What I saw in the American Conservative

An essay on Belloc and Obama in the American Conservative. Yes, I decided to subscribe.

A Brief History of Tuesday or Wednesday until now, and general pictures

About to head to bed. Summer starts sometime this week, but for me this week has been the most summerish week yet this year. I got two new books at Reston Used Books on Tuesday (or Wednesday): John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces and Essential McLuhan. I read McLuhan's whole interview with Playboy, which is contained in Essential McLuhan, the day I purchased it (it's quite a long interview for a magazine, especially one that I had considered to a put a stronger emphasis on images than the written word...), but I digress. It was a fascinating interview, and a couple points at the end cleared up some things I had wondered about.

Also, while in Reston I had the best coffee I've had in a while, purchased at a nondescript coffee shop in Lake Anne. I thought the cost a bit high at first, but I was given a hefty French press and empty cup for the price, which ended up filling the cup a little more than twice. Also, a dog slept inside the store, on a mat, which furthered my pleasure.

Saturday night was the first grill-out of 2010. It was had at Johan's townhome in the exurbs of Gainesville, Virginia. It went from roughly 4 p.m. to 12:30 p.m. While it was mostly held indoors, it still contained almost every ideal that can be asked for in a barbecue: Good company, great portions of meat, drink, and a rapid turn toward political philosophy late into the night, including such topics as the tea party, Israel, "socialism", et cetera. It was a good time, and it never got too heated and was generally enjoyable.

There are a couple other things worth mentioning, but I need to go to bed. Peace out..

An evening with Os Guinness at the Falls Church, or an evangelical critique of evangelicalism

Haven't written anything in here as of late because of the beautiful weather these last few days, being out of town and catching up with errands, etc. A few brief updates:

I rode my bike a good distance on Friday, going from Falls Church to Shirlington to National Airport to Union Station. I found a new and better path to Capitol City Brewery Shirlington, which, in my travels, is as significant as discovering the Northwest Passage.

I got a haircut.

I ate Chipotle with a homeless person who wanted to shine my shoes for money.

I had Palo Santo and Raging Bitch beers on cask, in specialty glassware, glassware that I got to keep with the purchase of the beers.

I had a couple good dinners with friends outside in great springesque weather

And today: Work, SuperChicken, Os Guinness.

I went straight to SuperChicken after work to have my usual: quarter chicken, beans, rice. I went all out and got a Mexican pineapple soda, which, as advertised, has real sugar, not corn syrup. I'm also amused by the fact that Mexico, a big corn producer in its own right, and a poorer country, nonetheless has higher quality and more natural sweeteners. Perhaps they are just more pre-modern.

I'm not going to write a whole bunch of what Guinness said tonight, number one because I'm not good at instantly digesting and representing such events, and because I've been listening to talk and typing since 9:30 this morning and need a break.

Os Guinness spoke about the crises in the Western Church. He spent a lot of time talking about modernity and globalization, as well as a lot of the usual stuff I've heard on Islam and secularism, though I will say he was refreshingly critical of the amount of nonsense within evangelicalism. He criticized a recent apologetics event he'd attended, saying their whole concern was with beating "the other" and winning arguments, and not caring a great deal for the souls with whom they're arguing. (Though I didn't think it as eloquently, this was the impression I got when I heard Alister McGrath (an Anglican) debate Christopher Hitchens.) Michael Cromartie of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, who moderated the event, told me he had been disappointed with McGrath's performance, and I told him, when I was sharing a cab with him, that I thought McGrath was thinking more than about just about winning the debate. Perhaps I'm being too charitable and McGrath wasn't as good as I think, but I get a better feeling from him than, say, Dinesh D'Souza, who dated Ann Coulter at one time.

Guinness told more than a few good, dry jokes -- jokes that I couldn't do justice to here by typing them. Two of the jokes referenced his Guinness beer heritage, and one joke was actually a true story that incorporated Guinness -- the family and the stout -- St. Patrick's Cathedral and scripture. Needless to say, it was a good joke.

Since I don't have the will, strength or mind to write any of the substantial points Guinness made tonight, I'll just mention that I was pretty impressed with him. He criticism was evenhanded, noting nonsense where he found it but never overdoing it, and always saying our greatest concern should be with ourselves and not others. And he made a few good criticisms of the church growth movement, designed by Dr. Elmer Towns, M.A., Th.M., MRE, D.Min, as well as a few other heresies of the Religious Right.

Certain questions raised by the audience were asked by those who had not understood what he was saying, and obviously already had preconceived notions (who has those?), like "Why should we not be concerned about militant Islam at all?" But the majority of questions were thoughtful.

That's all for tonight. I'll be in Lynchburg this weekend, and it's looking to be a hot one, so I'm hoping to do some evening events with anyone in town. Holla at me.

Chesterton Tuesdays

From Orthodoxy:

"Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase,
it might be true that the sun rises regularly because he never gets
tired of rising. His routine might be due, not to a lifelessness,
but to a rush of life. The thing I mean can be seen, for instance,
in children, when they find some game or joke that they specially enjoy.
A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence,
of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they
are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated
and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again"; and the grown-up
person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people
are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is
strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says
every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening,
"Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that
makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately,
but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the
eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old,
and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may
not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical ENCORE. Heaven may
ENCORE the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and
brings forth a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat,
or a griffin, the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal
fate without life or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy
has touched the gods, that they admire it from their starry galleries,
and that at the end of every human drama man is called again and
again before the curtain. Repetition may go on for millions of years,
by mere choice, and at any instant it may stop. Man may stand on
the earth generation after generation, and yet each birth be his
positively last appearance."