Anguished over Romantic Choices? A Lesson from Jane Austen

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Jane Austen's lesson here is that when one is anguished with one's own personal life choice, instead of following Charolet in her pragmatic rationalism, or Lydia in her emotionalism, we can follow Elizabeth in aligning ourselves to our telos, our true end, for Christians this telos is the resurrected life. This telos is what C.S.Lewis refers to as he says that Christians of the ancient times were people who had a heavenward view of life, but in the transition to modernity we have become too focused on happenings of  this earthly life. Given this context, it shouldn't be surprising why the existentialist philosophers of the 20th century, from Albert Camus and Jean Paul Sartre, considered choice a burden than a gift of freedom! Perhaps, it shouldn't be surprising that we modern this-worldly neurotics stymied with limitless choices find Jane Austen's world quaintly attractive!

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Ansari Analysis - Needed: A #meFORfeminism

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The #metoo movement is great in standing in solidarity against moronic men. Grace's mistake is in thinking the #metoo movement will give her crushed soul its pound of flesh. One could say her attempt likely has backfired. The #metoo movement cannot empower women like Grace and Gabrielle who desire enduring stories. Their courage in sharing their personal pain seems to me to call for a kind of #meFOR empowerment which is not so much as standing against someone but a standing FOR one's own hope for pursuit of enduring stories. This #meFOR movement should stand FOR one's deep desire to be a drawn into an enduring story of romance. To make a stand FOR positive romantic desires is to be self-differentiated enough to NOT stand allowing ones true desires and hopes for enduring story to be subverted by someone else erotic gratification.

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Christmas through a Star Wars Lens

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Both the Jedi and the Sith operating with conventional expectation of logic of power, miss the miracle of the story of Star Wars: the miraculous power of Luke's love turning Darth Vader to a loving father. Christmas season is a time for us to set aside our conventional expectations for our own lives, whether the expectation is for more health or wealth or happiness, and wait with awed eagerness, making space for God's miracle in our own lives. The miracle of Christmas is that somehow own own meager manger unconditionally surrendered to God will becomes a place where God's presence Forcefully manifests to redeem the darkness in this world.

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Theology of Blade Runner (original) - A Question of Empathy

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A mind compulsively intent on self-preservation cannot look at the world from the other person’s point of view. Only when one steps away from ones addiction to self-preservation can one’s mind be freed to see the world from the other person’s point of view. Then one will stop seeing others as “tools” in one’s own project of self-preservation, making way to have empathy for the other. 

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A Good Man is Hard to Find - the Misfit Disciple!

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Jesus. O'Connor is not trying to prove the faith, but rather to critique the Christian culture which often misses the radical nature of the person of Christ by equivocating Christianity to some banal morality of niceness. Flannery O' Connor puts the words of truth in the mouth of the criminal, perhaps not unlike the criminal crucified alongside. In a Flannery O Connor sort of way one could say that Misfit is a better disciple of Christ than the grandma. 

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Narcos - the Identity Game

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Remembering ones true identity is key to living into ones destiny. In Deuteronomy God repeatedly exhorts Israelites to remember what He has done and to teach their kids to remember. One has to remember ones identity in order to endure suffering. For example, when my identity as a healthy person is strong it gives me the strength to suffer seeing donuts but not eating them! Not unlike the bandits who endure suffering because the strength of their identity. Identity is the emotive force the motivates action. Of course, the bandits suffer and live for ultimately self seeking motives. The Christian on the other hand lives and suffers for the sake of the glory of God.

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Solar Eclipse, a Glimpse of Tolkienian Humor!

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Next time you see the see the Sun and the Moon, hopefully, it will not merely an incandescent ball of fire and a cold crater ridden piece of rock, rather your heart will be drawn to the unrequited love story between the angelic beings, Tilion and Arien. May be, it is not as unrequited as I make it to be, thanks to the eclipses!  And the brilliance of Illuvathar's creation... pointing back to the brilliance of God's handiwork.

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The Art of Mindful Emotions

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This lesson of being mindful of our emotions as a way of raising our ability to listen and be empathic is critical for personal relationships and for communal cohesiveness. Part of the reason why political discourse is so broken in Universities and the society at large is because people tend to blame the other people for the unpleasant emotions that others trigger in them. When our emotions get triggered by something that is happening we have to stop and ask ourselves, "Do I do well to get triggered?" 

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The Best Day of My Life Yet!

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Over the past few months, as I have been praying, meditating, talking with folks about ordination the phrase that God formulated in me, spiritually speaking is, to be ordained is to rest in the love of God and invite people to experience the love of Christ. This is the "why" that I have been looking for. This is the ax that will sharpen my spear. This is the anchor that will prevent me from being buffeted by the relentless waves of evanescent fascinations. This is what Keirkegaard talks about when he says, "purity of heart is to will one thing." 

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The 21st Century Super Heroes

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Safe, merciful and caring gospel cultures are built on the backs of such pioneering super heroes who give up their deepest desires to fulfill higher dreams of self transcending love, serving the under-served, which makes these modern single women missionaries the true super heroes of the 21st century. 

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Hopefulness of Tomorrowland: Which Wolf is Fed?

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The way to quell mass despair is not by a logic of power. Rather it should be by the way of love building itself to hope. In the movie, in order to get one of the dreamers, Frank (played by George Clooney) to be hopeful, Athena falls in love with him even though she knew a relationship between man and andriod would never be possible. Still she justifies her love by saying that Frank needed someone to believe in him. 

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No More Us vs Them!

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The fact that immigrants still want to continue to flock to States speaks to the attractiveness of the American project. We are facing some hurdles now. Instead of regressing into the clannish blame game, of the us-vs-them kind, we need to go deeper into what it means to be fully human and share stories celebrating integration of ourselves in each other's cultures.

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Reforging Broken Dreams

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In the run up to the first Advent the elderly Zechariah and Elizabeth had a surprise child who turned out to be the blessed John the Baptist. Their shame was transmuted into an unexpected blessing. Advent is a time that reminds us that our Father in Heaven cares about the hurts and sorrows of our broken dreams. He does not just slap our broken dreams back together the way we want it. Rather, our Father re-forges our broken dreams into unexpected new prospects, pregnant with beautiful blessings. 

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Most Important New Year's Resolution: Making Space

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One way to counteract modernism's corrosive nature is to consciously make space for God's presence. One important way of this making space is performing ceaseless prayers. I have found it to be most useful for my life is to say short prayers through the day, "Father have mercy on me." "Father take care." "Jesus, Son of God have mercy on me."

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10 Lonely Christmases of Seeing the Face of Jesus

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 I think my compulsive attending of multiple Christmas services over the past 10 years helped me reach a deep place in my soul where I catch a glimpse of the face of Christ. The Christmas songs were an opportunity to meditate on the face of Christ. Then the kind, grieving, loving face of Christ comforts me in my loneliness. The price to pay for my lonely Christmases is the deeper vision of face of Christ and it is worth it. After all, this gazing on God is the highest of all pleasures which David talks about in Psalm 27:4 "One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple."

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Seeing (love's enchantment) with the Heart!

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 It is only with the heart that we can see rightly because most essential things in life are invisible to the purely rational mind. For example, the enchantment of love can only be perceived with the heart. It takes imagination to see with the heart. A a mind that is solely rational will be scared by the disruptive enchantment of falling in love. 

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Tchaikovsky's Symphony #5 - Hope Breaking into Sorrow!

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At the end of fourth movement, Tchaikovsky resolves the music into a final victory over sorrowful Fate. Experiencing the release of musical deeply drawn tension helped me realize why someone would want to listen to it over and over again, as a way of feeling Gospel hope breaking into sorrow, during a times of trail as in WWII or as in the struggle against pervasive compulsions, the Original Sin.

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Princess Bride on the Pain of Love

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 It is the pain of deep but unfulfilled longing that keeps love potent. When Westley, the lover of the Princess Buttercup, in his disguise taunts her loss of first love, the Princess shouts at him, "Don't mock my love." Westley replies, "Life is pain... anyone who says differently is selling something." 

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Harry Potter Book 8 - a Redux to Old Themes in a New Flawed Format!

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Rowling's Harry Potter stories continues to delve on the theme of love being stronger than death in deep friendships, and so will continue to be perduring, in spite of the new formation not quite working. If there were ever to be a book 9, I do wish it would be a novel.

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