Posted my ballet comment, then went back and read the post and all the comments.
How inappropriate of me to not say something about Star Wars. Sorrryyyyyy. Here:
I want that t-shirt.
* also *
Top 10 sockpuppeteers:
2 [54 names] 'mindful webworker - what, me read?'
Really? #2? and second week in a row? Maet, have you modified the sockpuppet counting algorithm?
"Hello, my name is Mindful Webworker and I'm a sockpuppeting addict..."
Group: "Hello, Mindful!"
Good evening, overnighters!
Yesternight, I wasn't feeling up to attending the ballet, so Milady went without me. I could've caught the Dem debate, but I wanted something less gruesome, so I watched a Gotham.
But this afternoon, I did attend the Nutcracker.
Daughter takes the dance classes, but is not one of the "kids" anymore, and was not expecting to be part of the show this year. Then, she got cast as a rat, which is fun but not a major dancing role. Then she got put into a couple of other parts, including Snow. Yes, that's right, my daughter is a genuine earned-the-title Special Snowflake!
It's a relatively-small community show, so there were rough edges, but it was spectacular nonetheless, with excellent main guest artists as always, and choreography and direction by very talented professionals.
As I watched, I got to thinking, there's something in the Nutcracker for practically every flavor of the Complaining Class to get upset about.
For the self-defense haters, there's rifles, spears, and even a cannon!
For the PETA gripers, there's abuse of a bear, rats being shot, and mice being battled.
For the cultural segregationists, there's wanton and highly stereotyped cultural appropriation in Chinese, Arabic, and Russian.
For the Depopulation whiners, there's Mother Ginger with her troop of eight kids.
For the diet tyrants, there's lots of imbibing in the first part, and cakes, pies, candies, and other goodies in the second.
Also in the first act, for the social equalists, there's the whole bougoisee setting of the ritzy home.
For the genderlessness mongers, there's girls in frilly dresses playing with dolls, and rowdy, noisy boys teasing them. The girls are pretty and the men are muscular. (For the rest of us, there's legs and cleavage for guys, and taut muscular guy-butt for gals to enjoy!)
And for the anti-religious indignants, there's Christmas, and even angels.
Hard to believe this can be done in this day and age.
Oh, the outrage!
JTB: ...Urantia Book... will the paperback version hold up to use considering its size or should I look for a hardback version?
All my copies (in three languages) are hardbacks from the U Foundation, so I can't say about a paperback. The hardbacks have always been of excellent, durable quality.
I do recommend buying from the Foundation, even though they no longer have copyright and others publish it. It's also online at their site, urantia.org.
Be warned, falling asleep with the hefty hardback version on your chest can leave an impression. : )
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Which is my longwinded way of (re-)introducing my 2013 comic, "Journey to Bethlehem," illustrating the holy family, from packing for the taxman-forced trip until the Herod-induced flight into Egypt. Somewhat loosely derived from - I should perhaps say "inspired by" - the UB telling. I re-inserted a shepherd and made a few other tweaks, for illustrated-narrative purposes.
The comic was originally serialized in my "Daily Doodle" series and I got pressed for time. One thing I left out was the presentation of Jesus at the temple, where to Mary and Joseph's surprise, their newborn was praised in song. There is dark comic appeal in the spies of Herod hearing this, bringing back to the monstrous king some scraps of the song which they had heard, but failing to keep track of the holy family themselves. I imagine incomeptent minions getting the foul end of Herod's temper over that one.
Some of the comic may be a touch confusing if you don't know the UB version, or some intended-as-humorous bits might shock you if you are a Biblical absolutist, but I'd like to think it's mostly accessible and readable to all. And, I hope, reverently respectful.
The comic comes in two flavors. Full-size comic panels by themselves, all on a single page, or, a five-page reduced-size display interspersed with the UB's Birth and Infancy of Jesus text. Try the full-size.
That's my Christmas gift to the Book Thread readers. There are, ahem, PayPal donation buttons on the site. Don't know if they work, because nobody's ever used them. But they're there. (What kind of cheapskate hits for payment for a Christmas gift??) Comments may be left on the table of contents page.
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"You've got to read this book! It's the oneandonly true story of Jesus!" a relative exclaimed breathily, thrusting a Urantia Book at me a few years later. That was my introduction to the UB... but I eventually read it anyway.
About 1/3 of the UB's nearly 2100 pages is a purported revelation of Jesus's life and teachings, from incarnation through resurrection and ascension. Both his early ("lost") years and his pubic teaching are told in great detail, and from a behind-the-scenes ("angelic" narrator) perspective.
The UB's Jesus teaching does not entirely comport with the Gospels, in fact and detail - would we need a "revelation" if it was just a reiteration? - but I thought it was very much the same Jesus, in Spirit, I knew from the Gospels. Hoax or revelation, it's a good read.
After I read it, I looked for other such works. There are other "lost years" and "oneandonly true stories" of Jesus.
One I can remember reading was something called the Gospel According to Levi. I was unimpressed and never finished it. Did not seem at all to me like the Jesus I knew from the Gospels. Long decades ago, that's all I recall.
There were the Apocrypha, of course. Maybe some bits were valid, but very few bits that weren't also in the Gospels. Some fantastic tales that just don't ring true. Again, this is from long time ago memory. Reading them did leave me with great respect for the folks who decided to include only the synoptic gospels and John in the New Testament.
I liked the Gospel of Thomas. A collection of sayings and stories more than the narrative-like canonical gospels. Something like the Q gospel might've been? Didn't necessariy believe it that, when the Apostles complained about the Magdalene because she wasn't a man, Jesus said, well, then, we'll give her a man's soul. But it was amusing to me.
There's also A Course in Miracles which, while not a "true story of Jesus," does purport to speak in the Son's voice. I thought there were some things to be gleaned from the Course about how evil contends with good, but that Son's voice part annoyed me and I never finished. I found it rambling and repetitive. I'm a Course drop-out.
One thing I found weird was avid Course students who believed it really was Jesus talking, yet had never read the Gospels. How could you know if it was Jesus if you'd never read the only historical sources?
Worst thing that I read along these lines (sort-of) was Michael Moorcock's sci-fi time travel work, Behold the Man. I found it pointless, disgusting, and practically blasphemous. YMMV
I kept coming back to the UB. I should mention it encouraged me to better learn the OT scriptures, the basis for Jesus' teaching.
There are many aspects in the Urantia life of Jesus that intrigue me because the detail is so rich and the writing so well-done. Descriptions of place and time and culture - someone knew what they were talking about.
One small but fascinating "revelation" for me was in the birth of Jesus narrative. Mary delivered "with the help and kind ministrations of women fellow travelers." V8 forehead slap "duh!" So crowded the innkeeper was renting out the barn? They weren't all by themselves off in some pasture!
No shepherds heard singing and came by, though.
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Happy Jesus' birthday celebration week!
Over 150 comments? Time for my weekly wall o' text, then.
:/
I was raised in the heart of the Bible Belt, but in the sedate old-fash Episcopal church in which I was raised, we weren't Bible-heavy. Religion also wasn't touched on much at home, except for saying Grace at mealtime. Mom wanted us to attend church so we did. Dad didn't, except the Holidays.
Every week, the communion service included readings from the Gospels and the Epistles. The best part of the service for me (other than the end of it) were the readings from the Gospels. I loved Jesus from an early age, what I knew of him.
But readings from the Gospels don't really tell the story.
By mid-college years, I'd read and heard a lot of pro and con about Jesus, Christianity, and faith. Remember The Passover Plot? I knew the Christian teachings, but I didn't and don't necessarily buy into them all. But I wanted to know more about Jesus.
So, I first read the Gospels through for myself at 19. When I was done I had two peculiar thoughts: one, I understood at last what all the excitement was about for two thousand years, and, two, how come nobody ever told me about this? Heh.
The power of words: When I was finished, I was permanently persuaded that Jesus lived, that he said, and did, (most of) what he's reported therein to have done, including raising the dead and rising from the dead, and that he was, as he claimed, "Son of God." It's what they killed him for, after all.
Jesus I believed, but I've never been a Bible absolutist or Christian Fundamentalist. After reading the Gospels, I felt like I needed to know still more. I wondered if I ever would. Figured, probably not in this life.
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Bitter Clinger: Once you get beyond 25 years you're in fairy tale land.
Ooo, a hook for a poster I did a couple of years ago.
No One Expects the Future
http://bit.ly/no-one-expects-the-future
Bookshelves overflowing and hard drives jammed full. All I want for Christmas is more storage space, physical and virtual! Well, not all...
Like with the "cloud" and kindle-recall digital-book questions... I habitually download any videos. Infrequently, but occasionally, something will be disappeared from YooToob. Best to keep a personal copy.
Also, as I've mentioned before, better download than streaming because I can back up to re-watch a segment, or the whole thing, without the transmission bits "cost."
Relatedly...
Wish I could remember who posted three tips to quit helping the bad websites - one of them was, instead of linking to sites, screen-cap what you want to reference, and link to your screen-cap.
The latest five Prager U vids are good examinations of the differences between "left" and "right" views. Not exactly revelations to folks on AoSHQ, but well done. Dennis P himself on all of them.
How Do We Make Society Better?
How Do You Deal with Painful Truths?
How Do You Judge America?
Does It Feel Good or Does It Do Good?
How Big Should Government Be?
Also recommended,
Israel: The World's Most Moral Army
with Colonel Richard Kemp
Prager U videos list
https://www.youtube.com/user/PragerUniversity/videos
Laurie David's Cervix: Cancel the AMBER Alert. We found Grammy.
Amber's for children. You mean Silver alert. (At least that's what they use around hyar.)
*
AltonJackson: They should watch more cable TV...
Wow, you were fast with that one. I was gonna say it.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Friday warned Republican voters to steer clear of nominating Tea Party candidates who can't win in next year's general election.
"The way you have a good election year is to nominate people who can win," he told reporters during his final Capitol Hill press conference of 2015.
He urged Republican primary voters to avoid the mistakes of the past, mentioning several Tea Party candidates who went down in flames in recent Senate elections. ...
Alexander Bolton, The Hill
http://bit.ly/1mefWxJ
c/o Wm Jacobson, Legal Insurrection
http://bit.ly/1RxAnCR
Note the great strategy. Damn the Tea Party that gave us the Congressional majorities. Don't support, and even undermine, Constitution-supporting candidates, then blame them for not winning. Meanwhile, watch entire party go "down in flames."
VIA: Paul Ryan seems to have pissed off a rather large number of people.
Not just Ryan.
I'll say it again- of our seven Oklahoma "Republican" congressional reps & senators, only my congressman, Jim Bridenstein, voted "no" on the budget bloat bill. I yam disgustipated. This includes the vocal but useless Sen Inhoff and the newly-minted RINO Lankford.
Some of the other congresscritters offered the excuse "because it lifts a ban on exporting oil and provides funding for the military, among other measures."
http://bit.ly/1PeiiXp (Wash Times)
Wondering how the Republic of Texans voted.
"Hello Barbie," the world's first artificial intelligence-enabled Barbie doll, has become both the subject of delight for little girls and fear for some parents, worried their children's privacy could be at stake.
Breitbart
http://bit.ly/1Mp4V1S
Artificially intelligence-enabled Barbie doll? Whaaat?
And... isn't intelligent Barbie a contradiction in terms? Remember the pull-string version? "Math is haaard!"
chemjeff, "chaste" -don't think it's specifically what I was thinking of (if I was thinking of a specific word), but a good word for what I wanted. Thanks.
For something I was writing, I've been trying to think of a word. At least, I think there's a word. My agitated brain cells even think it starts with "c." Online thesauri have not been helpful. I've often found that once I put a question out there, the answer occurs to me. So, I thought I'd horde-source it. Ought to at least be good for a few laughs.
Exemplary, conservative moral rectitude, especially sexually. Celibacy when single, connubially faithful, "straight" as the twisted used to say.
11 down, twelve letters. (Just kidding on that part.)
Morning, Glories! Thanks for starting us up, Krak. Thanks for the report, Vic.
Says here it's 47° at the moment in NE OK, heading for almost 60 today, and around this range through Christmas. I don't mind. Not fond of cold.
* peeks in, looks around *
EEEK! YOW!
* passes out bunches of Snickers *
* runs for the exit *
The 12 Bans of Christmas
CampusReform
The singing is ... not that great.
The song is ... kinda lame.
But the "bans" are all real, and they note on which campuses.
If you want to go to just the last verse instead of going through the repetitions, use this link:
