Wednesday 16 August 2017

DDD (Doodlings Deficit Disorder)

Gadzooks! It’s the 4th of July,
when we boast we’re the gens Domini,
and with napalm and nukes
and a “Put up your dukes!”
we give thanks to the Lord of the Flies.

Thank God for small mercies. Large, and even medium, are out of stock.

The natural state of the human is the inhuman. Even to begin to become human takes time and practice – lots and lots of practice.

How do you begin to change the world for the better? By having no such ambition whatsoever.

Looking for a church? Narrow the field: check if it has a Mission Statement.

I’ve just read Rod Dreher’s book The Benedict Option. It’s not bad for a first draft.

Write, write, write! You don’t need readers to write. Readers, however, do need writers to read.

Not long ago the “church in exile” was a heuristic with potential for exploring post-Christian ecclesiology. Alas, ignoring the critical element of judgment in Israel’s self-understanding of Babylonian captivity, contemporary Christians have reacted to their loss of status and privilege with bitter resentment and whinging self-pity. [Muffled sound of Jeremiah rolling in his grave.]

Don’t worry if your prayers are interrupted by dreams. It is sufficient that your dreams are interrupted by prayers.

My dear pastor, what if your congregation agrees with everything you say? Then you’re not doing it right.

I hear that progressive Christians are having a heated conversation about whether the Creeds should contain a trigger warning for left-handed people.

“Let you word be ‘Yes, Yes’, or ‘No, No’, or ‘It all depends, It all depends’; anything more than this comes from the evil one” (Matthew 5:37: Jesus, on second thought).

“Sincerity”, “transparency”, “accountability” – bullshit! What are you hiding?

People who are anyone-phobic usually know fuck-all about the anyone.

Why do I love Wittgenstein? Because of the audacity with which he dives headlong into the chaotic depths of mind and soul, the tenacity with which he excavates nuggets of incandescent clarity, and the posture at once humble, disconsolate, and serene with which he bows to the intractably unsayable.

“Every cloud has a silver lining”, an adage that goes back to gloomy Milton’s Comus: “Was I deceiv'd, or did a sable cloud / Turn forth her silver lining on the night?” [ll. 221-222]. The short answer, Comus, is Yes: clouds are sable all the way down.

“Trump” is a good name for a dog. Wherever the President goes, he barks, licks his balls, and pees on the fire hydrants, right?

Who said, “We’re all in this together”? Was it (a) Emperor Nero (to a visiting delegation of Christians at the Colosseum in July 64); (b) the Commander of Abu Ghraib (at a summer fête for the residents in August 2004); (c) David Cameron (to the people of austerity Britain at the Tory Party Conference in October 2009)? Prize: a “May Contain Traces of Bullshit” tee shirt (compliments of Ben Myers).

You gotta hand it to austerity governments for their environmental friendliness: I mean the conscientious way they recycle the red tape they cut from business and industry by sticking it on the forms filled in by desperate benefit claimants.

It is, of course, good to have an interrogative mind. But asking questions is useless if, as often, you don’t really want to know the answers.

Life’s a kitsch. Then you buy.

The name “Starbucks” is a despicable aspersion on the virtuous first mate of the Pequod. Surely the coffee company should be called “Ahabs”: after all, like the ship’s captain, its product is evil.

How about a name for a nursing home that is neither saccharine nor non-descriptive but tells it like it is? For example: The Baby Powder and Urine, The Children’s Revenge, The Not-on-My Bucket List, or (for the more literary), The One Hundred Years of Hebetude, The Unbearable Nightness of Being, The Hamlet Shuffle.

“Any change?” the cadger asked my wife. “The Change?” she replied (her hearing isn’t so good now). “Been there years ago. Now I’ve got The Decay.”

Young, you sing and dance the songs of passion; older, you whistle the tunes and tap your feet.

2 Comments:

Alan K said...

Diolch

Bruce Hamill said...

David Cameron

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