aurorae vulticulus opacus..

day 9.

summary of recent news:
1. I am officially gradumacated. :D it sunk in just as I was walking on stage to shake ronthom's hand and before the rain started pouring down. it still has not entirely sunk in, or perhaps it was simply presumed several months ago. looking back, I feel like part of my heart either died or left this place long before the year was over. I didn't completely check out before the year finished, but I think my heart left UPS before the year even started. I remember the first few days back from summer, knowing that I was not home and that the home I yearned for could not be found on this earth. perhaps I bludgeoned my heart into place and ignored that sense of loss and it simply stayed there, unnoticed and unabated.
nonetheless, my heart soars because
a.) I will be at soundview this summer, serving and being served by God. my soul yearns for restoration and the washing that it so desparately needs, much of which will undoubtedly come from fulfillment [if I have learned one thing since working at soundview, it is that I am a servant by nature and need to be in a place where I can serve or else my soul grows weary].
b.) uw starts just a few weeks after soundview. words fail to express how much I am looking forward to graduate school, as they also fail to describe how terrified I am of the same thought. I take that to be a good sign. :D

2. just spent this past weekend with jim in olympia-land: kayaking, hiking, movieing, &c. praise God for brothers and the bond that comes only in His Kingdom.

3. please pray for my parents. fifteen years after they should have, they are beginning marriage counseling and they need every bit of support that can be found.

4. also, please pray for me and rachel. we desparately require grace, clear vision, and overflowing love.

5. this upcoming week I will be at soundview, working and helping the place get ready for summer campers. incidentally, if you want to reach me over the summer, send mail to:
8515 kphs
longbranch, wa 98351
you will get special mail back. :p

6. now that I have time to read again, I sort of went overboard. here is the current reading list I'd like to knock off in the next several months/years:

bakke.joy at work
bonhoeffer.testament to freedom
chernow.alexander hamilton
dostoevsky.writer's diary
girard.I see satan fall like lightning
girard.things hidden since the foundation of the world
girard.violence and the sacred
gibbon.history of the fall and decline of the roman empire
heller.catch 22
kant.basic writings
kierkegaard.fear and trembling
kierkegaard.practice in christianity
lewis.reflections on the psalms
moran.introduction to phenomenology
nietzche.basic writings
rabinovich.the yom kippur war
penrose.road to reality
peterson.christ plays in ten thousand places
piper.future grace
strassler.landmark thucydides

I am currently digesting don quixote. slowly digesting anyway.

anyway, kristan has to go. more to come shortly. God go with you folks.

"Therefore, death first; you must first die to every merely earthly hope, to every merely human confidence; you must die to your selfishness, or to the world, because it is only through your selfishness that the world has power over you; if you are dead to your selfishness, you are also dead to the world. But naturally there is nothing a human being hangs on to so firmly, indeed, with his whole self!" - Soren Kierkegaard

*this* is what the war on terror is about

a member of Iraq's Ansar Al-Sunna terrorist group was recently interviewed on an Iraqi television network. a partial transcript follows:

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’Adnan Elias: They told us to take him to the house of Habib ‘Izzat Hamu. We took him out there. We said to him: “Why did you do this and that… Why are you after us?” He answered: “It’s out of our hands. We get orders.” Then we were told to bring a knife.
Interviewer: You slaughtered him?
‘Adnan Elias: Yes, sir. Habib ‘Izzat Hamu got the knife. He slaughtered him, and when he was dead, he opened his shirt buttons and cut open his stomach.
Interviewer: Who opened him up?
‘Adnan Elias: Muhsin, sir.
Interviewer: When a doctor performs an operation he wears a surgeon’s mask over his nose and mouth.
‘Adnan Elias: No sir, he didn’t wear one.
Interviewer: He didn’t wear one?
‘Adnan Elias: No sir, he didn’t wear one. He cut open his stomach and took stuff out.
Interviewer: What did he take out?
‘Adnan Elias: I don’t know, his guts.
Interviewer: Weren’t you nauseous? Didn’t you vomit?
‘Adnan Elias: You mean Muhsin?
Interviewer: No, you.
‘Adnan Elias: I was standing a little bit aside.
Interviewer: And he didn’t vomit or get nauseous?
‘Adnan Elias: No, sir.
Interviewer: What is he, Dracula?
‘Adnan Elias: Huh?
Interviewer: Go on.
‘Adnan Elias: Yes, sir. He opened him up, took stuff out, and put TNT and explosives inside. Then he sewed up his stomach with thick thread.
Interviewer: With thread?
‘Adnan Elias: Yes. And a needle. He put the buttons back in place...
Interviewer: He buttoned him up.
‘Adnan Elias: Yes, he buttoned him up. We were told to take him in the car near the square in Tel A’far. We threw him there and placed his head back on his shoulders.
Interviewer: My God!
‘Adnan Elias: 15 to 30 minutes later they told his family to come and get their son. His father came with two policemen. They picked up the body and made no more than two steps – we were standing far away – Ahmad Sinjar pressed the button.
Interviewer: By remote control.
‘Adnan Elias: The body exploded on them, and they died.
Interviewer: So his father and the two policemen died.
‘Adnan Elias: Yes sir, and we took off.

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michael moore could not be reached for comment.

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God help the Iraqi people and protect our servicemen.

"Man creates what he calls history as a screen to conceal the workings of the apocalypse from himself."
- Northrop Frye