Little children are all literalists. Tell them that you’ll be a minute, and they’ll watch the clock till 60 seconds have ticked by. Ask them to hop to bed, and off they’ll go on one leg. They live up – or down – to our expectations as literally stated, so we have a responsibility to remember that they believe us when we say they’re smart, or frightened of mice, or prone to car sickness. And as parents, we’ve greatly enjoyed the signs of budding irony; of a developing appreciation for nuances, of the foundations of a sense that not everything is intended to be taken literally.
Some people never quite make that shift, and today’s saint was one of those. There were no shades of grey in St Francis’ enthusiastic adoption of the Way. ‘ “Francis, Francis, go and repair My house which, as you can see, is falling into ruins”,’ said the crucifix at San Damiano. And he started picking up stones and piling them one on the other. He heard a sermon on the text from Matthew about setting off to proclaim the Gospel without a walking stick and shoes, and was inspired to devote his life to holy poverty. Indeed, his obedience to this text led in time to the whole Franciscan order. ‘Preach the Gospel to the heathen,’ he read, and set off to Egypt to preach to the Muslims.
And, of course, there was the famous incident where his father, frustrated to have his son becoming a laughing stock, complained to the bishop. Francis was told that even the clothes he stood in belonged to his father. So he took them off and gave them back.
You’ve got to love a literalist.
so we have a responsibility to remember that they believe us when we say they’re smart, or frightened of mice, or prone to car sickness
Or that they’ll go to Hell if they ‘Sin’, or that Jesus rose from the dead, or that god exists, or that masturbation is a sin, or that fairies exist, or that Father Christmas is real (I could go on…)
Dawkins has a point when he says that Theists can be legitimately accused of child cruelty in some instances.
Theists (and non-theists) would do well to remember that children will believe everything an adult tells them. Children should be allowed to make up their own minds about things as nebulous as a deity and supernaturalism. Provide them with the demonstrable FACTS and EVIDENCE and let them make their own decisions based on FACTS and EVIDENCE when they’re old enough.
KA
…or that God doesn’t exist, or that science can explain everything, or that people are fundamentally good, or a whole heap of nonsense.
The idea that children should be able to make up their own mind about anything is based on the fundamental misunderstanding that teaching nothing is possible; teaching nothing is the equivalent of teaching something. The choice is not whether or not the child should be left to decide, but whether or not to teach them that a particular topic is worthy of being taught.
Indeed, given the number of adults who still believe in Father Christmas, I’m astounded that anyone can – with a straight face – claim that the things we are taught in childhood stay with us into adulthood.
I do, however, think children should be taught to think logically and to weigh facts and evidence. They are then equipped to make up their own minds when they are old enough, whatever else they have been taught. In my view, much of both Christian and new atheist rhetoric falls apart at the seams if you approach it logically.
Incidentally, most children leave literalism behind somewhere between three and seven.
Hence my final paragraph…
KA,
I think your comment is a little overdone, but I’ll grant your point that a morbid focus on hell and/or masturbation can amount to child abuse.
There’s a heavy responsibility on theists, but then that responsibility bears on all who have responsibility for others, especially for children.
FACTS and EVIDENCE are necessary reminders to theists. I’m sure that the esteemed Toad would agree.
JP’s apparent disputation that people are fundamentally good, is, of course, contrary to Catholic dogma about people being made good, in the image of God.
God Bless
Not really, Chris. I was just trying to mirror KA’s list, which had a whole heap of things I don’t believe and one I do, all listed as lies.
The thing about a man like Francis, is that we are lucky his zeal and literalism was combined with a sweet nature. Men with characters like him are either great saints or terrible sinners. Not much in between
Yes, indeed. And lucky that his literalism was caught and invested into that passage from Matthew.
They say this darn rain will clear up by sunday, but I see no FACTS or EVIDENCE
And that’s what makes weather forecasting an art and not a science. Science can tell you the FACTS, but it needs a human to apply those factors that you can’t programme a computer to know (yet!)
KA
KA has me musing on facts, and what they tell us. So here’s a possible fact, and some thoughts about what it might tell us:
The English painter J.M.W Turner was born on April 23rd, 1775. — He later wrote this fact in passing, no birth record survives. Now Turner is the great English landscape painter, the painter who captured the romance of England and its landscape like no one else. And April 23rd is St Georges day.
Now if he really was born on April 23rd, then it’s just a cute coincidence, and tells us nothing about Turner. But if it is untrue, if Turner chose that day as the most suitable to claim, then that speaks volumes about how he saw himself and his work, and how he wanted to be remembered by the English.
I like this, it’s trite if true, but very informative if false. 🙂
Interesting line of thought.
But if it is untrue, if Turner chose that day as the most suitable to claim, then that speaks volumes about how he saw himself and his work, and how he wanted to be remembered by the English.
Doesn’t that depend on the reasons why he choose that date which may or may not have anything to do with St George ? And what do we know of his reasons ?
I think there’s a sense in which all of KA’s list are true (depending on what one means by sin, hell, fairies, and Father Christmas). There is also a sense in which all are false. Meaning depends very much on how one interprets a text.
God Bless
Well there’s the rub and the riddle Chris. Nobody knows if Turner simply reported his birthday or had more in mind. — Modern critics can read as much or as little into it as they like. But because of how Turner saw himself and his work, the coincidence that he was born on Englands natural day is so pleasing that it invites speculation.
Turner never wrote that his birthday meant anything. It could have been straight reportage — a true but therefore meaningless coincidence. Or, alternatively, he could have (knowing that people would recognise the significance) have assigned himself the birthday — a false claim, but one that tells us a great deal about Turner.
With less subtiltly, Mexican artist Frida Kahlo did as a matter of fact pretend for a while to have been born in 1910. She was born in 1907 — but the Mexican revolution took place in 1910. — The lie tells us a truth about how she saw the place of her art in new and modern Mexico. If she had been born in 1910 it would have been just another coincidence. Do you see?
natural day
read national
One more example. Gallipoli was fought very near to, just across the water from, the ancient and ruined site now called Hissarlik. — A coincidence.
But in many poems that remember Gallipoli, the soldiers were dying on the beaches almost within site of Troy. — Pregnant with meaning.
Considered as a brute fact, Jesus being born in Bethlehem simply is, it does not signify.
But if Luke tells a story about the Messiah being born in the City of David — now there is meaning.
A problem with literalism is that meaning comes from humans telling and responding to stories, not brute physical facts.
Do you see?
yet more typos 🙂
Do you see?
As the disciples once answered Jesus, yes I do 🙂
We had a cool discussion last night of literary allusions in the gospel story of Jesus driving out the demons in Gerasa (or wherever !). I was glad I did it because some of those present found it very liberating. Literally believing in all those demons can be quite oppressive to some and an obstacle to belief in others. One of the more fruitful areas of modern scripture study has been the focus on scripture as literature.
That was followed by a very interesting presentation from Fr Peter Murnane which recounted quite a few “coincidences” in the Waihopai spy base plowshares action. Sometimes there is rather more to the coincidence than surface appearances.
God Bless
That was followed by a very interesting presentation from Fr Peter Murnane which recounted quite a few “coincidences” in the Waihopai spy base plowshares action. Sometimes there is rather more to the coincidence than surface appearances.
That sounds fascinating actually. And I can imagine it as an example of what I was thinking of.
ps 🙂
I was too lazy to write out “do you see what I mean” — but yes, on re-reading it does sound a little Zen to just say “do you see…” 🙂
Jerry, I’ve commented on your Pinker post.
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In other words, it is a parent’s duty to stuff his/her child’s head with whatever brand of nonsense to which the parent currently subscribes.
Believing it to be ‘literally’ true, of course.
Toad’s parents stuffed his head with Catholicism. Meanwhile, the people next door were stuffing their kid’s head with Judaism.
KA says children should be allowed to make their own minds up about metaphysics.
One of the few things Toad has made his mind up about, is that making one’s mind up about anything usually turns out to be unwise.
It is inevitable that parents will stuff their children’s head with whatever hthey believe. And close to inevitable that these beliefs will be precisely what the children rejects when they reach the age of rebellion.
It is a parent’s duty to teach children how to think. Sooner, rather than later, those children will decide for themselves what to think about.
Failing to teach the tools of logic is – I agree – child abuse, but a form of abuse that is carried out by the government in the guise of education and in the cause of making everyone the same..
Which makes infant baptism and childhood confirmation pretty idiotic. It would be much better to baptise only those who wanted to be Christians, and had experience of not being Christian. The only reason we baptise children is because of the (disowned) belief that baptism is necessary for salvation. As the Church no longer believes that last detail, baptising infants is a waste of time, and arguably a form of sacrilege. It certainly isn’t the NT model.
I don’t agree, Kerberos. We believe the sacraments give us access to santifying grace. Why on earth would we deprive our children of that?
When the early writers (including St Luke) talked about baptising a person ‘and his whole household’ what makes you think they really meant ‘and his whole household except for the children’? Indeed, the Old Testament equivalent – the mark by which a male became part of the House of Israel – was routinely administered at 8 days old.”We are circumcised not with a fleshly circumcision but with the circumcision of Christ, that is, we are born again into a new man; for, being buried with Him in His baptism, we must die to the old man, because the regeneration of baptism has the force of resurrection.” Hilary of Poitiers, Trinity, 9:9 (A.D. 359).
And we haven’t disowned the belief that baptism is necessary for salvation; we’ve nuanced the belief to say that God can provide the baptism (in some spiritual way) in cases when we don’t. ““Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”
http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p2s2c1a1.htm
“If they’re scared the advertisers are going to pull the plug because a particular story line is shown, such as evolution or what have you, they’re not going to show it.”
“Such as evolution” ? That’s the sort of thing that reminds one that the US culture is very different from that of Europe. And it’s sad beyond words that gay themes & gay love and gay stuff generally are still so controversial in the US (or anywhere else, for that matter). HF is much the better and much stronger for having explicit and unapologetic gayness – including that adds a narrative strand which greatly enriches the complexity of the action. If anything, there’s a need for more gay themes; otherwise there is a danger that what we have so far will be no more than a token appearance of gay characters. Ther are no token women, token aliens, token characters of mixed race – so ther shouldn’t be token gay characters, but more of them.
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Only A Part:
Username – Michael
PW – 0wVvprBHxauJHLJ8aMfa
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“And we haven’t disowned the belief that baptism is necessary for salvation; we’ve nuanced the belief to say that God can provide the baptism (in some spiritual way) in cases when we don’t.”
## IOW, that dogma (as it once was) has in effect died the “death of a thousand qualifications” – so its verbal form remains, but not its meaning. The meaning has changed, because keeping it unchanged would have put other dogmas and doctrines (such the universality of God’s Will to save; and, the sincerity of this desire) under too great a strain.
Believer’s baptism has the great advantage of being consciously accepted by someone who has had to consider very catefully whether he or she wishes to become a member of the Church. Infant baptism implies a different theology of the sacrament – such as a covenantal one analogous to the covenant with Abraham. Part of the problem is that different models of baptism have givem rise to different theologies, emphasising different strands in the Biblical covenant-accounts.
“…different models of baptism have given rise to different theologies”
The other way round, surely.
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“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”
…And yet, there are still people who will tell you that the likes of Gandhi are sitting up there in Heaven, alongside good Catholics. Fie!
Me among them, Toad. God can deal with the mechanisms of how saints of all faiths are born of water and the Spirit. Are they baptised after death? Is our outward and visible sign detatched from the inward and spiritual grace for those who serve God by another name or by no name at all? I don’t know. But I believe it is so.
But here’s what I think about the baptism issue. Let’s forget any historical-critical questions; just worry about the foundation myth of the New Testament, and not the largely lost events which inspired it.
Infant baptism was recognised as a pragmatic neccessity by the early Church. And the Church has always had a gift for clothing the pragmatic and contingent in the theological and the necessary. The baptism of families in Luke may provide a basis for the practise, — but the justification was sought after the event as it were.
The necessity of baptism by water – the physical action – is a logical conclusion for a young community, a community that intends to be a coherent body, not a vague grouping of like minded people. Once that community has come to dominate an entire society it is clear that the “rite of entry” is not to be skipped — if it were, the integrity of a “Christian society” and its norms would be threatened.
But it is also clear that the pragmatic necessity of the physical act is unworthy of God as portrayed by Christian theology. if it becomes a literal necessity. Francis Xavier weeping for the damned Japanese he would never baptise holds to a palpably inadequate theology. And so we inevitably see “baptism of desire” etc develop in Christian thought.
The truth is that nobody knows exactly what Jesus thought about baptism. Even great theologians have admitted that it is impossible to be sure why he was baptised, critical scholars accept that he was, but cannot reconstruct a definite “why” either. The dialogues in John do not solve the problem, they are clearly products of a developed Christian community, composed long after the death of Jesus.
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Surely, Joyful, Christ couldn’t have made it any clearer?
And yet you don’t believe Him? Why? Because it doesn’t suit you to?
Still, you do say you don’t know. That’s a start.
There is no conflict between the idea that people must be baptised to be able to go to Heaven, and the idea that people can go to Heaven without being baptised – once you realise two things. First, only the second clause refers to baptism in water by someone who uses the Trinitarian formula (we believe we have good reason to think that baptism in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit complies with the requirement – but we don’t know what else might). Second, the first clause doesn’t depend on our actions but on God’s, and doesn’t necessarily have to happen inside of the person’s lifetime.
solved then
It is no good getting hung up on the issue of how to interpret that phrase too strictly. — The conversation relies on a pun which works only in Greek. — One thing that this dialogue is not is access to exactly what Jesus himself said about baptism. The voice is that of the evangelist composing a dialogue in Greek. — That isn’t pedantry, this dialogue, as Meier has shown in painstaking detail is not a verbatim record of the words of Jesus
And as parents, we’ve greatly enjoyed the signs of budding irony; of a developing appreciation for nuances, of the foundations of a sense that not everything is intended to be taken literally.
Some people never quite make that shift, and today’s saint was one of those. There were no shades of grey in St Francis’ enthusiastic adoption of the Way
One of the differences between Jesus and Paul perhaps? it’s easy to imagine Jesus having a good sense of humour, and a command of irony. Paul always strikes me as (brilliant) but relentlessly literal
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Toad suspects Jerry is a skeptical as he is, on this matter. But who knows?
The Catholic Church is always saying, “There’s no two ways about it – do what Jesus says or else…” – and then this.
When he states categorically that unbaptised people will not go to Heaven and that’s that, nobody seems to listen.
They just come out with a lot of waffle.
“There is no conflict between the idea that people must be baptised to be able to go to Heaven, and the idea that people can go to Heaven without being baptised..”
Well, if that’s not a conflict, then Toad doesn’t know what a conflict is.
Which is unlikely.
“Second, the first clause doesn’t depend on our actions but on God’s, and doesn’t necessarily have to happen inside of the person’s lifetime.”
That would appear to open a massive can of possibly Calvinistic or Godknowswhatistic, (intimations of predestination here?) theological worms, and Toad will just let it go at that.
Except to imply, at least, that our actions – free will, in fact – don’t matter in cases, like this, and that God will decide, independently of our actions, will not do. For Toad.
“That’s not what I meant,” Joyful will say.
Over to you Chris!
Chris thinks that God will find a way to save everyone and for all to receive some form of baptism, even if only that of implicit desire.
The 2nd Vatican Council taught that God is not bound by God’s sacraments. If God wants to baptise by some other means, God can. If not, God wouldn’t be omnipotent and God wouldn’t be God.
[This teaching also means that God can confect the eucharist howsoever God might choose, even by a women or those in orders considered to be completely null and void.]
The deacon who taught Chris how to baptise taught us that the Church entrusts unbaptised infants to the mercy of God, in the confident and firm belief that God will save them.
God wants to save everyone. May God’s will be done.
Here’s one part of God’s plan to do that.
http://ncronline.org/news/spirituality/way-martin-sheen
The baptism of John the baptist is not considered a sacramental baptism but more akin to Jewish mikveh.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikveh
Jerry’s view on the gospel accounts as theological composition, rather than necessarily everywhere the actual words of Christ, is what the Church teaches.
God Bless
imply, at least, that our actions – free will, in fact – don’t matter in cases, like this, and that God will decide, independently of our actions, will not do.
Chris agrees.
Although Chris also thinks that it is logical and rational to choose life over death, heaven over hell, and that those who make a choice for their own eternal suffering are in need of spiritual healing,
And if God’s in the business of anything, God’s certainly in the business of spiritual healing by all sorts of ways and means, many beyond our imagination.
I think discussion of salvation is too often bogged down in moral choice and overlooks the significance of God’s power to heal and renew and restore all things.
God Bless
overlooks the significance of God’s power to heal and renew and restore all things.
A nice power to have, and yet he tarries
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This may be a bit overlong, and Toad is sorry, but this is a key issue, for him at least.
When young, he was taught specifically, by his Catholic priest instructor at his Catholic school, that Christ said, “Unless you are baptised by water and The Holy Ghost, you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”
And that Christ meant exactly, literally, not metaphorically, what He said, and you could take it or leave it, but you couldn’t fudge it.
For once He was not talking in parables and it was not open to interpretation.
Did that mean the likes of Gandhi would not be going to heaven? Yes, that was exactly what it meant, Toad was told.
This also involved Limbo, as an alternative. (It was around this point Toad began to decide to leave it, rather than take it. )
As some sort of compensation, the billions of unbaptised wouldn’t go to Hell either – too blissfully ignorant.
Toad supposes they spend eternity in some kind of vaguely pleasant, inoffensive, in-between “place” – a sort of spiritual New Zealand, perhaps?
The ‘fact’ that only baptised Catholics could enter Hell was what caused George Orwell to complain that Graham Greene, “… seemed to regard Hell as a sort of exclusive night club for the Catholic damned.”
Yes, it’s all amusing nowadays to us sophisticated folk, but it’s also ironic that Catholics, on here and CP&S, constantly lament about how nowadays nobody listens to Christ’s message.
But when He says something this unequivocal – and, to us, unpalatable – they try to give it ‘added’ meanings that are patently not there.
It would seem that some people don’t have the courage of Christ’s convictions.
Or so Toad suspects. Well, fair enough.
(That’s enough rant for one morning. If Toad has said all this before on here, he’s sorry, again)
Toad, a priest — Feeny from memory, was excommunicated from the Catholic Church during your youth, 1963 I think, for repeatedly teaching that non-Catholics could not be saved. What you say you were taught, to be fair, did not reflect the position of the Church.
Leonard Feeney apparently. His excommunication was due in part to his strict interpretation of extra Ecclesiam nulla salus which he advocated forcefully against instruction.
One hopes Toad doesn’t see Catholicism only through the lens of a certain North London school in the mid-century — might distort the image a bit. Though I tend to agree with most of Toads conclusions anyway.
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It’s most likely more than half a century that may have distorted Toad’s image. Although he believes he remembers it like yesterday.
However…
It does raise this issue: If literal baptism is not necessary to achieve salvation,
(i.e, Gandhi gets saved unbaptised anyway,) why is there such a fuss made about it?
Why are babies born in danger of death immediately baptised, if they’ll go to Heaven anyway, baptised or not?
And…
…those who make a choice for their own eternal suffering are in need of spiritual healing.
Chris makes an excellent point very neatly and concisely here, that Toad has long pondered…
Which is: Surely no-one who truly believed in God could ever reject Him.
Unless he/she were insane, maybe.
What some people reject, and doubt, is the idea of God, for various reasons that we are all familiar with, such as that He seems to be a bit ‘exclusive’ at times for a deity. (see above comments.)
The unfortunate person who thinks this way, might be mistaken, and Catholics might be right.
But, if so, being mistaken seems insufficient grounds for eternal damnation.
To Toad, at least.
(Goodness, he’s a garrulous amphibion today! Better shut up and get ready for church!)
Toad,
Before you were born, Fr Feeney was condemned by the Holy Office, and later ex-communicated for teaching a literalistic understanding of baptism similar to what you were erroneously taught.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Feeney
The Church has always believed that baptism extended to more than only those who received the sacrament eg baptism of desire, and baptism of blood.
None of the Old Testament saints received the ordinary form of the sacrament of baptism either but they have always been regarded as in heaven.
Did that mean the likes of Gandhi would not be going to heaven? Yes, that was exactly what it meant, Toad was told.
This also involved Limbo, as an alternative. (It was around this point Toad began to decide to leave it, rather than take it. )
Chris rather thinks that Toad made the correct decision, and one very much for God and for the fullness of the Catholic faith rather than the narrowminded exclusiveness which has often beset the Church.
A rather younger Chris would have nothing to do with false religions which wanted to damn non-believers to hell. How could such a view possibly be compatible with a God of Love ?
God Bless
If literal baptism is not necessary to achieve salvation,
(i.e, Gandhi gets saved unbaptised anyway,) why is there such a fuss made about it?
Because baptism is a blessing and a very special encounter with Christ by which one becomes a member of the Church. That’s a very special gift and grace which Christian parents have long wanted for their children.
Sure, there are other ways to make the journey, but if God gives one such special graces and helps, it would seem a good idea to take all the graces on offer. Chris can sure use all the graces on offer.
Surely no-one who truly believed in God could ever reject Him.
Unless he/she were insane, maybe.
Chris tends to agree with Toad. Anyone who really understands who God is, and what Heaven and Hell are, is very unlikely to make a rational decision for an eternity in Hell. It is simply not rational to choose eternal suffering. Anyone who makes such an eternal choice doesn’t seem to be in need of damnation but of healing. Maybe Origin was onto something in holding that even the devil would eventually choose God ? Sure, the Church condemned Origin’s ideas but not dogmatically.
The word Hell, in the NT, always means Gehenna (a smouldering valley of rubbish outside Jerusalem which is a graphic image of the consequences of sin), or Hades (the Greek abode of the dead). The sole exception is Tartarus in 2Pet2:4, the Greek abode of the wicked dead, but that seems to be reserved for wicked Angels.
It’s worth reading the NT references to Hell in the Greek. Try this (you can click on the Strongs numbers to get the word meaning).
http://www.blueletterbible.org/search/translationResults.cfm?Criteria=Hell&t=KJV&csr=9&sf=5
God Bless
Interestingly, the 2Pet2:4 reference to Tartarus uses it as a temporary holding place where the bad angels await judgement. That seems to support the Apocatastasis thesis, which has long had some very prominent adherents.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01599a.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocatastasis
Even the Catholic Right seem loath to condemn Apocatastasis.
http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=462522
God Bless
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Many thanks Jerry, for the Feeny information.
Food for thought?
No? Well, perhaps not on here.
As a lad, Toad thinks he knew the Feeny gang all too well.
All dead, and gone to their reward, now, alas.
Well, up to a point, Lord Copper. Several seem still to be clinging to the current wreckage of pedophilia and the like.
“A rather younger Chris would have nothing to do with false religions which wanted to damn non-believers to hell. How could such a view possibly be compatible with a God of Love ?”
Well, we entertain no doubt whatsoever that the older Chris is no less compassionate than his younger manifestation, clearly even more so.
Still, bit of a puzzler, isn’t it all?
Thinks Toad.
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“The word Hell, in the NT, always means Gehenna (a smouldering valley of rubbish outside Jerusalem….
Indeed it might be suggested, that the smouldering valley of rubbish – rather than being located outside Jerusalem – might actually be Jerusalem itself.
Current politics would seem, at least, not to regard this as a total impossiblity.
Thinks Toad.
If you think of the situation in the terms advocated in this clip:
Everything’s fine
🙂
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What a tip-top, very fine clip!
Now we know what life’s all about!
Joyful will be ecstatic!
(It says here.)
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Jerry, the Feeny material on Wiki was truly fascinating.
Rather like how several on CP&S would approach similar problems.
If they had the nuts.
Well here’s one more which is of relevance to those of us (all of us) who feel the need to announce what we “reckon” on the issues which come up on the blogs— no matter how little informed we may be 🙂