Saturday, August 31, 2024

Saturday Good Reads - Aug, 31, 2024


It was 1993 or 1994, and I was attending a men’s weekend conference in downtown Indianapolis. At lunchtime, there was a break, and people wandered all over downtown, or were checking out the conference sales booths. I was wandering inside the convention arena, and I heard some music. I strolled over to what turned out to be a 45-minute impromptu concert by Steven Curtis Chapman. This past week, Chapman reflected on his career and what’s next

Mark Zuckerberg wrote an extraordinary letter to Congress this week. Whether it was getting out in front of bad news, damage control, an apology, or all of the above, it still made headlines. Yes, Facebook was pressured to censor news on COVID, the Hunter Biden laptop, and other topics. And, yes, it did occasionally cave. And now we see that our Federal Bureau of Investigation interfered in the 2020 presidential election. See “Zuckerberg Defies the Borg.”

 

In the 1970s, few religious topics gathered more interest that the Shroud of Turin, purported to be the burial cloth of Jesus. It was supposedly definitively debunked as a medieval creation, but the legend lives on. A new form of X-ray dating says the cloth dates to at least 73 A.D., and an artificial intelligence image generator has recreated the face of the figure in the shroud. And “A Face in the Shroud“ is indeed haunting.

 

More Good Reads

 

British Stuff

 

Shattered Illusions: The record of the authorities defies denials of two-tier policing – Alex Story at The Critic Magazine.

 

The rise of cultural Christianity – Madeleine Davies at The New Statesman.

 

Faith

 

My Church Weeps with Me – Lara d’Entremont at A Faithful Imagination. 

 

The Doves Didn’t Go Anywhere – Shane Morris at Digital Liturgies.

 

Life and Culture

 

Beyond Scandal: The 2024 presidential election invites a sense of realism – Christopher Rufo at City Journal. 

 

Who Has Children Anymore Anyway? – Ben Christenson at Front Porch Republic.

 

Music

 

“Beyond the Sea” by Bobby Darin – Debra Esolen at Word & Song.

 

Writing and Literature

 

On the Trail of Five Red Herrings, a Sayers Novel That Stands Apart – Martin Edwards at CrimeReads.

 

How Henry VIII accidentally changed the way we write history – Raphaelle Goyeau at The Conversation.

 

Poetry

 

“The Loon,” poem by Lew Sarett – Sally Thomas at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

How Coleridge plays with your mind with “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” – Lucasta Miller at The Spectator. 

 

Sitting Down Discipline –Eva Pankratz at Rabbit Room Poetry.

 

“Ulysses,” poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

American Stuff

 

An Opinion of Doubleday – Chris Kolakowski at Emerging Civil War.

 

The red star returns – Gary Saul Morson at New Criterion.

 

Ode to Joy – Royal Albert Hall, London

 


Painting: The Reading, oil on canvas by Vittorio Reggianini (1858-1938).

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