Department Of Lost In Translation
“Thank you for helping us protect the habitats and wildlife of Connemara National Park. When you enjoy responsible outdoor recreation here, you help us preserve the Connemara wilderness and everything that makes it unique.”
(Intro to the Protect Nature/Useful Tips page
of the Connemara National Park’s website
Certainly, the Irish have a unique way of seeing the world. Despite knowing this, while starting to research visiting Ireland’s Connemara National Park moiself did a double take when I came upon this symbol on the park’s website, under the heading of “dispose of waste properly.” It was only after I read the accompanying blurb that I realized it was referring to garbage and litter, rather than…uh…human…waste.
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Department Of Things That Never Get Old [1]
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Department Of Blast From The Past
Sub-Department Of Genius, Schmenius
Perhaps I’ve told this story before; perhaps I’ll tell it again someday.
Dateline:
…more like 26-ish years ago. This memory prompt happened earlier this week, when I drove past the turn off road that led to our offspring’s favorite preschool/day care ( the owner/teacher called it, “Kids in the Country”), which was on a farm in southwest Hillsboro. I remembereded how enchanted I was when, one day after I picked up son K from KITC, we spent the ride home with him telling me about the life cycle of an aphid ( KITC’s project that week had been getting the kids to look intently at plants growing in the field, and learning about the insects that lived – either symbiotically or parasitically – on and around the plants ). Stories like that from K were plentiful; the KITC kids spent a lot of time playing and observing “nature” in the fields surrounding the house.
One afternoon when I’d picked him up from KITC, K was unusually – as in, completely – quiet. I glanced at him occasionally via the rear-view mirror; he seemed to be mulling over something. Eventually, apropos of nothing, he spoke up.
K:
“Mom?”
Moiself:
Yes?”
K:
“Ball and tall rhyme, but ball and boy illiterate.”
Moiself:
“That’s correct.”
Moiself was gob-smacked; my heart swelled with parental pride ( read: hubris ) as I thought, He’s not yet five years old, yet K knows the difference between rhyme and alliteration! I’m raising a effin’ genius.
Before my brain completed the thought, Belle, strapped in her car seat next to K, said something which annoyed him. He turned to face his younger sister and spouted:
“Poo-poo stinky baby butt face!”
Mission control to Robyn; please return to earth.
OK, that’s more like it.
Sure, and every kid gets a trophy.
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Department Of Random Thoughts About Random Chance
But first, a recommendation for a podcast listen:
“ ‘ Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.’
It’s been 45 years since John Lennon sang that line, yet it’s an idea that continues to speak to an uncomfortable truth. While we all like to think we have some measure of control over how our lives will unfold, our plans are often upended by unknown events and curveballs we couldn’t have predicted. This week, we conclude our Wellness 2.0 series by talking with political scientist Brian Klaas. He studies how we respond to the random events that shape our lives….”
( excerpts from the introduction/ description of
“Wellness 2.0: The Art Of The Unknown”Hidden Brain podcast, 1-27-25 ).
I’ve often thought that the study of random chance and luck – or just the acknowledgment of their existence – might reduce human hubris in the world. [2] In some religious traditions and theologies, it’s almost heresy to speak of randomness events as having significant consequences in peoples’ lives, because the acknowledgement of that truth poses a problem for the quasi-spirituality of Everything happens for a reason – a daft phrase which sugar coats a difficult truth (“I don’t know why that happened/Hey, shit happens”).
Many people, and almost all religious worldviews, do not respond well to randomness. This is because the certitude with which they promote themselves/their theologies (“we/our god/the great spirit of the cosmos has all the answers and is in control, don’t you worry”) erodes in the face of the admission of unpredictability. New Age, woo-woo spiritualities have this problem as well.
Personally, moiself thinks the next person who offers me Everything happens for a reason as a response to and/or an explanation for human tragedy should be pelted by moiself with chains of spiky, healing crystals. Then, when the Everything happens for a reason numbskull asks, WTF is up?!?, I will respond with something along the lines of, “Well, it’s like you said: Everything happens for a reason, and since this thing is happening to you, it is happening for a reason…and I must have a pretty good reason to want to shove this rainbow moonstone [3] up your ass.”
More on this next week.
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Department Of Lost In Translation, The Pathetic Sequel
“Pope Francis sharply criticized U.S. President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown in an unusual open letter to America’s Catholic bishops…, saying criminalising migrants and taking measures built on force ‘will end badly.’.
The pope, who last month called Trump’s plan to deport millions of migrants a ‘disgrace,’ said it was wrong to assume that all undocumented immigrants were criminals.
‘I exhort all the faithful of the Catholic Church … not to give in to narratives that discriminate against and cause unnecessary suffering to our migrant and refugee brothers and sisters,’ said the pontiff….
‘What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly,’ he said.
In Tuesday’s letter, Francis also appeared to respond indirectly to Vice President JD Vance’s defence of the deportations.
Vance, a Catholic, defended the crackdown in a January social media post by referring to an early Catholic theological concept known as the ‘ordo amoris,’ or ‘order of love,’ to suggest that Catholics must give priority to non-immigrants.
The pope said: ‘The true ‘ordo amoris’ that must be promoted (is) … by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.’ “
( “Pope Francis tells US bishops Trump’s immigration policy ‘will end badly’,”
Reuters, 2-11-25 )
It was inevitable. Catholic convert and he-who-puts-the-Vice-in-Vice-President, JD Lance – if for no other reason than to counter criticism of his principles after he was compassion and theology-shamed by his pope – was gonna have to speak about love.
But Vance’s version of love, like that of the love often spoken of/taught by patriarchal religions, is hierarchal.
Just as there is a conservative Christian hierarchy of family – god, husband, wife, children – there is also in that worldview a hierarchy, a prioritization, of love. First you love here, then you love there; first, you love this, your god, and *then* you can love your family, and then you can love your neighbor, and then you can love your… As a circle widens you can finally drop the possessive – “your” – and, assuming there’s some leftovers, try to love those people who have little or no personal relationship to you.
In this politically conservative-informed theology, you love your deity first, then “you love your family and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country, and then after, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world” as Vance told a Fox News interviewer.
Y’all who subscribe to (or used to, or don’t any more but still have some admiration for) Jesus’s all inclusive, the-well-never-runs-dry teachings about love, might be interested in the Gospel of Vance, in which Jesus’ lessons from scripture translates thusly:
America First.
I know; a link to a Fox News interview with JD Vance. Ick. I had to do an industrial strength sanitization to my eyes and the ears after listening to the clip, and then my fingers and keyboards after providing the link:
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Freethinkers’ Thought Of The Week [4]
“Since opposed principles, or ideologies, are irreconcilable, wars fought over principle will be wars of mutual annihilation. But wars fought for simple greed will be far less destructive, because the aggressor will be careful not to destroy what he is fighting to capture.
Reasonable – that is, human – men will always be capable of compromise, but men who have dehumanized themselves by becoming the blind worshipers of an idea or an ideal are fanatics whose devotion to abstractions makes them the enemies of life.”
( Alan Watts, The Way Of Zen )
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May you cherish the memory of when you understood
the difference between rhyme and alliteration;
May you acknowledge Random Chance and her sister, Luck;
May you see the life that happens while you’re making other plans;
…and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
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[1] At least, to ever-youthful moiself. Welcome to yet another new feature of the new year, which may continue on the third Friday of each month. Or…not.
[2] Particularly that of the “I Pulled Myself Up By My Own Bootstraps” variety.
[3] “Rainbow Moonstone – Infused with feminine energy, this stone promotes the wisdom to accept the rise and fall, as well as the changing cycles in creative life. Constantly forcing creative energy can actually hold us back – this potent crystal helps us to go with the ebb and flow.” ( The World’s Most Powerful Crystals )
[4] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
