wyclif.net

• The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust’s Personal Assistant : McSweeney’s
  (tags: music humour)
• A Ministry in the Cold, With a Gospel of Propane - New York Times
  (tags: christian demographics people)
• Stars of the Galactic Center: APOD
  (tags: astronomy photo space)
• Europe’s Old Churches Turn Into Bars, Eateries : MSNBC.com
  (tags: architecture christian church culture)
• m-ch: micro compact home
  (tags: architecture design environment)

• Mont Saint-Michel Abbey photos : Dark Roasted Blend
  (tags: photo church travel history)

I just realised I’ve never posted a YouTube video on this blog. So I might as well be meta the first time.

James Landale of the BBC is a descendant of a gentleman involved in the last known fatal duel on Scottish soil. He recently took time off to complete research on the event, as well as the history of the duel from the 15th to the 20th centuries:

When Europe’s medieval aristocrats were shorn of their private armies by increasingly powerful monarchs, they retained the right to resolve disputes of honour in private combat. They drew on the judicial tradition of trial by combat and the sporting tradition of knightly jousting to create the modern European duel. What began with swords by the early 19th Century ended with pistols.

By the 1770s gun makers in Europe were producing matched and boxed sets of firearms specifically for the duel, to ensure that the weapons were of equivalent quality. Rather than a frequently-misunderstood demand for blood, the duel was actually a demand for satisfaction for a real or perceived slight to a gentleman’s honour. This demand was made by a codified gesture of insult, usually the toss of a glove at the feet of the offender (throwing down the gauntlet), and a tradition carried forward from the old world.

Here in America, the “duel of all duels” was of course the Hamilton/Burr affair which resulted in death for Hamilton and disgrace rather than triumph for Burr. The irony of David Landale’s survival–he had never before fired a shot whereas his opponent was an ex-soldier–was that it never truly vindicated his abused honour. He became a hunted man. Such is the nature of blood vengeance!

Sorry about the lack of updates here, but I’ve had to be at two family funerals in the past week, as well as dealing with lawyers regarding estate closure. I’ve managed to live this long without resort to the legal profession, and I kind of wanted to extend that streak, but it’s broken now. Also, I’ve discovered that interacting with attorneys in the most rudimentary manner–just talking–absorbs an extraordinary amount of time. Not to mention money.

“It is the trade of lawyers to question everything, yield nothing, and to talk by the hour.” –Thomas Jefferson

There are a number of items in the recent news that demand comment. I’ll rectify matters shortly. Thanks for sticking around.

• flickr machine tags
  (tags: flickr photo tags)
• Biblical Greek Sites | National Biblical Greek Exam
  (tags: greek bible education lang tutorials)

StatGuy has a report on the attack of an Anglican Cathedral by Sudanese police. Of course, tear-gassing and beating parishoners during a service was all done in the name of ‘apprehending a criminal’, but the police report, comments, and information provided to the Canon of the Cathedral don’t add up.

I encourage you to read it all, including the linkage at Magic Statistics.

Jamie Smith conveys the current state of affairs succinctly:

Within the matrix of a modern Christianity, the base “ingredient” is the individual; the church, then, is simply a collection of individuals. Conceiving of Christian faith as a private affair between the individual and God–a matter of my asking Jesus to “come into my heart”–modern evangelicalism finds it hard to articulate just how or why the church has any role to play other than providing a place to fellowship with other individuals who have a private relationship with God.

This is at least part of what Francis Schaeffer designated The Great Evangelical Disaster.

With this model in place, what matters is Christianity as a system of truth or ideas, not the church as a living community embodying its head. Modern Christianity tends to think of the church either as a place where individuals come to find answers to their questions or as one more stop where individuals can try to satisfy their consumerist desires. As such, Christianity becomes intellectualized rather than incarnate, commodified rather than the site of genuine community.

–James K. A. Smith, Who’s Afraid of Postmodernism?

Evangelicalism as a commodity has resulted in a people burnt out on Christian bookstore theology. While the Emerging Church makes furtive attempts at experimental ways of “being church” in community, what I’d really like to see them concentrate on, like Smith, is an articulated ecclesiology. “Being a local community of people on a journey” seems to me a poor substitute for a vigorous parish witness and ministry, but rather than bash the Emergents (as Reformed folk are wont to do), I’d prefer to remain hopeful that something with definite ties to ancient and catholic sacramental practise will be forthcoming soon–even if it doesn’t look like what we have come to associate with traditional catholicity and its trappings.

I appreciate it when theological colleges and seminaries put exams and other materials online for the edification of the outside world. Maybe part of the appeal is the ‘fly on the wall’ factor of getting an inside glimpse of the quality of instruction going on at the school in question.

Dr. David Field, an authority on the Puritans, did just such a thing today. I highly recommend his blog. Take the exam, armchair theologian, and see how well you can do with just the permitted exam materials!

Eschatology Exam at Oak Hill College, London

• World GDP Density Map Per Square Kilometer: Econbrowser
  Visual distribution of world income
  (tags: economics geography history land maps)