all the crazy stuff in the news about ICE and immigration, the Spanish congregation has been able to hold together and even grow! People are bringing their friends/family and they are finding hope in the gospel. Prayers continue for an end to the raids, but the real hope is in Jesus, even if the worst happens.
God also confirms for me I’m in the right space. Last week one of “my” kids got his confirmation letter with a full scholarship to an excellent, private 4-year college. Everything I ever suggested to his cleaning mother mom for her extraordinary gifted child was followed up on. He loves Jesus and is a standout student and athlete at his school. He also lovingly helps his grandmother around the church as her dementia continues to advance. It’s just one story, but I think the ripple effect from this young man’s life will be significant.
An excellent and moving novel I read this year (though it was first published a few years ago) was “Lincoln in the Bardo”, by George Saunders. Saunders’ is a highly fictionalized, in certain respects fantastical, yet very sobering, story dealing with President Lincoln’s struggle to come to terms with the death of his young son Willie (likely from typhoid fever) in the midst of the Civil War. It takes place in D.C. and its environs, particularly in the cemetery where Willie’s body is entombed in a mausoleum, and his soul is stuck, along with many other spirits interred there, between incarnations. We meet these spirits, many of them, and learn something about what keeps each trapped in between lives, in what Buddhism calls the bardo, a place of transition. What keeps Willie stuck is the love of his father, who, after Willie’s death, goes into the mausoleum where he cradles the body of his son and grieves — an incident that is attested to by historical evidence — and promises to return again soon. Both Lincolns are trapped: Willie between lives; and his father in a grief which makes him question his ability to be leader of the nation and of the war effort, to send other parents’ sons to their death on the battlefield. The novel unfolds around that drama of struggling with grief and continuing with the ambiguities of life’s duties. Saunders’ novel is worthy read.
Linn,
I really enjoy hearing what’s going on in your congregation. The Lord is surely using you there!
What you’re sharing is very encouraging to read!
@ Linn,
Sounds like you guys are doing a good job of protecting brown people from Trump’s ICE patrols.
Today the U.S. — Trump and his people and the military using our tax dollars — has “seized” an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela. Trump says he intends to keep the oil. He has turned this country into a pirate state. He is also threatening the president of Colombia: “He’s going to be next.” The words of a mafia thug. We now live in a mafia state, and a pirate state. We are no better than Somali pirates.
He is a lawless man…an evil man.
As evidenced by his pardons of real drug smugglers…he cares for nothing but his own ego.
And I’m the bad guy for pointing it out…
We Americans should ask ourselves how we gave birth to such a monster, and what were the antecedents to his appearance. He is an evil man, but he is only possible because of a pedigree of evil in America.
Notice that Trump and his people didn’t blow up the oil tanker killing everyone aboard, as they did the so-called drug boats — that’s because they value oil more than human life.
This has never been about drugs; it’s always been about the vast oil reserves of Venezuela.