Month: September 2022

Collateral Damage

One advantage for our neighbors: all this wind has blown down the excessive Halloween decorations of one of our friendly neighbors.

Volleyball Tuesday

The Girl’s team played Woodmont High today — where three of her former teammates play. Mauldin is the team to beat right now, and when the home team went up four points on us, the crowd was going wild.

Then our girls got their act together and won by four points.

There’s always a bit of an advantage, I think, being the underdog on the home court. You really have nothing to lose, and if you hype yourself up enough (and you actually have the skills), you can convince yourself you can win. And then when you are winning, when it looks like you might pull off an upset (at least one set), your confidence soars. Until you start making mistakes, the favorites start coming back, and you start doubting yourself.

So Mauldin came from behind to win the first set 25-21, and in the second set, they did what I believe they felt they’d do the first set: they won 25-15. The third set was 25-18 or something like that, but they came close to losing the first set due to underestimating the opposition.

“Plus,” the Girl explained, “everyone thinks we’re the team to beat, so they play their best against us.”

After a tough club season last year, it’s good to see the Girl winning again.

Evening Swim Plus

Monday for us is YMCA night — swimming. The outdoor pool is still open, and while the air is cool, the water is surprisingly warm. Sometimes we go as a family (minus the Girl, who’s always doing something else), and sometimes it’s just the boys, along with a friend from time to time.

I try to swim some laps, but I usually get to about 500 yards, and I’m exhausted. My arms burn; my pulse is racing; my legs hurt.

What gives me a sickening feeling is the thought that when I swam competitively in high school, we used to do 600-yard swim/kick/pull (200 yards of each) as the first part of our warm-up.

Still Off

My favorite cult leader predicted a specific date for Jesus’s return yet again. It was supposed to happen today. That’s at least 5 days I know of that David Pack has predicted Jesus will return. He’s batting a solid 000. Why anyone still supports the hack is a mystery to me.

Evening Walk

We’ve overseeded our front yard and seeded our backyard. Not “overseeded” because after we started having our yard sprayed for weeks regularly, everything in the backyard died. Because it was all weeds.

This means, though, that our dear Clover is an inside dog for the next month or so as everything takes root and grows. So we take her on a lot more walks, which means we get to see lovely fall scenes like this.

Thoughts on Tomorrow

“I don’t want to be recorded.” I looked up and saw Thompson and thought at first she was joking, that she was sort of pretending to be a student. A sort of inside joke: “We both know that’s coming.” But I know her well enough to realize she doesn’t have that kind of deftness. I don’t think she even knows how to make a joke. I can’t remember what I said — I was standing by the computer, working to get everything ready for the class as they entered, and my attention was not focused on what she was doing.

“I don’t want to be recorded,” she said again, confirming what I’d suspected: she wasn’t joking.

“Okay, we can talk about this in just a moment. I’m trying to get things ready for class.” That’s what I said; what I thought was, “What in the hell is she talking about? Is she serious? How does she function in the school? Does she not realize that she’s recorded all the time? In stores. In homes possibly. Everywhere.” I kept trying to get things going and again I hear it.

“I don’t want to be recorded.”

At this point, I was thinking that we’d have an issue about this in the future, but I was slowly realizing that she wanted me to comply then. “Oh, I’m so sorry. Let me turn that off,” is what she was expecting to hear. She wasn’t letting me know that she wanted this to be taken into consideration in the future. She wanted it then.

“Well, I’m sorry,” I responded, still trying to get the materials ready for the next class, most of whom were in the room at that point.

By this time, she was getting noticeably upset. “I don’t want to be recorded,” she said again, at which point I almost said, “Jesus, lady — you’re as bad as the kids.”

In the end, she said she was going to go to the library, and I could send some kids there. By this time, the class was spiraling out of control because I was dealing with a teacher acting like a four-year-old instead of applying the same routine I’ve used daily. Once I got everything under control, the phone rang. It was Allison in the front office.

“Mrs. Thompson won’t be with you today,” she began, and I thought, “Jesus — I know this. You don’t have to tell me she’s in the library.” Instead, she continued, “She’s gone home.”


I’ve been thinking on and off all weekend about tomorrow and what that might be like. I have no idea what Thompson is going to be like; I have no clue what she’s going to say to me, to Davis, to Finley. She’s not the most reasonable person I’ve ever met, and she’s certainly not the sharpest person I’ve ever encountered, so I have this not-so-latent fear that it will be a disaster tomorrow.

Best-case scenario: I apologize and say I could have handled it better, and she says she was perhaps a little unreasonable. I volunteer to limit recording of the class in the future, and she suggests that it shouldn’t be too big of a deal, that it’s something she could get used to. I don’t see that kind of introspection in the woman, though, so I doubt that will happen.

Worst-case scenario 1: she quits, and the whole Special Ed program gets thrown into disarray. Four teachers (Haenlein, Hinner, presumably Woodard, and I) would all lose our inclusion teacher, and I have no idea the legal repercussions of that. Truth be told, the woman is more of a hindrance than help in class with her continual tendency to begin talking to students privately while I’m addressing the whole class. (Bringing that up will now be tiresome.) So not having her in class would not be a problem for me at all. But there’s the legal issue with compliance for the IEP.

Worst-case scenario 2: she becomes passively-aggressively disruptive in class. I don’t know if that is realistic: she doesn’t seem like she’s sharp enough to pull that off, truth be told.

Worst-case scenario 3: I get in trouble for what happened. That’s unlikely: I’ve already spoken to Davis about it, and her reaction reassured me, as did Haenlein’s and Rutzer’s.

What will actually happen will likely be something I’ve not foreseen, something completely unexpected. And I’ll deal with it like an adult.

Friday

Some days are so weird, so unexpected, so strange, so off-kilter that when everything finally calms down, when everything finally slows enough that you can take stock of the day, that you can take a breath and exhale slowly, that you can reflect on the oddities of the last 14 hours — those days reach that celestial moment, and you can only smile and ask, “What the hell was that?”

More Predictions

Dave Pack is at it again. He’s predicting Jesus’s return within the next nineteen hours:

19 Hours

In case that’s not clear, that’s tomorrow:

2 Choices (Tomorrow)

We can forgive him for not having figured it out sooner — after all, no one else has figured this out:

Figured it out

He’s figured out lots of other things, so we should be grateful for that.

Tickle

He’d predicted this earlier, and it didn’t come to pass, but in the end, he was just a day off. A day and nine years:

9 Years off

Still, it’s a relief to know the return of Jesus is happening tomorrow.

At least, that’s what he said on 17 September…

Serve

Middle School Volleyball

I try to support my students by attending one of their sporting events. Tonight, I watched the girls play a volleyball game.

So very different from the volleyball I’ve become accustomed to. Beginners are fun to watch, but they can be sadly predictable with the occasional lack of skill. It’s all part of the learning curve, no doubt.

Exchange

But God is NOT a commanding officer, now is He??

Of course, he is.

Who made him commanding office? One of higher authority had to do so. So who was it?

Don’t be silly with semantics. You know what I meant.

As you do mine. God IS and IS in command. So why do you rebel against your commander? And don’t pull this crap that He’s not YOUR commander.

But he’s not. Sorry — had to pull it.

What any rebel should say. Any treasonous rebel. Any delusional, treasonous rebel.

I’ll bet you just can’t wait to be in heaven watching me writhe in hell, right?

But what about YOU??? Evidently you wrote and then deleted. Afraid of your own lie? Yeah it’s hard work figuring new ways to ignore truth. Why are you avoiding the issue?

I originally said that there’s no hate like Christian love. You’re a great example of that. Then I thought you’d probably say something like, “I look forward to watching you roast,” or some such nonsense. I’m not afraid of anything; I’m not ignoring the truth; I’m not avoiding any issues. I just don’t believe. But I’m not dripping with only slightly concealed hatred like you are.

Why is it “hatred” to say you are a rebel against God? Or why is EVERYTHING that is a contrary view labeled “hatred” by you people?? It’s like the only verb you know.

So many Christians can’t see themselves as others see them. It’s a form of hatred because it’s a judgment made on a personal standard that insinuates that joy I suggested you feel when you contemplate me in hell. It suggests that you will stand in judgment alongside your god and say with mock sadness, “Lord, you know best, but of course, I can’t say anything about this miserable wretch other than to say he’s rebelled against you — which of course you already know, Lord,” all the while anticipating getting watch me get my dues. “I told you so!” you can say. So on second thought, perhaps it’s not hatred as much as childishness.

And how others see is always right and correct, huh? So we must cater to what YOU think? How bout non-Christians can’t see themselves the way God sees them? And once again, the unbeliever makes a shambles of Christian doctrine while congratulating himself in his mockery. Dude…we were ALL rebels. We say nothing about you that we couldn’t say of ourselves.

“How bout non Christians can’t see themselves the way God sees them?” — See? You’re speaking for your god, standing by his side and passing judgment, eager to see your so-called enemy cast into the flames. As for “And once again, the unbeliever makes a shambles of Christian doctrine while congratulating himself in his mockery.” — I don’t even see where that came from. I watched a couple of your videoes, so I know you have a real persecution complex like so many Christians, and you’ll read into things persecution that’s not even there, but I wasn’t even talking about any Christian doctrine. I was talking about your attitude. This whole thing started with me making an off-hand comment about the Christian god being a sort of commander-in-chief (You know, like “Onward Christian Soldiers”?), and you’ve blown this up into — I don’t even know what. I’m just shaking my head in disbelief: I don’t get you or your attitude. I never said anything derogatory about Christians or Christian beliefs. I just made a silly comment. Calm down, man. This has gotten way out of hand: you’re frothing at the mouth.

No I’m nailing you to the wall for bring so flippant. You make it sound like you’re not even referring to Christianity. Liar. Persecution complex? Not here, bud. You don’t know what that is anymore more than you understand rebellion.

I read that imagining John Wayne was saying it. Very effective.

Please identify this “hate”. You make reference to it but do not state what you consider hateful.

I did. A few comments ago. (That comment didn’t sound so great in a John Wayne voice. I was hoping for more “nail you to the wall” kind of bravado.)

Champions

L’s high school team won a local tournament with about 12 teams competing.

Perception

We have an epidemic of NHIs in the eighth grade. NHI is the code we enter for a graded assignment the student failed to turn in. Not Handed In.

I had a talk with my classes about the issue. On Thursday, I had students in each class guess the number of NHIs in their class for English. There were three options:

  • Fewer than 15
  • Between 15 and 25
  • More than 25

The two English I classes were certain they had between 15 and 25 per class. The two English 8 classes were certain they had fewer than 15.

The results for all classes were the exact opposite of what they expected.

The English 8 students refer to the English I (high school English) classes as “the smart kids’ class.”

“They’re not the smart kids class,” I always reply, but Friday, when I revealed the results, I added, “They’re simply the do-the-work kids class.”

Genocide

The commands to genocide in the Old Testament are particularly troubling for most people except for the most basic, literal-thinking fundamentalist (Protestant or Catholic). For them is simple: God said it, so it’s morally right. Most other Christians take a little more nuanced approach — at least the ones who know about the passages and want to deal with them honestly.

Capturing Christianity — a YouTube apologetics channel — invited Dr. Randal Rauser, who describes himself as “progressively evangelical, generously orthodox, rigorously analytic, [and] revolutionary Christian thinking,” to discuss the troubling passages. He wrote Jesus Loves Canaanites, a book that deals with the various Christian attempts to explain these passages. I listened to the interview on my run this evening, and two things stood out.

How do we make sense of the fact that God is supposed to be love and yet he commands all these awful things? Surely this creates some cognitive dissonance that Christians want to deal with. How do we deal with it?

Rauser explains that, in dealing with these passages, Christians need to “develop different reading strategies to minimize the cognitive dissonance that is created when we read these passages.” Earlier he mentions a new convert who discovered these passages and found them troubling, and Rauser suggests that new converts who haven’t been “inculcated” with these reading habits might find these passages to be stumbling blocks to their faith. It’s interesting that he uses the word “inculcated” because the definition Oxford is “instill (an attitude, idea, or habit) by persistent instruction.” Persistent instruction — drilling this into one’s head. So in order to deal with these issues, one has to have drilled into one’s head certain reading habits. What are these habits?

One of them is to ask if a given interpretation develops a love of God and man. If it doesn’t, it’s not the intended interpretation. But this puts the cart before the horse: one should not have to read the Bible with an ideal interpretive framework in place that automatically defaults to erring on the side of the Bible. That’s not critical study; that’s mindless acceptance.

Another reading technique is to apply what we know about God and ask if a certain interpretation reflects that.

He uses the extreme example of Dena Schlosser, who in 2004 used a knife to amputate the arms of her eleven-month-old baby because it was a sacrifice God had asked her to make. Rauser insists that

the vast majority of people today, we don’t even give it a moment’s consideration that God possibly willed such a thing to happen because we believe it is fundamentally inconsistent with who God is. And we would say, maybe she was influenced by a demonic entity or she is mentally ill, schizophrenic or something else, but what we don’t think seriously is that God maybe or possibly commanded that.

Yet I don’t see why we can’t imagine God commanding that: he did command Abraham to do just the same thing. If we’re going to accept that Abraham was justified in what he did, we have to at least consider that Schlosser was justified in what she did. After all, who are we to say that God wasn’t talking to her?

But of course, we will say that because it’s the only thing we can say. To suggest that God might be getting back into the business of having people slaughter each other at his bidding opens up such potential chaos and terror that it’s unimaginable.

A favorite question of skeptics when the story of Abraham and Isaac comes up is to ask the Christian, “What would you do if God commanded you to kill your child?” Most Christians will hem and haw and suggest that they’d have themselves checked into a hospital to check for mental illness and yet at the same time deny that possibility for Abraham.

I commend Rauser for dealing with the issue, but like Trent Horn, he seems just to be offering possible ways out that allow a Christian some breathing room from the crowding cognitive dissonance that rattles thinking Christians’ faith.

Strawman

This whole discussion starts with a sort of ad hominem attack on Harris, suggesting his view is “naive” and (later) silly. That’s amusing since all Harris was doing was paraphrasing the basic core of the Biblical account of the ascension and second coming. There’s a literal up motion and a down motion: Up toward the sky for the ascension, down toward earth for the second coming. All this “vast” and “rich” and “nuanced” theory that Davis presents is simply modern apologists’ attempts at recasting these events in a way that doesn’t so clearly contradict science. The fact is simple: for most of Christian history, a literal upward motion to heaven above us and vice versa was the only understanding. If you’re criticizing Harris’s view, you are in fact criticizing the Biblical account. All the theories Davis presents are simply speculative apology that has absolutely no support in the Biblical text.

Return

The Girl has been sidelined for three weeks with a badly-sprained ankle. She did physical therapy the entire time, and last week she was hoping to get the go-ahead to return to play. Instead, her therapist told her, “You can return to practice, but don’t play.”

She was heartbroken.

Tonight was her first night back. It was their first region game — all the other teams they’ve been playing have been out of region. They won in three straight sets: 25-6; 25-15; 25-17. Or all-told, 75-38, just under a 2-1 scoring ratio.

The Girl got to play about 1.5 sets. She indicated she was pleased with how things went, but I know she wanted more, wanted to do better. Still, after three weeks of not playing, she did a fantastic job. And as always, hers were the loudest cheers on the team.