thinktoomuch.net

(UPDATE: in an email conversation, H J and I have made amends, apologising to one another for getting riled up. This post hopes to encourage readers and commenters to avoid getting tangled up in such mutual-riling-uppings in the future. Understand how it happens, seek to avoid it.)
On Monday, an ordained minister and author commenting under [...]

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Four weeks ago I shared a YouTube clip of John Dominic Crossan. Today, a clip by the other author of the book I’m busy reading (for months): Marcus J. Borg:

For now, I’ll let this clip speak for itself. We should return to this topic a couple of posts hence.

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(NB: As a part of this post, you must also read the comments by Hennie below. )
In a conversation a couple of weeks ago with someone that has spent some time living in Indonesia, I learned that Bali has a much lower crime rate than the rest of Indonesia. The explanation* she offered for [...]

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Back in February, this humanist introduced me to Family Man, a graphic novel (aka comic) by Dylan Meconis. I’m not exactly sure how to sell this, but I’ve known for many moons that I will eventually try - it was just a question of when. Let’s give it a shot:
It’s brilliant!
There, that should do it. [...]

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[Wrote first draft in Heathrow. One editing pass and the addition of the explanation of how one could perform a double-blind study, was done from my "fully furnished" temporary flat -- furnishings include Wi-Fi, yay!]
In a post two months ago, I decided to poetically end the post on a little climax, to leave a lingering [...]

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The first couple of the Ten Commandments (numbering is non-trivial, traditions differ):
You shall have no other gods before me.
You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.
You shall not bow down to them or worship them
(From Deuteronomy 5, [...]

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In the wake of The Dark Knight, I thought I’d share a few posts I thought worthwhile. The posts do contain some spoilers, but if you still haven’t seen the movie, um, that’s your loss.
John Wilkins from Evolving Thought writes in The Dark Knight about dualities, order and chaos and Zoroastrian metaphysics (with [...]

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As those following the comments may know, I was still wondering whether I should forward the Abusing the Story of Job post to my family or not. And so I continue wondering. If I do send it, I would include a cover letter that goes something like this:
Dear Family,
With some hesitance, I attach a piece [...]

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Nope, I didn’t interview him. I wish.
Pieter sent me a link to a wonderful interview with Pete Rollins, partly discussing his recent book The Fidelity of Betrayal (amazon, kalahari). The interview gives some good perspective on what Pete is on about, and the kind of thing that makes me excited about… well… Christianity, though [...]

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To finishing this particular blog arc on “God”, I thought we’d take a look at the God(dess) of Deacon Duncan from Evangelical Realism. His patron deity is “Reality”, which he names with what he says is the Greek word for reality: “Alethea”. A baby names website defines Alethea as follows:
The girl’s name Alethea \a-le-thea\ is [...]

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