Gene Edward Veith Jr.'s Blog, page 365
December 20, 2013
Merry Christmas vs. Happy Christmas
Matthew Schmitz explains the difference between “merry Christmas” and “happy Christmas” and why the former is a more fitting greeting. See what he says after the jump, along with what I say. Matthew Schmitz, It’s Merry Christmas, Not Happy Christmas » First Thoughts | A First Things Blog: Christmas is conspicuously the only time [Read More...]
Swiss will vote on a guaranteed national income
While we argue about a guaranteed minimum wage, Switzerland is considering a guaranteed minimum income. The Swiss will vote in a national referendum on whether or not to give themselves a guaranteed income of $33,600 per year, whether they work or not. From BBC News – Swiss to vote on incomes for all – working [Read More...]
December 19, 2013
Post-Christian vs. non-Christian
“Post-Christian” does not mean the same as “non-Christian,” observes John O’Sullivan. A “post-Christian” society is one that seeks to maintain the cultural legacy of Christianity–such as human rights, benevolence, the institution of the family–after the religious beliefs that created and supported this legacy have been abandoned. In their place, post-Christian societies try to substitute laws, [Read More...]
From eucharistic hymn to Christmas carol
“Let all mortal flesh keep silence” is a hymn about Holy Communion. But now it keeps showing up as a Christmas carol! That’s how it’s presented in Christmas concerts, holiday recordings, and on many of the renditions on Youtube. But it is “an ancient chant of Eucharistic devotion.” I can see how it would shift [Read More...]
The language of totalitarianism
The “Dear Leader” of North Korea, Kim Jong Un, has executed his uncle, who had served as his advisor and mentor. Max Fisher writes about the language the still-Communist North Koreans used to make this announcement and the worldview it reveals. From Max Fisher,‘An intolerable mockery’: the wild-eyed worldview of North Korean propaganda in [Read More...]
December 18, 2013
Harold Camping dies
Radio evangelist Harold Camping has died at the age of 92. Best known for predicting that on May 21, 2011, Jesus would come back, Camping’s most harmful teaching was that all church bodies were heretical and that people should just listen to his radio broadcasts instead of going to church. Longtime readers of this blog [Read More...]
And now polygamy
A federal judge has ruled that Utah laws against polygamy are unconstitutional. From Utah Polygamy Court Ruling On ‘Sister Wives’ Case Confirms Fears Of Social Conservatives. (Religious News Service) Fueling debates over marriage and religious freedom, a federal judge declared on Dec. 13 Utah laws criminalizing polygamy are unconstitutional, ruling on a case involving the [Read More...]
He will come like crying in the night
You will note that I have mostly resisted the temptation to conflate Advent with the Christmas season, but I will start with the Christmas posts now that we are in the week before the Nativity of Our Lord. But to salute Advent, I offer you, after the jump, a fine poem on the subject by [Read More...]
Spycraft and Christmas presents
Target has hired former CIA operative Jonna Mendez as an online “Kid’s Gift Detective” to help parents shop for their children and hide the presents. She was the “chief of disguise” with the agency, working in the Office of Technical Service, which she describes as having something like the function of Q in the James [Read More...]
December 17, 2013
Sex and freedom in ancient Rome
Classical scholar Peter Brown has published in the New York Review of Books an excited review of Kyle Harper’s From Shame to Sin: The Christian Transformation of Sexual Morality in Late Antiquity (Harvard University Press). The book, which is said to break new ground in the scholarship of ancient Rome, shows that the vaunted sexual [Read More...]
