Freewheelin Theologian

That's not what it says. It is coded language referring to events in early 2nd century Rome. It is not a prediction of what is happening in the 21st century. No biblical scholar thinks this.

Wasn't the average temperature increase pre-2023 around 1.2 C? We've gone from 1.2C to 1.5C over the course of three years!

Trump and the MAGA movement is a fascist movement (see Jason Stanley's How Fascism Works for the historical parallels), but we are still living in a democratic republic. We can resist and defeat fascism, and the Kimmel episode is a case in point. Comey's trial will be another one.

Tylenol is woke.

Inspired by the courage of Kid Rock, Scott Baio, and Kevin Sorbo, today I declare that I will no longer apply for any teaching posts in Philosophy at the Sorbonne. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

It's not stated in the article, but I wonder if this new winter warming trend will accelerate the melting of the ice caps and thus hasten AMOC collapse. All the signs are pointing towards impending catastrophe, but the question is when -- this suggests sooner.

The kingdom of God is like seven completely brand new Springsteen albums to listen to on a Saturday night.

440ppm in three years. Makes me think of Kim Stanley Robinson's Forty Signs of Rain.

Global temperatures stuck at near-record highs in April: EU monitor Global temperatures were stuck at near-record highs in April, the EU's climate monitor said, extending an unprecedented heat streak and raising questions about how quickly the world might be warming.

Global temperatures are still high nearly a year after the end of El Nino. Why? It is deeply unsettling.

en.prothomalo.com/environment/...

"The Christian legacy is much too precious to be left to the fundamentalist freaks." - Slavoj Zizek

If as President you answer “I don’t know” when asked if you’ll follow the Constitution, you have violated your oath of office and should be removed.

Your questions presuppose a fundamentalist way of understanding biblical revelation and that's not the lens through which progressive and moderate Christians, and most Jews, read the Bible.

Adolf von Harnack's What is Christianity? (c. 1900) offers the image of a divine "kernel" being discernible within the human "husk" of Christianity within a particular historical period. Karl Barth speaks of reading the Bible for the divine "Word" coming through the human "words."

There is no moral argument for slavery. But I don't think God wrote the Bible. It was written by morally fallible human beings 2 to 3 thousand years ago. But most Christians see essential moral truths in Scripture despite the fact that some of it, for lack of a better term, is outdated.

Read the whole thing. Think historically, critically, and contextually. Become familiar with how non-fundamentalists interpret the Bible. Also study biblical criticism, theology, philosophy, and the entire edifice of Western culture and literature. Ask yourself, what are the counter-arguments?

Where do you think Star Wars got the moral code from?

The Mauna Loa Observatory recorded CO2 levels of 431.13 ppm yesterday. At the current rate, I think we hit 450ppm in 2031 but possibly 2030. I am about optimistic about humanity in the very long term, at least if we don't totally destroy ourselves. But I think the 2030s are going to be catastrophic.

We will reach 450ppm by 2031. It's bad now, but the shit is really going to hit the fan in the 2030s.

I hear Tulsi, Pete, JD, and Kash started a Spinal Tap cover band.

Who among us hasn't forgotten what country they are in while traveling? I visited Stonehenge about ten years ago and, honestly, I couldn't tell you whether I was in France, Germany, or Luxembourg. I might have even been in China, though definitely if I was in China I wouldn't be able to recall.

I guess I don't.

The graph only shows 2025 (red line) through January and February. I don't see the temperature average for the first 11 days in March.

That makes sense. Thanks for the response!

Shouldn't we be concerned about the fact that global temperatures have not decreased yet, six months after El Nino? 1.74 Celsius above the pre-industrial average seems unusual. I'm a humanities professor, not a climate scientist, so I am curious about the explanation.

2024 was 1.6 degrees Celsius (2.9 degrees Fahrenheit) above the pre-industrial average. Disaster is the new 30. It goes without saying, but we need to act now.

My New Year's resolution is to stop doomscrolling. Martin Luther said that "everything in the world is done by hope." Help me out, Bluesky.

Always pay attention to the timing! The mysterious drones spotted in the skies above New Jersey and several other states are obviously Santa's helpers. It is a typical distraction by the North Pole industrial complex.

"We run heedlessly into the abyss after putting something in front of us to stop us seeing it." -- Pascal, Pensees