Exciting Times
This morning I got a box of cereal out of the pantry and poured some Cap'n Crunch into my bowl. Then I went to the refrigerator and got some milk. After my nutritious breakfast, I took my bowl to the sink and rinsed it out. Then I put it in the dishwasher and went to brush my teeth and get ready for work.Heaven.
They say you don't appreciate what you have until it's gone. That's only partly true. You don't truly appreciate what you have until you lose it and get it back again. Probably in ten years I'll be rinsing something in the sink and grumbling about it. But for now, I choose to revel in having a kitchen. By the end of the week there will be silverware in the drawers, couches in the living room, and some creature comforts that have been sorely missed. As much as I'm looking forward to the TV being back in the front of the house, what I'm really looking forward to is it being OUT of the bedroom. It's up against the sliding glass door with a big blanket over it and it has scared the living bejeebers out of me every morning that I've woken up and seen it. Imagine the first thing you see in the morning being this huge looming figure towering over your bed. Freaky.
On a different note, I finished Brian Mclaren's "A Generous Orthodoxy" yesterday. It deserves many posts and will receive more detail soon, but for now I should say that it is possibly the best description of my beliefs and the best journal of a spiritual growth which patterns my own that I have ever read. I can't recommend it highly enough and I can't wait to read the other McLaren books in my stack.
One of the many things I liked about it is how often Chesterton's "Orthodoxy" is quoted. If you haven't read that book, well, you really really should. You may not enjoy it as much as I did...Chesterton's dry British humour strikes a wonderful major chord with me...but you have to appreciate how well he puts things. Not to mention the fact that he said almost 100 years ago so many things that the church is just now beginning to get.
Here's a sample for your Wednesday. One of McLaren's chapters is "Why I am catholic." He stresses the lower-case "c" in defining the word as "universal," but has many good things to say about the Catholic church. He likes that Catholicism is sacramental and liturgical, that it respects tradition, that it celebrates Mary, and that "Catholics know how to party." In particular, I think we in the C of C knock our tradition quite often in our attempts to distance ourselves from it. Here McLaren quotes Chesterton:
"Tradition is only democracy extended through time. It is trusting to a consensus of common human voices rather than to some isolated or arbitrary record...Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our butler; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our father."
posted by Thurman8er @ 9:40 AM
8 Comments:
Glad to see you’re enjoying (what my Dad used to say when he called and I was washing dishes) “hen house ways.”
Interesting perspective on tradition. Please post some more from McLaren.
Catholics do know how to party. My Dad used to be the full-time First Sergeant at our local National Guard Unit. He was responsible for renting out the Armory to different parties and events. As a kid I always looked forward to the local Catholic Church Christmas Party that was held in my Dad’s Armory. The next day I would go to the Armory and scour the Drill Floor for firecrackers and sparklers. I miss those days.
Greg, we in Fresno missed out on McLaren last year. He didn't make the trip out here and John York covered for him. After reading his stuff, I'd love to meet him but I know that sometimes these guys don't meet our expectations. Sometimes it's the man, but I think more often it's just the circumstances. The next time you hear him, he might just blow you away. Who knows?
I'm just glad I can finally do my favorite thing in the kitchen: get a drink of water! Yippee! It was kind of ruined last night when that first sip made me choke but I was still so happy!
I can relate to Greg's experience. Most people like me until they hear me a second time!
The rest of this note is for Lisa: Wait until the brown water turns clear before drinking.
I had a friend that came from the Catholic church. He said that he decided to leave it after he caught the priests having a drinking party one night. So at least those guys know how to party.
Congrats on the new kitchen!! Hope the water turns clear soon!
Hey, NOT pouring Captain Crunch into a bowl, NOT getting that gallon of milk out of the fridge… That is a definition of living in Europe.
Glad things are looking up.
I've always enjoyed that perspective of tradition, and sometimes need to be reminded that the vote of many generations may outway mine. Our culture is constantly revisiting issues that our fathers did, and yet we sometimes fail to wonder why they chose the path they did. Unfortunately, any examples I can come up with would be tinderboxes for debate, even in my own office where I'm the only one working, but I do agree with Chesterton. On a lighter note, this guy that ran into your house, was he wearing a mechanics outfit, holding a wrench, and had a little line of water across his shirt. Cause every now and then I think that guy is still chasing us.
I have had medical implants put in to keep me from remembering that guy. He was nuts.
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