Do you have an altar? Then your religion is completely unoriginal. Do you worship a God who is a father? Then your religion is completely unoriginal. Do you religiously partake of bread and wine? Then your religion is completely unoriginal. Did your God die and rise to life again? Then your religion is completely unoriginal. Do you sing and/or light candles during worship? Then your religion is completely unoriginal. Do you worship a Goddess identified with the moon? Then your... Read more
The totality of who we are defines us and it is in every piece and parcel that we come to realize the great truth that is: I. The pieces of previous choices and previous moments in history bite into our skin, paper thin, like the shards of broken mirror that they are. These slights against our outer most layer, our skin, anger us—even offend us into great fits of denial and rage. We reject the audacity of the past to... Read more
True Grit is about justice—both human and Divine. It starts with a call for both Old Testament and American justice on the 1870s frontier. It ends with a neat demonstration of the Law of Return. The main players in this morality tale are Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges), the lawman who acts as if he is above both kinds of Law. And Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld), the 14-year-old girl who starts by invoking the laws of the United States and ends... Read more
“Know thyself,” admonished the Oracle of Delphi. “If that which you seek you find not within, you will never find it without,” wrote Doreen Valiente. When I saw The King’s Speech, I thought about those quotes. And about the kinds of power represented—power that comes from within, from knowing one’s self and having a healthy pride in one’s abilities and accomplishments. And the kind of power that is accorded by holding a certain place in society. Power that comes from... Read more
Winter’s Bone is named for an old saying. To “throw someone a bone” is to give her a scrap of kindness, a small favor out of one’s larger store. To give less, in other words, than one could ultimately afford to give. Ree Dolly (Jennifer Lawrence) and her family live on the bones and scraps of contemporary American society. Her meth-cooking father is missing. Her mother has retreated into the dark landscape of her own mind. The 17-year-old girl is... Read more
At this year’s Oscars, the film The Kids Are All Right is up (amongst an unprecedented ten nominees) for Best Picture, and Annette Benning is also a nominee for Best Actress in her role as Nic in this film. It will be interesting to see whether or not the film and Benning end up the winners; Benning already won a Best Actress award at the Golden Globes, being nominated alongside her co-star Julianne Moore (as the character Jules) for that... Read more
Inside each of us is a shadow. For Natalie Portman’s brittle ballerina in The Black Swan, that shadow could have been her salvation. Instead, it drove her mad. In Jungian psychological terms, our shadows are the parts of us that we deny, but which must be explored and incorporated in order for us to be whole. One way to work with the shadow is to draw it out in order to explore its attributes more fully. When we know our... Read more
With very little reluctance, I must admit I’m more than a bit of a luddite. I see computers as something of a necessary evil, and held off from composing any sort of writing directly on the computer well into my first year of graduate education (1998). The mobile phone I currently own barely answers calls and does text messages; it certainly doesn’t connect to the internet or have any “apps” of any description, nor even a camera. And while I... Read more
Find other posts related to this topic on the link round-up post! Over on PAGAN+politics Cara Schulz wrote a great recap of PantheaCon. I will concur that not only is she very nice in person but very funny as well. I was happy to room with her and after meeting her in person have even more respect and love for her, even if she is a conservative! In her post she mentioned something that she and I had discussed while... Read more
I have a profound dislike of talking religion and politics. However, what’s happening in Wisconsin touches deeply on my core religious values and beliefs. I am a Union kid. My father was not only a member of the UAW but he also served a term as a local rep. A master electrician, he began learning his craft through an apprenticeship program, believed strongly in buying goods manufactured in the US and took me to pro-Union and American-made demonstrations. He was... Read more
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