The beauty of globalization

How many exotic locales can you pick out in the first 3 sentences of this NYT story?? Just relieved that Miami Beach is appropriately represented. No wonder I love Get Shorty so much.

homage to George Carlin

In a post earlier this year I mentioned how I derived my inspiration from brilliant comic George Carlin. What a shock to read of his passing today - at the age of 71.

Carlin's career and legacy are compelling not only for the pure talent that powered his wit (which, while offensive to some, certainly had intrinsic merit for its astute cultural observation), but also for the missial nature of his career. He risked his early successes to reinvent himself because, in his own words, “I was a traitor...I was living a lie.” His challenge to many presumptions grew starker as the years went by and sometimes regressed into a cynicism that surpassed the entertainment value one would hold a purported comedian to; but his vision and desire to hold fast to his ideals are to be commemorated along with the gifts and insights he brought to his diverse audiences.

I don't know Chris Blumhofer but I already like him

THANK YOU THANK YOU Mr. B b/c you detest the pop culturization of Our Lord as much as me! It may sell a lot of books to distill the creator of the earth, the Alpha and Omega, the maker of all things (of course this descriptive list is by definition incomplete owing to our inability to grasp the infinite) to a business principle...but er, can the Created really appropriate the Creator for its own ends? When exegesis is inversed into starting first with a principle for our own sake, we become impoverished, losing all sense of our proper relationship to Him. The logical outcome of that trend is what CS Lewis termed "God in the Dock."