Found this article from the band "Cold War Kids"...

"The next real literary 'rebels' in this country might well emerge as some weird bunch of anti-rebels, born oglers who dare somehow to back away from ironic watching, who have the childish gall actually to endorse and instantiate single-entendre principles. Who treat of plain old untrendy human troubles and emotions in U.S. life with reverence and conviction. Who eschew self-consciousness and hip fatigue. These anti-rebels would be outdated, of course, before they even started. Dead on the page. Too sincere. Clearly repressed. Backward, quaint, naive, anachronistic. Maybe that'll be the point. Maybe that's why they'll be the next real rebels. Real rebels, as far as I can see, risk disapproval. The old postmodern insurgents risked the gasp and squeal:shock disgust, outrage, censorship, accusations of socialism, anarchism, nihilism. Today's risks are different. The new rebels might be artists willing to riskthe yawn, rolled eyes, the cool smile, the nudged ribs, the parody of gifted ironists, the 'Oh how banal.' To risk accusations of sentimentality, melodrama. Of overcredulity. Of softness. Of willingness to be suckered by a world of lurkers and starers who fear gaze and ridicule above imprisonment without law. " DFW

A sonnet of earth...

Child of Dust

Dear prodigal you are my son and I
Supplied you not your spirit, but your shape.
All Eden's wealth arrayed before your eyes;
I fathomed not you wanted to escape.

And though I only ever gave you love,
Like every child you've chosen to rebel.
Uprooted flow'rs and filled the holes with blood;
Ask not for whom they toll, the solemn bells.

A child of dust, to mother now return;
For every seed must die before it grows.
And though above the world may toil and turn,
No prying spade will find you here below.

Now safe beneath their wisdom and their feet
Here I will teach you truly how to sleep.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKTpMofVxAk

Lewis and the Evangelicals

Here at PHC, we have a mandatory campus-wide reading and discussion of C.S. Lewis's Prince Caspian (I guess, in part, in anticipation of the film soon to be released.)  The school, as a whole, seems to be quite approving of Lewis and quite ready to enlist him as an ally.  At the same time, the school appears to me as devotedly evangelical.  Now this seems to me a rather odd fixation for Evangelicals to have.  As one author said "One of the puzzles, indeed, is the way in which Lewis has been lionized by Evangelicals when he clearly didn’t believe in several classic Evangelical shibboleths."  A high-Anglican medievalist seems an odd hero for American Evangelicals.

I myself have a (perhaps uncharitable) theory regarding the matter.  I tend to attribute American Evangelicalism widespread approval and fascination with Lewis to be due to the actual differences between them.  In Lewis they find the wonder, mystery, enchantment denied their imaginations due to their religiosity and narrow theology.  In Lewis they find Christ, and in a brighter and more majestic fashion than they had before witnessed.  I admit though, this is less a theory than an autobiography.

As you might have inferred, there's something of an admission in there that I feel somewhat out of place at PHC.

There's nothing like Google Earth for inspiration...

You can tell a lot about a society by its architecture, especially by the architectural focus of a culture’s greatest buildings.

The other day Colin pointed out to me that medieval cathedrals were actually built in the shape of cross.  Amazing.  I wasn’t aware of this (thanks Colin!).  I looked up Westminster Abbey and Salisbury Cathedral on Google Earth, and sure enough, I was presented with an image of a cross.  Even more remarkable is the fact this design was constructed at a time when no one imagined that a human being would ever see the design; it was just for God’s eye.

Cathedrals were the greatest architectural feat of Medieval Christendom.  Now contrast these images to great structures of our own day. 

I recall Dr. Spinney, years ago, talking about the “theology of architecture” wherein he contrasted medieval cathedrals with modern sports stadiums.  I’d bring up another modern structure, the shopping mall.  This is the world’s largest indoor shopping mall.  Breathtaking, isn’t it? ;)

What glorious monuments to our culture’s absurd devotion to inflated celebrity and cheap products and entertainment.

Well, until next time

-Shane

Edit:  By the way, the idea for using Google Earth to see the design was also Colin's.

You know that school we all like?

You know, this one:

Well, the Review Committee decided to let me in for some reason.

It seems my well thought out plan is unfolding like a perfectly played game of chess.

Well, actually, it seems my idiotic fumbling in my collegiate pursuits has somehow--Providentially--come together; and it appears I'll be granted the privilege of attending PHC.

Dan said Soli Deo Gloria when he was accepted.  I think Sola Gratia might be even more appropriate in my case.