Canada Geese on campus

Originally uploaded by Raymond Yee.

It was fun and strange to see Canada geese on campus today. What are they doing hanging out here?

Since I think of myself as a target reader of Ideas : A History of Thought and Invention, from Fire to Freud, I'm mystified by the author's comments in the NY Times yesterday (What's the Big Idea?):

On the other hand, not all big ideas are good ideas.
In fact, most big ideas are probably terrible ideas. What do you think
is the single worst idea in history?

Without question,
ethical monotheism. The idea of one true god. The idea that our life
and ethical conduct on earth determines how we will go in the next
world. This has been responsible for most of the wars and bigotry in
history.

Surely, the thoughtlessness of the comment is not a reflection of the
quality of the book! The ethical monotheism of the Chrisitian kind
urges me to give the man another chance.

I wrote last week
"A question that I've been pondering: is the distinction made between
clergy and laity in the Christian church a caste system?" It is
serendipitous that I read this morning in Christian Century (October 18, 2005, p. 25), the following mini-review by Anthony B. Robinson of Who Are You to Say?: Establishing Pastoral Authority in Matters of Faith:

A UCC pastor, Rosenberger raises the important
questions too few are willing to ask: Is there a place for authority in
the pastoral role and office? What is the nature of appropriate
authority and what are its grounds and sources? Is Christian community
really possible absent legitimate authority?

I just put an interlibrary loan request for the book through the campus
library. I certainly believe that there is a place for pastoral
authority, and there there are solid grounds for such authority in the
Bible (and in long Christian tradition). What has bothered are the
perks and privileges that often come with being a clergy. The divide
between clergy and lay staff in a church can be stark at times. I have
to ask myself whether my question is motivated by envy since I'm not
part of the clergy. Moreover, as an elder in the PCUSA, I am a lay
leader myself and have enjoyed a certain status within the church. I
too must wrestle with being leader who professes to have Jesus of
Nazareth as my supreme model.

I saw everything from the new books I ordered, kids on BART all carrying the same plastic bags, a wild turkey on campus, and a hipster brand of car that I didn't end up buying.

paint "chips" at the local hardware store

Originally uploaded by Raymond Yee.

There is something strangely captivating about this display of paint chips. Does it represent the entire range of possible paint colors to put on one's walls? Probably not. If not, then what's left out and why? (Naive questions on my part....)

A question that I've been pondering: is the distinction made between clergy and laity in the Christian church a caste system?

Thursday was marked by a downpour that I (accurately or inaccurately)
thought of as the first major rainfall of the season. The following day
was sunny, though I carried my umbrella out of fear of getting wet. The
variability in the weather is exhilarating. Having grown up in northern
Ontario, I still find it hard to believe that December has arrived just
from looking outside. But the last month of the year is here. It is a
busy, busy, busy time.

When people ask me how I've been, I reflexively respond "Oh, busy".
Now, I'm beyond busy. There's just so much to do in the two weeks
before Laura and I travel east to visit family. So why am I sitting in
our living room wrestling with words rather than the Ikea furniture
that needs to be assembled? Although thinking is often procrastination
for me, I suspect that my running around -- as productive as it has
been -- is for the moment a hinderance to internal work of disciplined
thought, prayer, and quiet that I've been avoiding. Writing is hard
work. Prayer is often hard work. The results often seem so meager given
the effort. Yet I need to do that work.

Writing the previous two paragraphs has centered me so that I can tell
you more about the things that we've been up to and things that still
need to get done. I wish I could string together a coherent
supper-narrative that weaves all of what I want to say into a neat
package. Instead, I give you a list of vignettes:

On Friday night, Laura and I had a late-night dinner at Daimo, my
curent favorite local purveyor of Cantonese food. We ran into Victor, a
former neighbor of mine who is also a Ph.D. student in chemistry. He
told me that he had recently purchased some chemistry texts that I had
donated to the Berkeley Public Library-Friends of the Library. I was delighted. I've written previously about how I desired to give away my books to someone who can make use of them but then turned to selling books on half.com.
I had to find a way to pare down my book collection in a hurry. The
Berkeley Public Library takes books in good condition en masse. I've
donated 8 boxes of books with three more on the way. I was concerned
that donating advanced science texts to the BPL bookstore would not get
my books to the right people. Last night's news was a little answer to
prayer.

Last week, Laura and I bought a Toyota 2006 Corolla to replace our
stolen car. We're still getting used to it. Even though it is Toyota's
entry level car (with some options added), it is certainly more car
than either has ever had. We learned to negotiate a price that we were
happy with and have enjoyed dealing with our seller, Hanlees Hilltop
Toyota in Richmond, CA.. What we did: we signed up for Consumer Reports Ratings and recommendations available at ConsumerReports.org
for a month, paid for a price report for the Toyota Corolla to get a
breakdown of the wholesale prices, followed the advice on the Consumer
Reports site, called around to get some quotes, decided beforehand what
we we were willing to pay and when we would walk away, and stuck to our
guns. It's also useful to have two people involved in the negotiation.
Although I did most of the talking, Laura picked up on important points
that I missed.

In response to my post on PRISONER OF NARNIA, two friends wrote by email. They have given me permission to quote their email here.

Sharon Gallagher, editor of Radix Magazine, wrote:

I just read the Gopnik article this week and was
unhappy with it. I'm not surprised that Gopnik likes the A.N. Wilson
biography. He takes Wilson's interpretations of Lewis's faith and
sexuality and presents them as fact. Other biographers came to
different conclusions. He also adopts Wilson's condescending attitude
toward faith.

In my Radix (31:3) interview with Norman Stone, the director of the first Shadowlands,
Norman is quite clear that Lewis's faith sustained him during Joy's
illness and death. (Norman had talked with people who knew Lewis at the
time.)

I wish that The New Yorker had given this assignment
to either John Updike or Malcolm Gladwell--two of their superstars who
would have handled the material with more understanding. (I've been a
big fan of Gopnik's other writing and even bought his book about Living in Paris.)

Ginny Hearn wrote:

The quote in your blog from Adam Gopnik (11/20) ended like this, in his discussion of CSL's A Grief Observed: "Lewis ended up in a state of uncertain personal faith that seems to the unbeliever comfortingly like doubt."

Hmmmmm. It's been many years since I read AGO, but this statement is
apt to be read as "In his life, Lewis ended up in a state of uncertain
personal faith . . . ", which is not accurate. I recall that this book,
written in a journal-like fashion in the several months following the
death of Joy, expressed CSL's understandable, terrible anguish at her
loss after their brief marriage--but Lewis did NOT end up in the doubt
[or unbelief in Christianity] that this statement might imply to an
unbeliever looking for "comfort" in his or her doubt.

A poppy from the U of Toronto

Originally uploaded by Raymond Yee.

I only found this poppy this morning while going through the backlog of personal mail. Too bad for the late discovery. I was looking for a poppy this year because I wanted to wear one on November 11, in remembrance of the war dead and also of my own roots in Canada, where poppies are traditionally worn on that day.