MetaCatholic

Sometimes I’m not quite sure what counts as spam. Today I received a comment left on my About page, which I’ve treated as spam. It was in no way a response to anything I said there, or have said anywhere on my blog. It appeared to be entirely generic, and came with what looked like a false web address entered. In content it was a dismissal of the freewill response to theodicy and related questions, with half a not very good argument and half a simple ex cathedra pronouncement on it’s stupidity. The tone and overall thrust appeared to be “and how silly your belief is”.

Now I might have misread the genre and intent of this comment, and if so, I apologise. But it also put me in mind of the remarkable number of comments I come across from atheists on any religious story (or religion related story) on the mainstream media sites. Many (most?) of them are ranting and repetitive, concerned more to dismiss the general thrust of belief than to respond to any particular point made in the story. 

There are three things that baffle me about this. 

1. Why do so many atheists seem to spend so much of their time thinking about religion, and seeking to rebuke it? If life is short, and that’s it, then why waste time getting even slightly worked up about it?
2. Why, if it seems to be an article of faith that atheism is rational, and religion is not, are so many of the comments devoid of anything remotely resembling a rational argument?
3. Why are all the atheists who comment fundamentalists? That is, the God and theology they oppose is nearly always fundamentalist Protestant, and just occasionally Vatican I anti-modernist Catholicism. Do liberal Christians never become atheists? Or is there something about the personality type that’s prone to having conversion experiences and evangelising for their point of view?

Oh, and I have no idea what the answers to those questions are.

A big thank you to James McGrath for honouring MetaCatholic with a blogging award. This is an award for blogs that make me think and make my day.  (Isn’t it fascinating how in the past indicative that’s a compliment, and in the present imperative it’s a threat.) This one seems to have spread across quite a wide range of blogs, so I’m especially flattered to receive it. The rules are simple:

1) Write a post with links to 5 blogs that make me think and/or make my day.

2) Acknowledge the post of the award giver.

3) Tell the award winners that they have won by commenting on their blogs with the news!

I should say, at this point, that I’m enjoying backtracking this award and discovering some new (to me) and interesting blogs. You may find the same worth doing.

Like James, I find it particularly difficult to whittle it down to five, but here goes (in no particular order).

• Jon Birch for the ever-stimulating Adventures of ASBO Jesus (non-UK readers, an ASBO is an anti-social behaviour order).
• John Hobbins of Ancient Hebrew Poetry for engaging my attention in areas I didn’t know I was interested in.
• Andrew Brown, a journalist whose thoughts are always worth reading, and whose posts both around religion and science and the reporting of religion are particularly stimulating.
• Halden, of Inhabitatio Dei, who often takes a conventional topic and manages to find the unconventional slant on it (and who also seems to find the same things funny as I do).
• Finally, last, but by no means least, for those as fascinated by words as I am, Separated by a Common Language is an often wry, always interesting take on the different ways we fail to communicate across the pond.

I hope, if you’ve not encountered any of them before, you will enjoy them as much as I do.

I was quite impressed with this theme when I was browsing. Put that alongside the fact that I was getting bored with my old one, and it’s time for a change.

I’ve meant to get around to Ben’s One Movie Meme for ages, so here’s my contribution.

1. One movie that made you laugh
There’s Something about Mary

2. One movie that made you cry
Shadowlands

3. One movie you loved when you were a child
Batman – The Movie (i.e. Adam West and Burt Ward)

4. One movie you’ve seen more than once
Wargames

5. One movie you loved, but were embarrassed to admit it
The Faculty

6. One movie you hated
Derek Jarman’s Jubilee 

7. One movie that scared you
Carrie

8. One movie that bored you
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre

9. One movie that made you happy
Amélie

10. One movie that made you miserable
Road to Perdition

11. One movie you weren’t brave enough to see
I might be kidding myself when I say, “I can’t think of one – It’s just that I don’t much like horror films

… comes from Michael Bird.

In sum, our Southern Baptist Identity must be rotted in the consensus fidei of the Christian Church.

I don’t normaly kriticise other peeple for there misteaks, since I make enough of my own, but I couldn’t resist this one. (I do hope Mike will leave this in.)

Eddie has tagged me with a meme of his own devising. The rules appear simple: name your impossible dream, and then tag some more folk.

Oh, dear, I mean I am so full of impossible dreams, from scoring a hat-trick for England – preferably against Germany, through to fronting a sell-out indie concert at Wembley. But deep down, I still nurture that desire to write the book that turns Pauline scholarship on its head, and becomes the book that everyone simply has to refer to. It carries on the back endorsements like “This is the book I wish I’d had the imagination, courage, and depth of understanding to write” from scholars as diverse as Dale Martin and Tom Wright. The biggest snag is I have absolutely no idea what such a book could contain.

I tag John Hobbins, ElShaddai Edwards, Peter Kirk and Iyov.

I was going to write a blog post today, but I realized I didn’t have anything to say.

A happy blogging birthday to metacatholic. My first post here was May 1st 2007, when I decided to take this blogging lark seriously and move over from some on-off-on desultory attempts on Blogger.

A few boring and nothing much to be proud of stats. In that year I’ve amassed 544 posts (so around one-and-a-half a day), had 61,102 visits, and blotted out 8,462 spam comments.

Many happy returns to me, and a big thank you to all those who I’ve complimented, insulted and otherwise interacted with here or in the comments of their own blogs.

Jim West has done a terrific job in getting the new Biblical Studies Carnival up and running almost before the month has started. It is an excellent and wide-ranging survey, with lots of tasty links to follow–up. It is really impressive that Jim can read so widely among books, conference notices, discussion lists and blogs, and still be entirely wrong about such basics as the synoptic problem. One of the most noticeable things about Jim’s survey is the way he holds back his own opinions, and restrains himself is it’s clarity of forceful opinion, entertainingly expressed. I like a man who’s not afraid to be wrong in public. (Possibly the only thing he has in common with the Bishop of Durham.)

No, seriously, Jim, thank you for an excellent and ultra-punctual resource. There’s a lot here to browse I hadn’t seen.

This is weird. I reckoned the most significant post I made today was this one. According to my stats no-one (or possibly one person only) has visited it. Did I just choose a boring title? Oh, the mysteries of blogging. (If it doesn’t get at least one visit after this anguished plea I may have to adopt an extreme strategy which will include advising Lingamish to avert his eyes from some strong language.