Things On My Mind

The car . . . totalled.  Not much else to say.  Ahead of us, an unwanted new car and a court date for the teenager.

The teenager . . . survived the events surrounding Senior Skip Day, which involved minor pranks, kids driving around in groups in cars in the wee hours of the morning, parties and meals and movies and sleepovers and basically 24 hours away from home connected only by the evanescent filament of the cell phone.

The television. . .a powerful conclusion/cliffhanger to Joan of Arcadia last night.  What brilliant creators and writers that show has.  As the daughter and I mulled it over, I began to realize the significance of every character's name, including Ryan ("little king") Hunter (okay, that one's obvious), the devil incarnate.  Will -- that's the essence of the father, all right.  Helen -- a woman around whom the world once centered.  Grace -- Joan's best friend, the Jewish daughter of a rabbi and an alcoholic, a best friend who comes bearing invisible gifts -- what else could she be named?  Kevin -- the charming brother confined to a wheelchair; his name means "handsom."  Luke -- the physics-obsessed younger brother, "bearer of light."  Judith, Joan's dead friend -- a Biblical heroine.  And all the physics stuff -- the knowledge that is bringing us closer to the essence of God, and all those high school kids variously engaged with or made miserable by it.  The most orginal and powerful show on television.

The Christians. .  . the other ones.  For a terrifying read, check out the May issue of Harper's magazine:  Soldiers of Christ:  Inside America's Most Powerful Megachurch and Feeling the Hate with the National Religious Broadcasters.  It doesn't seem to be online yet, so I'll just share this brief quote from the second article:

"I can't help but recall the words of my ethics professor at Harvard Divinity School. .  .who told us that when we were his age. . . we would all be fighting 'the Christian fascists.'  ***  "[F]ascism, [he] warned, would not return wearing swastikas and brown shirts.  Its ideological inheritors would cloak themselves in the language of the Bible; they would come carrying crosses and chanting the Pledge of Allegiance."

They are here. . . pay attention to tomorrow's Justice Sunday, a mega-event being planned by the extreme Christian Right and its buddy Bill Frist to bring attention to the filibuster issue and their view that the judiciary has trampled on sacred ground with its consideration of abortion and gay rights issues.  Justice Sunday bears no connection to either justice or shabbos, but that isn't stopping the folks who have concluded that Jesus Christ was born to lead a conservative and authoritarian United States of America to its righful political dominion over the world.