MENU

Author

On May 6, 2014 By In Scribblings

The Power to Save of Christian Repairmen & Water Vendors

The National Journal has a post about the effect on the ground of Texas’ 2013 anti-abortion laws. (“Anti-abortion” in that they have to be licensed and inspected the way medical clinics have to be.) Abortion clinics are closing left and right. And it’s not necessarily because of the judiciary. It’s because of the people of Texas. Here are some quotes from the article.

“I can’t find anyone to deliver water or resurface the parking lot, because they’re against abortion. I can’t get someone to fix a leak in the roof,” said Amy Hagstrom Miller, CEO of Whole Women’s Health.

Hagstrom Miller also said it has been impossible to find hospitals that will agree to give admitting privileges to abortion providers, or ambulatory surgical centers that will sell or lease their facilities. Leasing or buying the space itself is expensive and difficult, and Hagstrom Miller currently has mortgages on three buildings, which she will have to sell. She purchased those under a different name, and did construction without associating them with Whole Woman’s Health out of concern that she wouldn’t get permitting or might attract protests.

This is lest ye doubt your power, o Christian businessman, to save. Don’t falsely separate “business” and “religion”. A child’s life might depend on it.<>ценынапродвижение ов

Read more

On May 5, 2014 By In Culture, Family and Children

We Told Everyone Gay Marriage Is Perfectly Okay

Remember Gene Robinson? Only a few years ago, he scandalized many by becoming the first openly homosexual Episcopal bishop, and then by marrying his partner.

Welp. Now he’s getting divorced. You can read about it here. He’s sixty-six years old, but apparently the acrimony is too great to continue with the 25-year relationship. Although he wouldn’t say so.

Here’s what he did have to say:

“As you can imagine, this is a difficult time for us — not a decision entered into lightly or without much counseling,” Robinson wrote in a letter. “We ask for your prayers, that the love and care for each other that has characterized our relationship for a quarter century will continue in the difficult days ahead.”

“It is at least a small comfort to me, as a gay rights and marriage equality advocate, to know that like any marriage, gay and lesbian couples are subject to the same complications and hardships that afflict marriages between heterosexual couples.”

Mr. Robinson continued in this vein of acting like a responsible adult. As we all know, in this day and age we’re all French: we pretend to be blase about our lover’s lover and about our bitter divorce. It’s grown-up to be cool about divorce. Be cool, Gene.

“My belief in marriage is undiminished by the reality of divorcing someone I have loved for a very long time, and will continue to love even as we separate,” Robinson wrote in his column. “Love can endure, even if a marriage cannot.”

Love can endure, even if a marriage cannot. Right. I keep forgetting that love is a feeling, not an action.

It’s not like divorce could by definition mean someone’s not loving someone. That’d be ridiculous.

But that’s not the point here anyway. The reason I’m sharing this is to say that Mr. Robinson is right. Just like any marriage, gay and lesbian couples are subjected to the same complications and hardships that afflict marriages between heterosexual couples.

This is not Mr. Robinson’s first divorce. He divorced his wife in 1986. He did so “amicably”, for no other reason than that he could no longer be married. And that was fine. He divorced for no sound biblical reason, and was not defrocked.

Remember when you and I told the homosexual community that marriage was sacred? And then we went and got divorced like everyone else did? That’s what made this okay. We declared marriage profane well before anyone started trying to say that marriage could be something besides what it obviously is.

One thing marriage obviously isn’t is unholy. Or convenient. Or bitter. Or selfish. Or temporary.

Once we said it was those things, we were the ones who changed the definition of marriage.

Originally published at Joffre The Giant.<>seo оптимизация веб а

Read more

On April 29, 2014 By In Books, Culture

Men Without Balls: The Difference Between Elves & Spacers

caves of steel

The Caves of Steel trilogy, or the Robot series, by Isaac Asimov was one of my favorite works as a child. In fact, thanks to my mother, Isaac Asimov was one of my favorite authors as a child; I say that even though I hated Foundation. I loved Galactic Empire, and the Black Widower stories, and The Gods Themselves. I believe my introduction to him was my mother’s copy of The Stars, Like Dust, a title which caught me with its beauty and punctuation at age nine.

I will tell you the three things that impressed me most about the Robot series, in which a human and android detective combine to solve murders while awesomely revealing and expounding to the reader sci-fi tropes of far-reaching societal consequence. (bam!) The first was the dark, warm, and hardly understood feels evoked by the romantic tension between Lije Bailey and Gladia in The Naked Sun, the second was the exploration of Earth public restroom etiquette in Caves of Steel (men never ever ever spoke to each other), and the third was the deleterious effect of the incredibly long lives of the Spacers on them individually and on their society.

Spacers, who were descended from the best Earth had to offer, and had departed purged of all disease, ruled every part of the galaxy they had explored. And they did not permit the short-lived and disease-ridden Earth-dwellers to leave their planet and pollute the cosmos. They lived for 300 or more years, feared death, lacked initiative, moved slowly, and craved safety.

Recall that the largest literary loom that loomed in my childhood was The Lord of the Rings. In that tapestry, the immortal elves were doomed to leave the world to men. They were the first children, and lived forever, but knew that the second children, doomed to die, had a fate beyond death that brought them closer to the Creator (although that is only explicitly stated in The Silmarillion, which I read years later). There is undoubtedly a bittersweetness to the elves’ immortality, but that never robbed them of this: they blessed their world. The elves were crafters and gardeners and musicians and smiths and architects and poets. They made beauty appear everywhere they went.

I loved Lije Baley and R. Daneel Olivaw so much as a kid. I’m telling you, I read his adventures over and over again. But I knew, even as a child, what the difference between the worlds of Asimov and Tolkien were. There was no God in Asimov, and there was in Tolkien.

“If you were to die now,” says Hans Fastolfe the Spacer to Lije Baley the Earther, “you would lose perhaps forty years of your life, probably less. If I were to die, I would lose a hundred fifty years, probably more.” Spacers fear death, and the murder in their midst is too terrifying for them to contemplate.

Meanwhile, from the Wars of Beleriand to the dawning of the Age of Men, the elves, a noble race but not without their moral failings, not only continue to make beautiful things, but continue to lay down their lives for their world and for Men.

What’s the difference between elves and Spacers? I’ll tell you.

Elves know where they go when they die. They go to be in the light of Ilúvatar, who is a Christ-figure. In fact, they don’t have to die to go there; they can sail there if they wish, though Men may not. The ones who stay love Creation, and will die for it, knowing what their blessed fate is.

C. S. Lewis feared that without the God of Christ we would become “men without chests”. I believe we have become such men. But there is another organ missing. We don’t live to 350 and own 10,000 robots, but we do live to 90 and own 3 robots. That apparently is enough.

We are the men without balls.

Originally published at Joffre the Giant.<>реклама на легковых автомобиляхпрайсы на контекстную рекламу

Read more

On February 26, 2014 By In Culture, Family and Children

5 Perfect Pairings For Girl Scout Cookies

 

Beer & Brewing recently posted to their blog several contributors’ ideas for pairing beers with Girl Scout cookies. Inspired by that, I decided to combine the cookies with not only beers, but cocktails as well.

I proudly present 5 Perfect Pairings For Girl Scout Cookies:


Dulce de Leche with a rich “Irish” chai tea latte. Start off by pairing this sweet cookie treat stuffed with milk-caramel chips with a smooth and rich chai tea latte, preferably made with half-and-half or cream. Be sure to add a little tot of rum to your chai to complete the experience. The richness and fat of the hot cream will pair very well with $700 million annually, while the crumbliness of the cookie will remind us that the Girl Scouts don’t actually do much except perpetuate themselves with that money. Which leads to…

Thank You Berry Munch and Blue Moon Belgian White. This combination is in honor of the “rustic camps” once enjoyed by the girl scouts. The cranberries in the cookies serve as a nod to the Girl Scout tradition of being out in the wilderness. The cookies’ white chocolate reminds us that white chocolate isn’t really chocolate at all, just as Girl Scouts aren’t really scouts at all. Their rustic camps are shutting down all over the country, since they’re not being used enough. The Girl Scouts say it’s because they don’t have enough money, while the actual girl scouts say it’s because all the safety regulations and prohibitions make the rustic camps dumb. If your girl ever does go camping, crack open a beer, because that’s about how often she’ll go: once in a Blue Moon.

Savannah Smiles and an Old Fashioned. Preferably hold the simple syrup on the cocktail. What better way to celebrate the Girl Scouts foundation emerging from the sleazy and grubby divorce/adultery/live-in-mistress/alcoholism mess that was founder Juliette Gordon Low’s marriage? Take a little lemon bitterness and coat it in confectioner’s sugar, et voilà, you have a feminist movement founded to get back at men. Wash down the sugar-coated bitter pill with a good Old Fashioned, extra bitter, if you like; this will remind you both that old fashioned beginnings matter, and of feminism’s requirement that its adherents never be content. Which leads us to…

Thin Mints and a Chocolate Martini. There are two choices here. One would be to pair a minty drink with these iconic chocolate-covered mint cookies. But that would be a little too lively to represent an organization whose membership has thinned from three to two million over the last ten years. Delightfully addicting chocolate serves to remind us that the only reason the Girl Scouts are still relevant is that you keep buying their stupid cookies. The thin in Thin Mint also tastes wonderfully of girls who are taught to not be happy with how they were made to be, either in soul or body.

Finally, we have an absolutely delightful combination that I know you will love, with a combination of flavors that you will immediately recognize as inspired.

Samoas with a Bloody Mary. Samoas are the famous caramel- and coconut-covered confections that changed the cookie world in the 1970s. That’s why I choose to pair it with a drink that reminds me of bloodshed. More specifically, a bloody mary reminds me of another revolution of the 1970s, that is, the legal right to murder babies in utero. That was when Planned Parenthood’s racist, classist, and eugenicist program finally came into its own. Local and regional Girl Scout troops partner with Planned Parenthood all the time, since the Girl Scouts’ sexuality curricula and badges fit right into their mutual wheelhouse, just as sweetly as caramel and chocolate. That should mix nicely with the tomato juice and vodka of the cocktail; the juice especially does a good job of hiding the taste of baby blood. Too radical for you? Am I guilty of hating on a group because they’re just a little “too pro-abortion”? There’s no sliding scale on this, as if it were a political issue. Just a little bit of baby-killing flavors the whole cocktail. And the whole cookie too.

I hope this tasting and pairing guide helps you make the right decisions regarding your Girl Scout cookies. While many people find making these sorts of decisions to be daunting and complex, they’re really much more straightforward than they look. Taking these pairings as inspiration, I believe that anyone can know exactly what to do with Girl Scout cookies.

Cross-posted at Joffre the Giant.<>brutus-aet2.comцена на рекламу а

Read more

On February 26, 2014 By In Scribblings

On the Artistry of Sex

Pastor Thabiti Anyabwile has just posted a quick bit at his Gospel Coalition blog, the blog being called Pure Church and the post The Artistry of Sex Forgotten in the World. In it he says that sex is supposed to beget not only children, but artistry. I find it interesting that he doesn’t say “fun” or “joy” or “recreation” or “communion”. He says “artistry”.

I would absolutely love to read your comments on the worth of that statement. Half of his post was this Francis Schaeffer quote:

How often do Christians think of sexual matters as something second-rate. Never, never, never should we do so according to the Word of God. The whole man is made to love God; each aspect of man’s nature is to be given its proper place. That includes the sexual relationship, that tremendous relationship of one man to one woman. At the very beginning God brought Eve to man. A love poem can thus be beautiful. So if you are a young man or a young woman and you love a girl or you love a boy, you may indeed write beautiful love poetry. Don’t be afraid. That too can be praise to God. And when the two people are Christians it can be a conscious doxology (Art and the Bible).

Given that I recently posted an erotic poem at my blog, you will not be surprised to know that such words please me. What is your degree of comfort with such things? Do find them to be a good at all? The response to my poem at the blog and on social media platforms was all positive, those who didn’t like it presumably maintaining a kind silence.

But there was one dude whose response was “uuunsubscribe”.

So what do you think? Can your sex be a doxology? Can your love poetry be a doxology? Or am I just being silly?<>рекламная компания москваcтоимость продвижения интернет магазинов

Read more

On January 27, 2014 By In Culture

Apéritif: A Poem About Pre-Meal Drinks

by Joffre Swait

Here’s the first of a series of poems on food to be published throughout this week by several Kuyperian authors.

We will follow the general course of a meal. It therefore gives me pleasure to open the proceedings by opening a bottle of dry sherry as a little  apéritif. A little something to get us started.

Apéritif

“La manzanilla de Sanlúcar y Los Puertos alegra a los vivos y resucita a los muertos.”

The insurance salesman and process management consultant

Will tell you that it’s best to trip light. Carry-ons, kid.

An acquaintance took bags to Rome, which with ancient

Tradition the natives stole while giving lodgment.

     Someone took my CDs in Madrid.

 

How like an avaricious hotel clerk

Is every meal you’ve taken in all your life.

The majority dashed off some sugars, and tried not to work.

And you, complicit or embarrassed fell asleep to their smirk,

     And blamed your schedule, or maybe your wife.

 

The very best meals have worked to impress and to wow

The sleepy tourist who fatly steps up to the table.

Because you travel heavy, with a weight on your brow,

The meal sneaks your time, your most valuable now,

     And sells to his cousin as quick as he’s able.

 

It is wiser to travel as if eating a five-course meal,

To show up with an empty stomach and an edge for appetite.

If you’re to eat the entire world with zeal,

To devour all they offer in Des Moines or Castile,

     Come wakeful-eyed with spine upright.

 

Travel light to your meals. Check in no worries or cares.

Simplicity and joy are the carry-ons you need.

If you don’t speak the language, listen and be aware.

Show up to the table ready, awake and légère.

     Let nothing be stolen from you while you feed.

 

If your palate is training, your start and first step must be bright.

Make yourself time to choose an apéritif,

Something dry and clean, to start up your tongue with light.

Calvados, or maybe champagne, or any wine that is white.

     Gin and tonic wakes your tongue before beef.

 

I remember the start a manzanilla sparked in my mouth.

This friend and I sat on the lawn, our wives cooking young,

Ten years ago. He in Minnesota now, I the South,

Our first children just babies, kept in the house,

     Our new lives on the tips of our tongues.

 

Which seems heavy, but tastes just like chamomile tea.

I still own that time, the little dry apples still carry

Lightly in the throat, an entire meal now free

To travel through time, not trapped by dull inattentive me,

     But wakeful once waked by a sherry.

<>web продвижение а раскрутка ов

Read more

On January 15, 2014 By In Culture

Going To The Pub “Boosts Men’s Mental Health”

Cross-posted at Joffre The Giant.

pub

Going out to the pub “boosts mental health” in men, according to The Scotsman.

Well, yeah.

The reason given, however, is weirdly male-stereotypical: it’s because the pub lets men open up about their emotions.

Researcher Dr Carol Emslie asked about drinking habits and was surprised they said pub visits benefited their mental health.

“The most surprising thing was the way drinking opened up a space for men to behave in alternative ways that aren’t so associated with masculinity,” she said. “There was the idea if you’ve had a few drinks it really helps you to express emotion in a way you might not in your everyday life. I did not ask about mental health. This they raised themselves.

“There is a stereotype that men are strong and silent about their mental health and it is something they never talk about. This wasn’t what we found. It was very much the idea that alcohol or drinking in these communal groups had this positive effect on your mental health.

“You’re drinking together, you’re laughing and joking and it’s uplifting. It helps you to open up and relax. Also men talked about it being a way of looking out for each other.”

What a feminist perspective. What a crock.

Look, I’ll concede that the “I love you, man” moment comes more easily when the beer is flowing, and that they can sometimes be salutary. But what I’m really reading here is this: women interact with each other in a healthy way; men are incapable of interacting like women unless alcohol is involved; therefore women and men can now rejoice, send your pet man down to the pub for his girl-circle time with the boys.

It’s not complicated, Ms. Lady Scientist. Men, like women, are human. They like to have freedom. They like to have friends. They like to have affirmation and acceptance. You don’t want to be a hothouse wife; nor do we wish to be hothouse men.

Wise women have always approved of husbandly pub time. One of the weird side effects of the feminist revolution and its radical individualism is the idea that when hubby and wifey are not at their wonderfully satisfying jobs far from the house, they should both be spending all their time at home together. All hubby and wifey are is two individual particles who decided to hang on to each other for a time; they are not part of a broader society and community, except as consumers. Wives resent their husbands absences because there is little security or society in their marriages.

Well…healthy humans continue to be as they have been. They make families in towns and communities, and have friends and hangout spots and extended family nearby. In that setting, men like to go to the pub to receive the “hail, fellow, well met” reception that is so satisfying.

Going to the pub is about camaraderie, not confession.<>созданиепоисковая оптимизация а топ

Read more

On January 8, 2014 By In Scribblings

12 Days of Christmas Winners

It is our great and tardy pleasure to announce the two winners of our 12 Days of Christmas Book Giveaway!

M. W. Andrews has won the first prize, Bread & Wine and Watch For the Light. Heather Johnson wins a copy of Uri Brito’s The Trinitarian Father.

Congratulations to the winners, and thanks to everyone who entered for supporting our website.<>реклама на яндекс директкачественный копирайтинг

Read more

On January 7, 2014 By In Books, Family and Children

Handmade Catechism Books

Photo Joyful Hearts & Faces.

Allow me to endorse to you The Purple Carrot.

Mary Lee of The Purple Carrot fame is the wife of a former elder of ours in Florida, who is now resident in California. They have the passel of children that is usual with Reformed families, theirs being particularly handsome. And they catechize these children of theirs, which is a holy, wise, and constructive thing to do.

They catechize them with The Purple Carrot products: handsome hand-made copies of the Catechism for Young Children, the Westminster Shorter, and the Heidelberg. (Let my product endorsement begin!)

Catechization is an important and integral part of Christian education. When our kids reach a certain age we buy them their own Bibles, but the idea of having individual copies of the Westminster Shorter Catechism for each child hadn’t occurred to us until we got our little cloth-bound beauty in the mail.

 

If you want to see a little more of the book, watch my video embedded below. You can find Mary Lee’s Etsy store here.

Each book is different, with different covers, binding, and fonts. She also sells blank books to be used as journals, as well as other random-cool hand-made stuff. Go on, visit her Etsy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKQSwJ_BpP4<>позиций а

Read more

On January 3, 2014 By In Books, Culture, Family and Children

Free Copy of Pastor Uri Brito’s “The Trinitarian Father”

Hello dear Kuyperians. You might have noticed some recent excitement here at your favorite Kuyper-inspired website over the publication of Uri Brito’s booklet The Trinitarian Father. As Steve Wilkins said, “Pastor Brito helps us to see what God’s nature implies for us and requires of us as fathers. His essay is an excellent beginning to getting us into Trinitarian shape.”

You can buy the book here, for a mere $8, and it is well worth the purchase, dear friends.

Even more exciting than that, however, is the prospect of getting a free copy. Which you can now do by making sure you’ve joined our current book giveaway. There are now two prizes, the first drawing being for Bread & Wine and Watch For The Light, and the second drawing being for The Trinitarian Father.

Even if you’ve already entered, share the contest. The more people join through your link, the more entries you have. Contest ends on Sunday the 5th.

As the Huguenots probably never say, bonne chance!

[contesthopper contest=”7513″]<>klasnobotкопирайтинг заказ статей

Read more