{"id":55,"date":"2011-06-20T16:16:00","date_gmt":"2011-06-20T16:16:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/2011\/06\/how-to-read-blogs\/"},"modified":"2011-11-18T12:52:28","modified_gmt":"2011-11-18T17:52:28","slug":"how-to-read-blogs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/2011\/06\/how-to-read-blogs.html","title":{"rendered":"How To Read Blogs"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p><span style=\"font-size: x-large;\">Rule Number One:\u00a0Use your eyeballs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Sorry I haven\u2019t p-p-p-posted in like chika-chika-4 days. I have been white-water rafting in the grand canyon, killing bald eagles, and dressing in their skin. Actually I was at Franciscan University, which really amounts to the same thing, meeting new people, (including some fellow bloggers, like the ever wonderful Michelle who writes at <a href=\"http:\/\/catholicunveiled.wordpress.com\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Catholic Unveiled<\/a>, and deserves your attention, AND support, for she is heading off to Mexico to live the Catholic missionary life) getting my dorm, picking my classes (Milton, English Renaissance, Creative Writing, Latin and English 102) and reading Truman Capote in the car. Have you read that guy? He\u2019s great, like a nihilistic, homosexual man version of Flannery O\u2019Connor on drugs. Then I went to New Jersey to see Dispatch, and read C.S Lewis\u2019 The Four Loves and George Weigel\u2019s Letters to a Young Catholic, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Letters-Young-Catholic-Art-Mentoring\/dp\/0465092705?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=badca-20&amp;link_code=btl&amp;camp=213689&amp;creative=392969\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">which is worth reading for the opening chapter alone<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>But Marc, you say, idly eating your gerbil, this post is entitled How To Read Blogs, not My Life, and I say yes, way to be that guy and point it out in front of everyone. So I shall inform you:<\/p>\n<p>Reading Catholic writers \u2013 in general \u2013 should take into account why they are writing in the first place. And it\u2019s a very simple reason: to convert the entire world to Catholicism. This is especially true of blogs, for \u2013 being so small and insignificant \u2013 their writers naturally have a massive Napoleon Complex, and thus the most unattainable goals. So upon reading a darn good blog post, and in particular an assertive, controversial or argumentative post, I suggest rule number two:<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: x-large;\">Rule Number Two: Send disagreeable posts to those who might disagree with them.<\/span> If\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/youngevangelicalandcatholic.blogspot.com\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Brantly Millegan<\/a> brilliantly craps all over Calvinism, well then, send his brilliance to some Calvinists, or else what\u2019s the point? If Shea writes that <a href=\"http:\/\/markshea.blogspot.com\/2011\/06\/analysis-of-holes-in-fr-corapis-story.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Corapi is full of corapi<\/a>, what good is it to the world to have 700 million comments saying, \u201cMark, you\u2019re right. Absolutely. I like your beard.\u201d Now, you all have that atheist friend, that heretic sister, that incredibly liberal facebook\u00a0acquaintance\u00a0that you can\u2019t\u00a0unfriend\u00a0because he\u2019s your mother\u2019s brother\u2019s wife\u2019s massage therapist, and they, like ourselves, need to be set free by the truth. Amen? Obviously, don\u2019t share the truth like a jerk, saying \u201cHey, this guy shows how dumb you are!\u201d (especially not towards atheists, they\u2019re touchy), but instead with love, real intellectual hunger, excitement for the truth, and vague opening statements like, \u201cHey, thought of you while I read this\u2026\u201d It will start a conversation, and that\u2019s what we, as Catholics, want. To build relationships that will lead others, and ourselves, closer to the heart of Christ.<\/p>\n<p>So a little\u00a0exercise. From now on let us make it our goal to share with one disagreeing person any blog post that convicts us as true. Why not? It might convert the entire world.<\/p>\n<p>Anyways, my entire blogging career has been validated. My computer could explode right now and I\u2019d be happy as a clam. Why? A comment on <a href=\"http:\/\/badcatholicblog.blogspot.com\/2011\/03\/why-arent-you-catholic.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Why Aren\u2019t You Catholic<\/a>?.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThank you for asking this question. Since my answers turned out to be just excuses, I have signed up for RCIA.\u201d- Otepoti<\/p>\n<p>Good luck, Otepoti! I will be praying for you!<\/p>\n<div class=\"blogger-post-footer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/3060433030054060305-4696791896361149775?l=badcatholicblog.blogspot.com\" alt=\"\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\"><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rule Number One:\u00a0Use your eyeballs. Sorry I haven\u2019t p-p-p-posted in like chika-chika-4 days. I have been white-water rafting in the grand canyon, killing bald eagles, and dressing in their skin. Actually I was at Franciscan University, which really amounts to the same thing, meeting new people, (including some fellow bloggers, like the ever wonderful Michelle [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-how-to"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How To Read Blogs<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Rule Number One:\u00a0Use your eyeballs. Sorry I haven&#039;t p-p-p-posted in like chika-chika-4 days. I have been white-water rafting in the grand canyon, killing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/2011\/06\/how-to-read-blogs.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How To Read Blogs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Rule Number One:\u00a0Use your eyeballs. Sorry I haven&#039;t p-p-p-posted in like chika-chika-4 days. I have been white-water rafting in the grand canyon, killing\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/2011\/06\/how-to-read-blogs.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Bad Catholic\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-06-20T16:16:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2011-11-18T17:52:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/3060433030054060305-4696791896361149775?l=badcatholicblog.blogspot.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Marc\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Marc\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/2011\/06\/how-to-read-blogs.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/2011\/06\/how-to-read-blogs.html\",\"name\":\"How To Read Blogs\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2011-06-20T16:16:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2011-11-18T17:52:28+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/badcatholic\/#\/schema\/person\/f128368f53f1348bf999033c303eb91e\"},\"description\":\"Rule Number One:\u00a0Use your eyeballs. 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