07:30 GMT
Sorry for the light posting today. I went to get my hair cut (it had been three weeks, and my hair is far too long for comfort when it's been uncut for three weeks), and then went "Christmas" shopping with Gus and Jen. Christmas shopping is a bit entertaining for me at this stage of my life. Do you remember being a kid, and you got all excited for Christmas? You got two entire, glorious weeks off from school, and you got piles of gifts from all sorts of people.
To be honest with you, I've not been in a very "Christmas" place for the past few years. Once I found out that Christmas was actually a Roman Catholic bastardization of a preexisting Pagan holiday, and once I started recognizing that modern Christmas is both A) over-secularized and B) excessively capitalized, it lost most of its appeal.
I'm kind of schizophrenic in this way for a number of reasons. First, I tend to be contrary to some überfundamentalist Christians, in that I'm not against secular things; of course, if something starts religious, it should remain religious. I'm also a die hard free market capitalist; at the same time, someone who's truly following the guidance of the Bible will recognize that such direct association of a religious holiday with the unnecessary and non-productive accumulation and dissemination of wealth is at least somewhat sacreligious.
I encourage everyone out there, if at all possible, to give personal gifts this year, instead of just "something so-and-so would like" or "something cute I saw at a shop." I'm not trying to be one of those lunatics that encourages you to plant a tree for someone or sponsor a child in their honor; if you want to do those types of things, that's great, but that's really not a gift. Just please, please, make Christmas about more than giving stuff.
In other (mostly unrelated) news, I've been trying to consistently read scripture on a daily basis. The new U2 album was released about a month ago, and listening to it for the first time was sort of a spiritual experience for me. It reminded me that dedication is important in one's quest for holiness. Because this academic quarter has been sort of rough, I decided that, instead of trying to pick back up on Genesis and Acts, that I'd read the book of Job. I've been reading one chapter per day, but what I'm going to try to do is read that chapter once in the morning and once in the evening. If anything else develops, I may post about it.
Frequent readers (HA!) may also notice that I've been citing a few new sources fairly regularly in the last couple of days. As I've gotten back into the habit of checking the news on a daily basis, I've been slowly reminded of some of the sources I've wanted to check regularly. I'll try to continue citing a diverse array of sources, but if I see something good, I'll post it, even if I've already posted heavily from that source.
Anyway, I have to be at work in eleven hours, I need sleep, and I'd like to get some work done on the paper (or something else, who knows) before I leave for work, so I'm off to bed. If you've read this and find my life and opinions fascinating... I appreciate it, but maybe you should invest in a copy of The Histories by Herodotus? You can't go wrong with a book about the Persian Wars and various Hellenic and Ancient Near Eastern history.
Cheers, mates.
To be honest with you, I've not been in a very "Christmas" place for the past few years. Once I found out that Christmas was actually a Roman Catholic bastardization of a preexisting Pagan holiday, and once I started recognizing that modern Christmas is both A) over-secularized and B) excessively capitalized, it lost most of its appeal.
I'm kind of schizophrenic in this way for a number of reasons. First, I tend to be contrary to some überfundamentalist Christians, in that I'm not against secular things; of course, if something starts religious, it should remain religious. I'm also a die hard free market capitalist; at the same time, someone who's truly following the guidance of the Bible will recognize that such direct association of a religious holiday with the unnecessary and non-productive accumulation and dissemination of wealth is at least somewhat sacreligious.
I encourage everyone out there, if at all possible, to give personal gifts this year, instead of just "something so-and-so would like" or "something cute I saw at a shop." I'm not trying to be one of those lunatics that encourages you to plant a tree for someone or sponsor a child in their honor; if you want to do those types of things, that's great, but that's really not a gift. Just please, please, make Christmas about more than giving stuff.
In other (mostly unrelated) news, I've been trying to consistently read scripture on a daily basis. The new U2 album was released about a month ago, and listening to it for the first time was sort of a spiritual experience for me. It reminded me that dedication is important in one's quest for holiness. Because this academic quarter has been sort of rough, I decided that, instead of trying to pick back up on Genesis and Acts, that I'd read the book of Job. I've been reading one chapter per day, but what I'm going to try to do is read that chapter once in the morning and once in the evening. If anything else develops, I may post about it.
Frequent readers (HA!) may also notice that I've been citing a few new sources fairly regularly in the last couple of days. As I've gotten back into the habit of checking the news on a daily basis, I've been slowly reminded of some of the sources I've wanted to check regularly. I'll try to continue citing a diverse array of sources, but if I see something good, I'll post it, even if I've already posted heavily from that source.
Anyway, I have to be at work in eleven hours, I need sleep, and I'd like to get some work done on the paper (or something else, who knows) before I leave for work, so I'm off to bed. If you've read this and find my life and opinions fascinating... I appreciate it, but maybe you should invest in a copy of The Histories by Herodotus? You can't go wrong with a book about the Persian Wars and various Hellenic and Ancient Near Eastern history.
Cheers, mates.
1 Comments:
Hey Gav, I just want you to know, in case you're waiting for a reply to this, that I saw that you'd commented yesterday, but I haven't had a chance to go check the links. I'll check them out tomorrow at work and maybe post on them if appropriate.
In case you're on Pacific, Mountain, Alaskan, or Hawaiian time (or Guam!), and you read this within the next hour or two, happy Christmas mate!
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