On Voting Day (politics and other stuff)

Firstly - if you have not done so, please go vote, no matter who you are voting for. (Yes, I think it matters who you vote for. Yes, I want you to vote anyway. Improving the process is more important than getting a specific 'good' result.)

Secondly, if you have voted - start talking it up earlier next year/next election. Twice today I've come across people who have trouble voting because they didn't bother to update their registration when they moved - MONTHS AGO. If you show up at a precient where you are not registered, and they don't let you vote because you don't have proper ID showing that you're *supposed* to vote there - this is a feature, not a bug. Please help encourage people to get this stuff straighten out EARLY.

Thirdly - I'm not non-partisan. I have opinions and they are right, true, and correct and if you disagree then you are wrong. But. As I've said before - differing opinions doesn't mean we have to fight about it. And it doesn't mean we have to believe the worst about each other.

I'm not going to go all happy-happy-joy-joy, isn't-the-world-full-of-sunshine-and-flowers. There are demons, there are people who commit acts of horrific violence, there are people who thrive on injustice and smug superiority and looking out for number one, there are people who not demand mercy for themselves, but also validation, and who want not only justice but divine retribution for everyone else, and if God isn't up to the task, well, they'll help the old guy out.

But that's not most of us, and we need to assume that's not the people we live and work and pray and vote with. For our own sanity, if nothing else.

So...a few things to highlight, today.

Let Freedom (and Happiness) Reign - a book review in The New Yorker, about an illustrated wander through the country.

Special Arab/Muslim issue of Apex Magazine. (It's good that we have such stuff. It'll be better when such doesn't merit 'special issues'. Inbetween will be hard.)

How the Rest of the World Reports on the Tea Party in Foreign Policy - *shakes head* On the one hand, it's helpful, in a 'how do we talk about this' way, to know what other people think. On the other hand, it's frustrating to see that it's not just Americans who absolutely don't understand other people's cultures and backgrounds.

Continuing with the educational-but-not-helpful theme - I don't this this is the best answer to the idea of a writer using comics to popularize Muslim virtues. I think there's tons of room to discuss the on-going integration and interaction between 'the West' and 'Islam' - from between nations to between congregations to within those people currently living on the borderlands, including those people who ARE the borderlands - but I think comics (and art, and lit, including SF) are a way to discuss that, and *should* be used.

Heck, if it's good enough for Pope John Paul II, it's good enough for anyone.

(Part of the discussion should, I think, be focused on 'separation of church and state' as a Western/Christian ideal, and possibly not a universal human truth. But that's a sidebar, I think.)

A few days ago there was a horrific attack on a Christian church - during services - in Iraq. I think it worthy to offer prayers for those injuried, those dead, their families, and for the soldiers and police who responded. And for those who carried out the attack.

If you have not yet watched, I recommend this clip of Jon Stewart's finale speech at the Mall on Saturday. I don't agree with a lot of what Stewart says on most days. But I agree with a lot of what he says here.

And following on that: Brian Spears quit blogging about politics.

CSFFBT: 'The Skin Map' by Stephen Lawhead

This is going to be a slightly different take on this month's Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy Blog Tour. I haven't quite finished the book yet, and so will reserve more in-depth comments until tomorrow, when I will have finished it.

First, some notes first:

The Skin Map and
Author’s web site - http://www.stephenlawhead.com/

In short, about the book itself:

Lawhead is turning into one of those authors whose books I pick up with a sigh of relief, because a) I know it's going to be good and b) I know it's not going to make me crazy by proposing brain-breaking concepts.

(By 'brain-breaking' I don't mean twists on physics or large amounts of math - I mean things like "religion is for weak and stupid people" or "monarchies are great because of the order and stability they produce" or "carnivores are inheritantly evil".)

In The Skin Map Lawhead revisits one of the oldest of SF concepts - the alternate reality, visited by people from Our Earth. This has been used in a zillion ways, from Andre Norton's Here There Be Dragons (as well as the whole of the Witch World novels) through Stephen R. Donaldson's Chronicles of Thomas Covanant to Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere as well as countless less notable others.

(This is not to knock other examples of the subgenre as being despicable - I have as a special love the Crossroads series by Nick O'Donohoe, which Amazon tells me collectible sets of the original paperbacks are going for ungodly sums, and which was not, imo, all that terrific a fiction series, despite my deep love for the subject matter. Ahem. Moving on.)

I mention Neverwhere in particular because it, like Skin Map, uses the backdrop of London as its launching point to Someplace Else. As an rural American by birth and inclination, I am afraid I not ever going to Get the fascination with the layers of history wrapt in London. Lawhead, though, makes a better-than-usual job of creating a believably complex modern metropolis as well as an alternative (1600's) reality that doesn't have me shrugging off suspension of disbelief as 'too much like work'.

And that's actually not being fair - I was well and truly drawn into this book and its plot, and look forward to finishing it tomorrow. Reading it was only complicated by the fact that I've finished three (and a half) other books in the last week. Between them - Kage Baker's House of the Stag, a partial re-read of CJ Cherryh's Gate of Ivrel, Lois McMaster Bujold's Cryoburn and Connie Willis's All Clear, I am full, to the shallowest hair root, of alternate realities and timestream convolutions.

So when a Skin Map character - just in passing, or so it seems - takes steps to advert a major historical disaster (and so save thousands of lives) my warning bells go on. (Danger Will Robinson, Danger!) Because no good turn goes unpunished, and no modifications of the plan go unnoted, and nothing is so good as it looks.

I haven't read far enough to know if the danger-adverting is just windowdressing, or is actually treated with more depth later on. I'm looking forward to finding out.

Two - no, three other notes:

- The character of Wilhemina is turning out to be, oh, eight or nine times more awesome than I had thought she was going to be. (I was, frankly, expecting another Neverwhere-esque non-entity.)

- The *concept* of a skin map is great. It even evokes that old classic The Illustrated Man. But in the context of WWII and the final solution, I'm a bit twitchy about things made from people skins.

- The cover - eye, strange symbols, pyramids and London, all in red-orange - is awesome.

As I said, hopefully more, later. Meanwhile, other CSFSBT participants are:


Red Bissell
Thomas Clayton Booher
Keanan Brand
Grace Bridges
Beckie Burnham
Morgan L. Busse
Jeff Chapman
Christian Fiction Book Reviews
Valerie Comer
Karri Compton
Amy Cruson
CSFF Blog Tour
Stacey Dale
D. G. D. Davidson
George Duncan
April Erwin
Tori Greene
Ryan Heart
Bruce Hennigan
Timothy Hicks
Christopher Hopper
Becky Jesse
Cris Jesse
Becca Johnson
Jason Joyner
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Shannon McDermott
Allen McGraw
Matt Mikalatos
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Nissa
John W. Otte
Gavin Patchett
Sarah Sawyer
Chawna Schroeder
Kathleen Smith
Rachel Starr Thomson
Donna Swanson
Robert Treskillard
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Dona Watson
Phyllis Wheeler
Nicole White
Dave Wilson

Those other people out there that God also loves

Still tip-toeing back into journaling. Which has been complicated by new&different things at work, and the threat of new&exciting things at work.

It's good to have work. It's good to have purpose.

Two days ago I wrote 501 not-very-good-and-not-very-connected words. This is a win.

Yesterday I started re-sorting books throughout the house. Still in progress, but with the eventual goal of 'make the books you haven't read yet accessible. Oh, and sort the non-fiction by subject. And the fiction by author, so you can get rid of duplicates.'

Today I actually opened up Google Reader to read the blogs I'm supposed to be following on this blog.

Of note: Neil Gaiman suggests giving away books for Halloween. Brilliant.

Anchoress on 'purging' Bad Catholics. Related (at least in my head): Becky Miller talks about godly writers writing about ungodly things. (Maybe it's related in my head because of the Elizabeth Moon stuff.)

...I don't have a good answer. There is the commandment to love each other. There is the responsibility to not let badly-acting companions tempt one into doing what one should not. There is human weakness and avoiding the near occasion of sin. There is keeping ones mouth shut if one can't say anything, and there is refusing to sit by and fold ones hands.

My guess is that Christ would have a separate solution for each situation. Which sounds like work.

Speaking of which - On Steve Colbert's Catholicism.

Oh, and NaNoMo is coming.

Talking to tax collectors without coming across like a Pharsee

Last Sunday we had a guest lecturer priest - a missionary with Cross International. I can't speak for Cross International itself - this was the first I had heard of them - but the priest was straight out of the Catholic Worker "economic justice was Christ's first priority" school of faith.

For the record, I have never heard a rich person speak of the poor with the hate and loathing that many social justice advocates use when speaking of the rich.

I...have a hard time with that. [snip more in-depth comments as trending too close to the political] And I had a harder time with the presentation (taking the form of a homily). For me, who tithes a fair bit (although not as regularly or as much as I should) the homily nearly encouraged me to snatch money back *out* of the offering plate (metaphorically speaking.) And not because I don't doubt that there are people who need it - or that I am in need of giving it, regardless of the want on the other side. The homily was so much a one-sided (complete with cherry-picked scripture and tirades against 'rich corporations' who avoid paying taxes) blast against the wealthy (without, conveniently, defining 'wealth') that I was nearly (I hope) at the point of rolling my eyes.

The homily pretty much completely fit the label of "not helpful." It seemed to make the visiting priest feel better, though, and it did lead me to review my tithe schedule, so it wasn't completely a loss.

But I can't help thinking that maybe, given a different twist on the words, more could have been done.

There has been an on-going conversation in my house (for about five years now, on and off) about 'how to change people's minds'. And change their actions. How to fulfill the obligations of spiritual grace to admonish the sinner.

I don't have an answer, yet. But part of the answer is, I think, that yelling at people in righteous fury does more to make me feel better than it does to change the world. And, in this case 'make me feel better' is not in the sense of 'make me feel closer to God'. More is done, I think, by choosing the right words, the right time, and the right manner of speaking, in order to apply the right leverage at the right point in order to move a stone.

How to know the right words? Well, speaking to someone in French when all they speak is Mandarin is an example of 'not the right words.' Speaking disparagingly of treasured cultural icons of the listener is another. Speaking hatred instead of love is a third.

I have not found it easy to find the right words. It requires, I think, skill on the part of the speaker, a deep understanding of the message (so one can speak Truth and not just repeat a memorized magical script) and an understanding of the impact of particular words on the listener. So one must understand the listener. Usually by spending time with them, coming to understand what burdens they are struggling with, what their gifts are, what they value and what they hold lightly. Then one can more easily speak and have effect.

This is hard.

In part, it is hard because it means spending time with, and learning to put on the mind of those 'others', to better know how the message will be received. This not only means hanging out with 'horrid' people, but opens one up to the (wrong-headed) values that one was trying to change in the first place! Dangerous ground indeed.

Far safer, and easier, to stand at a distance and yell, than to step forward with open arms. And that's less of a metaphor than I would like, in today's age.

But it is also hard because it means we have to come to know and love the people we oppose. It means setting aside hate, distian and righteousness, and our own agendas, and taking on God's mission.

Tough stuff. I have never been able to pray St Francis's prayer ('grant that I may never seek so much to be understood as to understand') with ease - dadnabit, I'm right, can't you people see that? I do not trust easily. And I judge all too swiftly. I count it as a victory, now, years down this road, that I *know* I should understand, should forgive, should love, *first*, and not expect to only grant those gifts to those who have already understood, forgiven, and loved me.

It is only what the Man did - and expects of those of us who follow him -'love God with all your heart, all your mind, and all your soul, and love your neighbor as yourself.'

Onward, with tentive steps...

So, with a foundation down - not fully settled, not without a few cracks, but the road is clear, though rough in places. And if the rocks get thick, I have a staff to hand.

***

Via The Anchoress:

The Reapers Are The Angels. Zombies, which are at least not vampires.

Ron Rolheiser writes about crowds.

***

Walked to Mass this week. The number of joys and blessings wrapt up in that - that I can walk; that I will; that I found a house close to the church; that the weather was beautiful; that I have decent and yet practical clothes; that I have the time; that the world continues on as it has...too many to count.

If you want to hear God laugh, sit down and tell him about your plans

I actually don't know if I'm back yet.

It's the first day of fall - an ember-gold harvest moon hangs in the east, giving lie to the heat that lay over eastern Virginia all day - which is an odd time for new beginings. But no stranger, I think, than six days past the winter stolstice.

I've been reading Word Among Us again. This month, the articles are focusing on Mother Theresa. One piece, written by Mother Theresa's biographer, emphasized that, for twenty years before starting her Calcutta ministry among the poorest of the poor, Agnes was a professed sister: praying, serving, living in community.

She didn't just wake up, at 21 years of age, and become the person she was to be, when she died.

I'm not the person I'd like to be, eventually. Perhaps I should get started on that, again.

***

It's very difficult, even on a long deployment, to make many major adjustments to one's life. Many years ago, starting a year-long assignment in a remote area, I was advised to pick three things to work towards, over the coming 12 months. I thought this was a bit low, but pick three things I did. I'll add some others in a few months, I thought.

At the end of the year, I found that I had accomplished one of the original three, and was very pleased with myself.

I think, as a trial, I will pick one habit a month, set a reasonable/sustainable goal, and focus on that one for that month. The next month, I'll add another, and try to keep the first one going strong. My intent is not to drop all the things I'm doing part-time and only so-so, but to establish a foundation, first, and let the others 'hang fire' for a day - or three - while focused on one issue.

In keeping with 'first things first', the first is to re-focus on my prayer life.

***

Via Instapundit - an interesting post on environmentalism as religion. Also includes some information on Christian 'Creation Care'.

CSFF Blog Tour - North! or Be Eaten, by Andrew Peterson (Part I)

This is part one of what will hopefully be three parts of this month's Christian Science Fiction and Fantasy Blog Tour. The book of the month is North! or Be Eaten, by Andrew Peterson. It is part II of the Wingfeather Saga. The first book in the series is On the Edge of the Dark Sea, and I have not read it yet.

Actually, I haven't finished this one yet, either, as my order from Amazon took longer to get here than I had thought. (And I spent the weekend socializing instead of working being productive.)

This would be a good point to put in an FTC required disclaimer (The requirement of which is ridiculous, as print reviewers don't have to do this.) Anyway:

In conjunction with the CSFF Blog Tour, I have received no recompense or material from the publisher or any other person or entity.


What I can talk about:

The cover is beautiful - faux leather print, with ornate yellow typeset and a central illustration (in color) which strongly evokes (for this reader) the Golden Compass novels. I don't think this cover is aimed at the Christian Fiction Crowd, (for the extent that there is a CFC) but as a hook for the YA SFF audience, I think it's pretty smart.

(Other works evoked include Left Hand of Darkness and Thirty Days of Night, so make of that what you will.)

The interior is as striking as the cover, if not more so. Peterson uses interior illustrations (which appear to come from Barlowes - the Horned Hound is featured, among other interesting beasties) and short chapters. (As an aunt, I strongly approve of short chapters for reading to the younger set. Ten page chapters strain the throat.) He also uses footnotes, which I completely dig. (Not just on the cover, which has served Bujold's Baen-published Miles novels well, but inside the text as well.)

I will hopefully have more to say tomorrow, after I finish the book. Meanwhile, other members of the tour are listed below - check them out!

Brandon Barr
Justin Boyer
Amy Browning
CSFF Blog Tour
Stacey Dale
Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Todd Michael Greene
Ryan Heart
Timothy Hicks
Becky Jesse
Cris Jesse
Jason Joyner
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Dawn King
Rebecca LuElla Miller
New Authors Fellowship
Nissa
Donita K. Paul
Crista Richey
Chawna Schroeder
Andrea Schultz
James Somers
Steve and Andrew
Rachel Starr Thomson
Robert Treskillard
Fred Warren
Jason Waguespac
Phyllis Wheeler
Elizabeth Williams
KM Wilsher