the problem of pain and the abolition of man

"Now the proper good of a creature is to surrender itself to its Creator--to enact intellectually, volitionally, and emotionally, that relationship which is given in the mere fact of its being a creature."

"Everyone has noticed how hard it is to turn our thoughts to God when everything is going well with us. We 'have all we want' is a terrible saying when 'all' does not include God. We find God an interruption. As St. Augustine says somewhere, 'God wants to give is something, but cannot, because our hands are full--there's nowhere for Him to put it.' Or as a friend of mine said, 'We regard God as an airman regards his parachute; its there for emergencies but he hopes he'll never have to use it.'"

"We can rest contentedly in our sins and in our stupidities; and anyone who has watched gluttons shovelling down the most exquisite foods as if they did not know what they are eating, will admit that we can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world."

"Prostitutes are in no danger of finding their present life so satisfactory that they cannot turn to God: the proud, the avaricious, the self-righteous, are in that danger."

"If God were a Kantian, who would not have us till we came to Him from the purest and best motives, who could be saved?"

-- All from The Problem of Pain, by C.S. Lewis



"The operation of The Green Book and its kind is to produce what may be called Men without Chests. It is an outrage that they should be commonly spoken of as Intellectuals. This gives them the chance to say that he who attacks them attacks Intelligence. It is not so. They are not distinguished from other men by any unusual skill in finding truth nor any virginal ardour to pursue her. Indeed it would be strange if they were: a persevering devotion to truth, a nice sense of intellectual honour, cannot be long maintained without the aid of a sentiment which Gaius and Titius could debunk as easily as any other. It is not excess of thought but defect of fertile and generous emotion that marks them out. Their heads are no bigger than the ordinary: it is the atrophy of the chest beneath that makes them seem so.

"And all the time—such is the tragi-comedy of our situation—we continue to clamour for those very qualities we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civilization needs is more 'drive', or dynamism, or self-sacrifice, or 'creativity'. In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful."

-- The Abolition of Man, by C.S. Lewis

busy bourne finds his chest and burns his white-ness away

School starts on the 20th. Busyness is around the corner, but I am more excited than anxious. I need to meet with my adviser and schedule my classes for the semester. There's a possibility I may be adding the teaching credential program into my studies so I can teach if I so choose after I graduate, and I am also hoping to have the time to study abroad in Spain, Italy, or London. Much of this seems highly unlikely as I am already behind in my studies, and only have time for 9 units this semester as opposed to the 16 or 18 I should be taking. With work and the possibility of a rent expense coming (I'm thinking of moving out soon) my time is going to be extremely limited and my funds sparse if existent at all (another blow to the study abroad plan). Yay for school bills, car insurance, and that damned Walmart down the street.

But other than a few things on my mind, I'm good. I saw the Bourne Ultimatum over the weekend, read the first section of The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis (which you can find here if you don't have a copy), and went to the beach on Sunday. Ultimatum was excellent, Abolition was just as intriguing as it was 5 years ago, and the beach was a good time. I only have one gripe about the beach, though: it closes at 10pm. This wasn't really a problem on Sunday because I was with family and staying that late just doesn't happen. But when you're 22, in college, and have a fetish for bon-fires and cathartic star gazing, 10pm is entirely too early. Most events for the college-age crowd don't even begin until 11 or 12 anyway. Ten seems unreasonable to me. Even 12 is a bit early. Two in the morning is just about right. If I had more time and energy I'd write some long, elegant, and slightly arrogant letter to some big honcho in Huntington Beach about the ills of a 10pm curfew in one of the most famous beaches in the world. But I don't go often enough, and it wouldn't have done any good anyway. No one listens to 22-year-old know-it-alls. That's so not fair. Don't they understand the genius that I am? Gosh!

Anywho, I got burned again at the beach (yes, black people burn believe it or not, it just takes longer). I got burned for the first time in my life when I went fishing a few weeks ago, and then again this weekend. I know what you're thinking: "first time?? Why are you complaining?" I'm not really. In fact, I am more thankful because of it. It may hurt a bit, but I can sleep without the horror of turning pink in the sun like some of you crackers. Nevertheless, I spent much of Monday soothing my double-burned, peeling shoulders with some lotion. It has Aloe Vera in it. That makes it special.

P.S. (a run-on) I love (not really, but you know what I mean) how I can call white people "crackers", but if you so much as look at me cross-eyed I can sue you and your dog for everything you guys are worth and win, and then I can watch as you and your dog go to prison and get brutally raped by some distant cousin of mine over and over again whilst the officials turn a blind eye in fear of being sued themselves for "discrimination" and end up getting put behind bars and violated by the very person with the very crime that they timidly whispered and hinted about in a public address a few months earlier. Now that is messed up.

(I'd be lost without the words "and" and "but".)