Instructions for the race

After Hebrews 12:1-17 

Listen, runners: here are

instructions for the race.

Lift your drooping heads.

Strengthen those weak knees.

Make straight paths.

Strive for peace with all.

Strive for the holiness

known only to the Lord.

Share the grace.

Avoid bitterness.

Know your birthright is

worth more than a meal.

Accept the discipline

meant for your good.

Endure.

Endure to the end.

 

Photograph by Steve Lelham via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Sunday Readings

 

When Christian Groups Subvert Religious Liberty of Christians – Joe Carter at The Gospel Coalition.

 

Summer Reading for G.K. Chesterton – Joseph Pearce at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

Female Faith Poets: Where to Begin – Jody Collins at Poetry & Made Things. 

 

You’re Useless – Br. Gerard Rosario DeAngelis at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

Saturday Good Reads - June 22, 2024

Hell hath no fury like the federal government scorned – or caught doing something embarrassing. The U.S. government has sought the extradition of Julian Assange since the Obama Administration. His crime: committing journalism. Had The New York Times done the same thing (and did, back in Daniel Ellsberg days), no federal agents would come banging at the door. But times change.  

Conservative journalist Christopher Rufo learned that Texas Children’s Hospital was doing what had been outlawed by the state legislature. He was given chapter and verse, with names blanked out, of children still being operated on for transgender purposes. He wrote about it, and wrote about it again. And the feds have now come for the young doctor who was his source, with a 10-count indictment. A legal defense fund has now been set up for the doctor.

 

“A government with a permanent deficit and a bloated military. A bogus ideology pushed by elites. Poor health among ordinary people. Senescent leaders. Sound familiar?” Historian Niall Ferguson explains how we’re all soviets now.

 

In 1861, Missouri stayed in the Union – barely. The governor tried to lead the state into secession. The move to join the Confederacy was stopped with bloodshed, and it happened here in St. Louis. Tonya McQuade at Emerging Civil War describes how the “Wide Awakes” helped keep Missouri in the Union. 

 

More Good Reads

 

Life and Culture

 

Speaking Responsibly about Religion and Politics: A Review of Who’s Afraid of Christian Nationalism? – Paul Kruse at Front Porch Republic.

 

Techno-Terror: If It Drives You to Drink, Have a Drink with Me – David Murray at Writing Boots.

 

News Media

 

Washington Post Foreign Desk, Accused of Pro-Hamas Bias, Teems with Al Jazeera Veterans – Joseph Simonson at the Washington Free Beacon.

 

Israel

 

Israel’s Double-Edged Sword (Part II) – Michael Oren at Clarity with Michael Oren.

 

Faith

 

Let’s Hear It for the Second Parents – Tim Challies.

 

O, Brother – Sean Dietrick at Sean of the South.

 

Observations on Exvangelicals and Deconstructing – Jake Meador at Mere Orthodoxy.

 

The Man Who Introduced Evangelicals to C.S. Lewis – Justin Taylor at The Gospel Coalition.

 

Writing and Literature

 

Shakespeare Wrote Shakespeare – Henry Oliver at The Common Reader.

 

Reading War and Peace in Both War and Peace – Joel Miller at Miller’s Book Review.

 

The Taste of Strawberries: Tolkien’s Imagination of the Good – Jeffrey Bilbro at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

Metaphor Magic: Wield Your Pen Like a Wand – Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach.

 

British Stuff

 

The Markets of Old London – Spitalfields Life.

 

Defend Christian private schools – Steve Beegoo at The Critic Magazine.

 

Poetry

 

"Telling the Bees" by John Greenleaf Whittier – Sally Thomas at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

The Lord is by My Side – CityAlight

Painting: A Good Read, oil on canvas by Theodoros Ralli (1852-1909).

Discipline has a purpose

After Hebrews 12:1-17 

We are children, learning;

we are children inevitably

wayward, choosing the wrong,

ignoring the right. Because

we are loved, we are

disciplined.

 

It is sons who are disciplined,

sons and daughters, heirs,

disciplined to be trained

to endure the race,

the discipline running

with us in the race, keeping

in our lanes, propelling

us forward, training

us all the way, training

us because he loves

us.

 

Photograph by Candra Winata via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Friday Readings

 

Entropy of the Modern Mind – Greg Doles at Chasing Light.

 

From The Finding of the True Cross – hymn by Yared at Kingdom Poets (D.S. Martin). 

 

Fisher of Men – poem by Chris Slaten at Rabbit Room Poetry.

 

The Uselessness of Prayer – Trevin Wax at The Gospel Coalition.

 

Sacred Heart – artwork by Jack Baumgartner at The School for the Transfer of Energy. 

A Taste of Honey, Poetry & Love: An Interview with Laura Boggess - T.S. Poetry.

"From the Ashes" by Damien Boyd

An elderly widow has been found dead in her home. The attending doctor diagnoses natural causes, but a rather clever young policewoman tells her partner that they’re to report any death of an elderly person, according to a note on the Avon and Somerset Police Department’s intranet. They do, and soon enough, Detective Chief Inspector Nick Dixon visits the scene. And he quickly sees that the woman has been strangled.  

A similar case had been reported in a neighboring police jurisdiction, that of an elderly man initially believed to have died of natural causes. It turned out that he, too, had been strangled. A regional task force is created, and Dixon is made an Acting Superintendent so that Avon and Somerset can keep control.

 

Both victims were teachers from the same seaside community. They taught at different schools but likely knew each other. But Dixon and his team, which includes his partner Jane Winters now six-months pregnant with their child, can’t find anything else that might be a connecting point or a reason for their deaths. That is, until there’s a third murder, and a chance remark leads to the first breakthrough in the case.

 

Damien Boyd

The victims played for the same bridge club team. And, 20 years before, they were all in Torquay for a tournament the night the tournament hotel burned down, killing three people. And it’s that discovery from which Dixon moves the investigation forward. 

 

From the Ashes is the 14^th DCI Nick Dixon mystery by British writer Damien Boyd, and it’s a clear winner in the series. Boyd keeps Dixon (and the reader) guessing as he builds the tension and then brings the story together in a thrilling conclusion.

 

Boyd uses his own experience as a legal solicitor and a member of the Crown Prosecution Service to frame his stories. And that knowledge and experience is telling. He understands how policemen do their work, how prosecutions operate, and what happens when a former tax lawyer (Dixon) brings his very unorthodox thinking to police work. 

 

Boyd has to do a 15^th entry in the series; we want to find out about Nick and Jane’s wedding, the baby, the politics at police headquarters. And we want another cracking good tale.

 

Related:

My review of Damien Boyd’s As the Crow Flies.

 

My review of Damien Boyd’s Head in the Sand.

 

My review of Damien Boyd’s Kickback.

 

My review of Damien Boyd’s Swansong.

My review of Damien Boyd's Dead Level.

 

My review of Damien Boyd’s Death Sentence.

 

My review of Damien Boyd’s Heads or Tails.

 

My review of Damien Boyd’s Dead Lock.

 

My review of Damien Boyd’s Beyond the Point.

 

My review of Down Among the Dead by Damien Boyd.

 

My review of Dying Inside by Damien Boyd.

 

My review of Carnival Blues by Damien Boyd.

 

My review of Death Message by Damien Boyd. 

 

Some Thursday Readings

 

Nicholas Kristoff tries to figure out who destroyed the West Coast – Stephen Miller at The Spectator.

 

Yesterday’s Men: The death of the mythical method – Alan Jacobs at Harper’s Magazine.

 

The odd couple: Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene – Jeffrey Meyers at The Critic Magazine.

 

Red Marks, a Dark Teesside short story by Glenn McGoldrick, is free on Amazon today.

 

What Comes After Liberalism? – John Horvat at The Imaginative Conservative. 

The Unexpected Ballerina

The summer issue of Cultivating Oaks Press is live online, and the theme is courage. It includes a short story I wrote, "The Unexpected Ballerina." The issue is chock full of articles, poems, photography, and more by Annie Nardone, Junius Johnson, Maribeth Barber Albritton, Amelia Friedline, Kris Comely, Justin Lee Parker, Amy Wevodau Malskeit, Rob Jones, and more, under the general editorship of Lancia Smith. It's a wonderful issue.

How I Came to Social Media

It was work that originally led me to sign up for Twitter and other social media platforms. For a number of years, social media became my work. Even when I retired, I was still managing the company’s social media platforms. 

From 2003 to 2004, I spent nine months working in communications for St. Louis Public Schools, which was in dire straits. Enrollment had declined to an official 40,000 from a peak of about 100,000, and the district was still operating school buildings, a headquarters building, and an administrative staff that supported a 100,000 enrollment. A management firm was hired by a reform school board to take over and do the painful stuff that had to be done. The management firm was in place all of two days when it discovered that the district was bankrupt.

To continue reading, please see my post today at Dancing Priest.

Photograph by Sara Kurfeß via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Wednesday Readings

 

R.E. Lee, the father: Great tickle fighter and more – JoAnna McDonald at Emerging Civil War. 

 

How Normandy Remembers the Only U.S. Military Chaplain Killed on D-Day – Blake Stilwell 

at Military.com. 

 

Book Notes: Union General Daniel Butterfield – Civil War Books & Authors. 

A Poetic Masterwork: "The Shield of Achilles" by W.H. Auden

In 1948, poet W.H. Auden (1907-1973) received the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for The Age of Anxiety, a long poem in six parts that addressed the search for identity and meaning in an industrialized world that was constantly changing. His poetry was already recognized as among the very best being published; the native-born Englishman and naturalized American occupied the top, or almost top, of the poetic literary world. 

The poem reflects an event in Auden’s life that would become more pronounced as he grew older. He had embraced religious faith, and his poetry was increasingly reflecting that acceptance. But his poetry was also developing into a more cohesive entity, with poems informing and relating to each other in a directed and consistent way. 

That cohesiveness (critics usually call it coherence) blossomed into full maturity with Auden’s 1955 collection The Shield of Achilles. It’s a remarkable work, not only for how the individual poems relate to each other but for Auden’s mastery of language that is often stunning.

To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.

Some Tuesday Readings

 

The Necessity of Continual Pitching – Terry Whalin at The Writing Life.

 

Grandmother – poem by Eva Salzman at Every Day Poems.

 

6.16.2024 – poem by Paul Wittenberger at Paul’s Substack.

 

How to Sell Your Next Book – Harvey Stanbrough at The New Daily Journal. 

James Boswell’s East End – Spitalfields Life.