#the holy trinity of existential crisis | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

biqherosix · 3 years

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*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧ ohh how about lance and keith with an s/o who has elemental powers!! (i’ve always had this idea in the back of my head but i cannot write so i’m requesting it 😌✨)

oceana terra - headcanons

fluff

(voltron legendary defender — romantic! keith kogane x waterbender! reader; romantic! lance x earthbender! reader)

if a world with a giant robot as the universe's strongest weapon exists, there's bound to be a part of that universe where element bending also exists

cw / bloodbending

a/n — uh hi :) for once, i have nothing to say other than i miss keith akira kogane and lance mcclain. space bfs for the win ! oh and also the lance mcclain portion of my personality analysis advice column is in the works anon !! but anyway, the bending shown is loosely based off atla / tlok, so enjoy mwah !

keith

this angsty boy has such a fiery personality (him, zuko, and mako are the holy red trope trinity and you can fight me on it) that it's the literal law (my law, you can reference all my atla / tlok fics for that later lmao) that he end up with someone opposite his elemental vibe thus ending up with a waterbender

but your powers are a little more broad, so any liquid also ends up in your spectrum to bend

the plot twist is that you grew up thinking you were a human, enrolling in the galaxy garrison completely unaware you weren't human at all, instead a rare species of bender the galra yearn to destroy

you always wondered why you were always so attracted to any vast body of liquid despite being trained as a fighter pilot

but it all made sense when allura explained it to you since you weren't a paladin but "made for greater things" and keith took a really long time to process it

he didn't know if it was because of the actual news or because you immediately made a water pun upon finding out (lance who? and sokka? we don't know them we only know y/n l/n in this household)

keith doesn't treat you any differently, but you lowkey have to work up to the amount of trust you had from pre-voltron events

it's just a big deal for you and you don't really know how to deal with it, and on top of that keith just has an existential crisis since he liked you because you were so familiar and then they drop the waterbending bomb on him

but y'all get through it after lance annoys him enough bc his banter makes him miss you (for payback you freeze lance's cups of water during breakfast)

omg pidge keeping up with the earth calendar in space and you make it snow in the castle on christmas !!!

also epic pool fights >>> expect the pool to turn into a water park

anyway back to the regularly scheduled headcanons

imagine keith being touch starved, it gets worse bc you feel as though he shouldn't hold your hand or you'll accidentally hurt him or something (this boy just needs to be protected someone give him a hug, cause it ain't gonna be me)

you compromise with tapping each other's hands or loose pinkies interwined (ohh just wait till you bloodbend)

your relationship is definitely spontaneous, hot headed, and badass af !!! with an emphasis on competitive

and i mean competitive, the vibe just goes through the roof after discovering your powers

y'all would always fight for the top grades in your crew bc you were baby and you wanted to make shiro proud but y'all took it to a whole other level in space

choose your fighter: a beginning waterbender who's being trained by an ancient altean or a fast learner who happens to wield a sword?? my bet is on the fast learner (everyone has bets on who wins between y'all, it's a weekly match at this point)

my mind immediately going to angst oop- okay keith has been through a lot okay, his mom left, his dad died, shiro was previously announced dead, and now you're a waterbender who can manipulate the water in one's body

however allura didn't think to inform you of mf bloodbending, so it came off as a shock when you did it upon being captured in season seven and zethrid and ezor had pidge

you shut down, and it was so hard to talk to you even if you shared a space in the black lion with keith (jeez poor krolia having to hear that confrontation)

but when you let it out, keith is right there and he tells you of the times he's been scared of himself whenever his galran side pops out sometimes

and he tells you how he's going to be there with you and that at least y'all will finally have some familiarity being back on earth (jokes on you-)

it's a big step though because keith vocalizing things is a rarity but he's also a simp for you and he'd do anything to make you feel better

especially after he left for the blades so if anything he's just making up for lost time

lance

this boy has had feelings for you since the minute he met you and thinks the whole universe of you

they had found you in a galra prison during a simple recon mission, which then turned into saving you, as the rumors of the galra finding rare benders and exploiting them for their power turned out to be true

well they didn't actually have to save you, you mocked one of the guards enough to have them let you go and you wrecked them with the surrounding metal in the room

lance had been the one to come and retrieve you, to which you weren't expecting the paladins to find you anytime soon so it surprised you when you were met with a laser gun to your head, and suddenly he was pinned in metal

he may have enjoyed that a little too much and wanted to kiss you right then and there, having literal heart eyes at your intense glare, and as per usual shiro had to come to the rescue

but since you were a high risk prisoner due to your powers, the paladins thought it would be safer if you stayed with them until you could go into hiding (which means once sam holt is found, you're headed to earth because you look human enough and you could help make earth believe in alien life)

which meant spending more time with lance !!

okay but lance has always been for having a badass powerful significant other wbk, so it's no surprise y'all ended up together

he says your bending makes the relationship more fun and thrilling (he just has a type okay)

and his sparring sessions are actually challenging for once

but also y'all just work well together, two peas in a pod, two people sharing one braincell, the like

y'all do self care nights !!! and y'all happen to be quite the explorers so occasionally on foreign planets you'll find stones, turning them into crystals with your bending

lance was so in awe that there's always a pack of stones waiting for you in your room, and you've amounted to so many little crystals that you make jewelry together

it can be a separate date on its own or something to pass the time while wearing face masks

the first thing he made were matching bracelets, it was pretty cute

but when he's sad he'll just pull up to your room, pull out the space crystals (you totally have a stash of self care products for when lance isn't ready to leave your room) and make jewelry for his family as an homage to them

he'll ramble on and on about them, stopping abruptly to be able to string the tiny crystals along into a bracelet or when he needs utmost concentration

but you listen wholeheartedly, contributing to the abundance of bracelets and other trinkets in hopes they'll like them too

it's a small gesture, but for lance that's enough (and that's when he realizes he loves you)

when you inevitably leave for earth, he gets sad because you'll have to be experiencing earth without him, but thinks it's a perfect time to give you the promise ring with a special crystal he managed to find without you

he finally tells you he loves you and promises to see you back on earth (he got a little carried away and made you a video for earth too for days you missed him, however you accidentally gave it to his family and they immediately took you in as their own; especially veronica who took you under her wing as you venture the garrison together)

aw and when you and lance reunite it's the cutest thing he has a mf heart attack

granted you hug keith first bc he didn't necessarily have anyone to come home to and he was family considering y'all are lowkey alike, and you ramble about how you jumpstarted and metalbended a train with veronica when lance just pulls you into a kiss like bro i missed you

the mcclain family cheers him on bc their baby is here alive and thriving but keith is like ugh ew gross

but everything is almost back to normal bc you and lance are together again and that is all that matters !!!

#keith kogane x reader #keith kogane imagine #keith x reader #keith kogane #keith vld #keith kogane voltron #lance mcclain x reader #lance mcclain imagine #lance mcclain #lance vld #lance mcclain voltron #voltron x reader #voltron imagine #vld x reader #vld imagine #voltron legendary defender #voltron #vld #daniza's fave characters are paying rent

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her-alien · 2 years

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the ✨(un)holy trinity✨: existential crisis, religious trauma, election anxiety

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falklore · 2 years

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The holy trinity of existential crisis the lucky one nothing new and mirrorball

#kat speaks

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cassianus · 3 years

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Can the Ladder, a work written by a hermit monk who lived 1,400 years ago, say something to us today? Can the existential journey of a man who lived his entire life on Mount Sinai in such a distant time be relevant to us?

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

After 20 Catecheses dedicated to the Apostle Paul, today I would like to return to presenting the great writers of the Church of the East and of the West in the Middle Ages. And I am proposing the figure of John known as Climacus, a Latin transliteration of the Greek term klimakos, which means of the ladder (klimax). This is the title of his most important work in which he describes the ladder of human life ascending towards God. He was born in about 575 a.d. He lived, therefore, during the years in which Byzantium, the capital of the Roman Empire of the East, experienced the greatest crisis in its history. The geographical situation of the Empire suddenly changed and the torrent of barbarian invasions swept away all its structures. Only the structure of the Church withstood them, continuing in these difficult times to carry out her missionary, human, social and cultural action, especially through the network of monasteries in which great religious figures such as, precisely, John Climacus were active.

John lived and told of his spiritual experiences in the Mountains of Sinai, where Moses encountered God and Elijah heard his voice. Information on him has been preserved in a brief Life (PG 88, 596-608), written by a monk, Daniel of Raithu. At the age of 16, John, who had become a monk on Mount Sinai, made himself a disciple of Abba Martyr, an "elder", that is, a "wise man". At about 20 years of age, he chose to live as a hermit in a grotto at the foot of the mountain in the locality of Tola, eight kilometres from the present-day St Catherine's Monastery. Solitude, however, did not prevent him from meeting people eager for spiritual direction, or from paying visits to several monasteries near Alexandria. In fact, far from being an escape from the world and human reality, his eremitical retreat led to ardent love for others (Life, 5) and for God (ibid., 7). After 40 years of life as a hermit, lived in love for God and for neighbour years in which he wept, prayed and fought with demons he was appointed hegumen of the large monastery on Mount Sinai and thus returned to cenobitic life in a monastery. However, several years before his death, nostalgic for the eremitical life, he handed over the government of the community to his brother, a monk in the same monastery.

John died after the year 650. He lived his life between two mountains, Sinai and Tabor and one can truly say that he radiated the light which Moses saw on Sinai and which was contemplated by the three Apostles on Mount Tabor!

He became famous, as I have already said, through his work, entitled The Climax, in the West known as the Ladder of Divine Ascent (PG 88, 632-1164). Composed at the insistent request of the hegumen of the neighbouring Monastery of Raithu in Sinai, the Ladder is a complete treatise of spiritual life in which John describes the monk's journey from renunciation of the world to the perfection of love. This journey according to his book covers 30 steps, each one of which is linked to the next. The journey may be summarized in three consecutive stages: the first is expressed in renunciation of the world in order to return to a state of evangelical childhood. Thus, the essential is not the renunciation but rather the connection with what Jesus said, that is, the return to true childhood in the spiritual sense, becoming like children. John comments: "A good foundation of three layers and three pillars is: innocence, fasting and temperance. Let all babes in Christ (cf. 1 Cor 3: 1) begin with these virtues, taking as their model the natural babes" (1, 20; 636). Voluntary detachment from beloved people and places permits the soul to enter into deeper communion with God. This renunciation leads to obedience which is the way to humility through humiliations which will never be absent on the part of the brethren. John comments: "Blessed is he who has mortified his will to the very end and has entrusted the care of himself to his teacher in the Lord: indeed he will be placed on the right hand of the Crucified One!" (4, 37; 704).

The second stage of the journey consists in spiritual combat against the passions. Every step of the ladder is linked to a principal passion that is defined and diagnosed, with an indication of the treatment and a proposal of the corresponding virtue. All together, these steps of the ladder undoubtedly constitute the most important treatise of spiritual strategy that we possess. The struggle against the passions, however, is steeped in the positive it does not remain as something negative thanks to the image of the "fire" of the Holy Spirit: that "all those who enter upon the good fight (cf. 1 Tm 6: 12), which is hard and narrow,... may realize that they must leap into the fire, if they really expect the celestial fire to dwell in them" (1,18; 636). The fire of the Holy Spirit is the fire of love and truth. The power of the Holy Spirit alone guarantees victory. However, according to John Climacus it is important to be aware that the passions are not evil in themselves; they become so through human freedom's wrong use of them. If they are purified, the passions reveal to man the path towards God with energy unified by ascesis and grace and, "if they have received from the Creator an order and a beginning..., the limit of virtue is boundless" (26/2, 37; 1068).

The last stage of the journey is Christian perfection that is developed in the last seven steps of the Ladder. These are the highest stages of spiritual life, which can be experienced by the "Hesychasts": the solitaries, those who have attained quiet and inner peace; but these stages are also accessible to the more fervent cenobites. Of the first three simplicity, humility and discernment John, in line with the Desert Fathers, considered the ability to discern, the most important. Every type of behaviour must be subject to discernment; everything, in fact, depends on one's deepest motivations, which need to be closely examined. Here one enters into the soul of the person and it is a question of reawakening in the hermit, in the Christian, spiritual sensitivity and a "feeling heart", which are gifts from God: "After God, we ought to follow our conscience as a rule and guide in everything," (26/1,5; 1013). In this way one reaches tranquillity of soul, hesychia, by means of which the soul may gaze upon the abyss of the divine mysteries.

The state of quiet, of inner peace, prepares the Hesychast for prayer which in John is twofold: "corporeal prayer" and "prayer of the heart". The former is proper to those who need the help of bodily movement: stretching out the hands, uttering groans, beating the breast, etc. (15, 26; 900). The latter is spontaneous, because it is an effect of the reawakening of spiritual sensitivity, a gift of God to those who devote themselves to corporeal prayer. In John this takes the name "Jesus prayer" (Iesou euche), and is constituted in the invocation of solely Jesus' name, an invocation that is continuous like breathing: "May your remembrance of Jesus become one with your breathing, and you will then know the usefulness of hesychia", inner peace (27/2, 26; 1112). At the end the prayer becomes very simple: the word "Jesus" simply becomes one with the breath.

The last step of the ladder (30), suffused with "the sober inebriation of the spirit", is dedicated to the supreme "trinity of virtues": faith, hope and above all charity. John also speaks of charity as eros (human love), a symbol of the matrimonial union of the soul with God, and once again chooses the image of fire to express the fervour, light and purification of love for God. The power of human love can be reoriented to God, just as a cultivated olive may be grafted on to a wild olive tree (cf. Rm 11: 24) (cf. 15, 66; 893). John is convinced that an intense experience of this eros will help the soul to advance far more than the harsh struggle against the passions, because of its great power. Thus, in our journey, the positive aspect prevails. Yet charity is also seen in close relation to hope: "Hope is the power that drives love. Thanks to hope, we can look forward to the reward of charity.... Hope is the doorway of love.... The absence of hope destroys charity: our efforts are bound to it, our labours are sustained by it, and through it we are enveloped by the mercy of God" (30, 16; 1157). The conclusion of the Ladder contains the synthesis of the work in words that the author has God himself utter: "May this ladder teach you the spiritual disposition of the virtues. I am at the summit of the ladder, and as my great initiate (St Paul) said: "So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love' (1 Cor 13: 13)!" (30, 18; 1160).

At this point, a last question must be asked: can the Ladder, a work written by a hermit monk who lived 1,400 years ago, say something to us today? Can the existential journey of a man who lived his entire life on Mount Sinai in such a distant time be relevant to us? At first glance it would seem that the answer must be "no", because John Climacus is too remote from us. But if we look a little closer, we see that the monastic life is only a great symbol of baptismal life, of Christian life. It shows, so to speak, in capital letters what we write day after day in small letters. It is a prophetic symbol that reveals what the life of the baptized person is, in communion with Christ, with his death and Resurrection. The fact that the top of the "ladder", the final steps, are at the same time the fundamental, initial and most simple virtues is particularly important to me: faith, hope and charity. These are not virtues accessible only to moral heroes; rather they are gifts of God to all the baptized: in them our life develops too. The beginning is also the end, the starting point is also the point of arrival: the whole journey towards an ever more radical realization of faith, hope and charity. The whole ascent is present in these virtues. Faith is fundamental, because this virtue implies that I renounce my arrogance, my thought, and the claim to judge by myself without entrusting myself to others. This journey towards humility, towards spiritual childhood is essential. It is necessary to overcome the attitude of arrogance that makes one say: I know better, in this my time of the 21st century, than what people could have known then. Instead, it is necessary to entrust oneself to Sacred Scripture alone, to the word of the Lord, to look out on the horizon of faith with humility, in order to enter into the enormous immensity of the universal world, of the world of God. In this way our soul grows, the sensitivity of the heart grows toward God. Rightly, John Climacus says that hope alone renders us capable of living charity; hope in which we transcend the things of every day, we do not expect success in our earthly days but we look forward to the revelation of God himself at last. It is only in this extension of our soul, in this self-transcendence, that our life becomes great and that we are able to bear the effort and disappointments of every day, that we can be kind to others without expecting any reward. Only if there is God, this great hope to which I aspire, can I take the small steps of my life and thus learn charity. The mystery of prayer, of the personal knowledge of Jesus, is concealed in charity: simple prayer that strives only to move the divine Teacher's heart. So it is that one's own heart opens, one learns from him his own kindness, his love. Let us therefore use this "ascent" of faith, hope and charity. In this way we will arrive at true life.

Vatican, Feb. 11, 2009

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sitp-recs · 4 years

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Toeing the Line by @shiftylinguini

Harry/Draco, Harry/Teddy/Draco (Explicit, 8k)

Draco wasn’t sure why watching his partner fuck Teddy until he screamed was somehow less morally iffy for Harry than just doing it himself, but Draco wasn’t about to judge. Not when he was balls deep, anyway.

I’m slowly getting back into the Drarry realm after indulging rare pairs for a week, so let’s take it slow and start with threesomes, shall we? Can you tell how much I love it when a character creates a set of rules to convince himself that “this is fine, I’ve got it under control, it’s not too bad if I don’t...” only to snap the moment it becomes too much?? In case that wasn’t clear, here’s more shameless smut to complete my “forbidden love” holy trinity, this time with guilt-ridden Harry being gently encouraged by his lover to finally touch his godson after denying himself for so long. This fic is pure filth combined with soft intimacy, longing and tenderness, my jam. Poor Harry, I gotta say his existential crisis gives me life; his surrender is breathtaking, enabled by a generous Draco and a lovely, desperate Teddy.

The dynamics are perfect, unique and heartfelt. I love how the author translates effortlessly the special connection between Harry and Teddy. You can tell it runs deeper than desire, it’s something fond and precious, and maybe that’s why Harry never stood a chance. He was always supposed to give in, which in this case can be a comforting thought. The epic level of hotness in this feels like a personal attack. All hail daddy kink and hand porn (that wrist touch did things to my body and soul!). Last but not least, I love how comfortable Harry and Draco are around each other, a great depiction of an established relationship based on trust. This is a tasty meal, masterfully crafted to make you fall in love with this OT3. Check it out right now!

Read on AO3

#hp fic rec #drarry #harry x teddy #harry x draco x teddy #fave

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ellsey · 4 years

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Agents of Shield Rewatch 6x05 The Other Thing

Remember when we used to go on vacations?

Hahahahaha yeah

Melinda looks beautiful and I’d watch her sleep like a creeper too Phil

Noooooooo they’ve got Melinda tied up!

The juxtaposition of heart eyes Phil and emo Sarge is something

“I’m gonna turn you”

On?

Sorry it had to be asked

Aww Elena doesn’t want to talk to her ex about her current but now dead bf

Mack is having a pretty rough go of it as director :(

Enoch is still having an existential crisis hahaha

Hahahaha oh Davis

Enoch you impulsive sexy anthropologist

“Chronica 2 is gone”...what happened to Chronica 1?

“Bestie.” “Fitz!” All we need is Deke yelling for Bobo and we’d have the holy Fitz trinity

Poor May :(

I love this precious Phil and Melinda content but also it sucks that we got it after it was over

Boo!

STOP TRAUMATIZING MELINDA MAY 2K20

Also dead guy crab walking at you has got to go in the top place of the list of things you will never be able to unsee

On the other hand Sarge wasn’t wrong about having to stab the people who got batsied

Enoch sounds like he’s describing a puppy

Which...fair

“The Enoch that I invited into my charging pod was reckless, but not a traitor” *insert audience wooooooooooo here*

“I cannot believe I ever granted you access to my data port” NOOOOOOOO HAHAHAHA I’M DYING

Enoch looks really confused by Daisy and Jemma

So Sarge isn’t exactly a bad guy? How random

The batsies are related to the monoliths??

This doesn’t make a lot of sense to me ehh

May would make an amazing teacher I love that idea

Just imagine her as the director of the Philip J. Coulson Academy for Spy Arts and Kids Who What to Learn to Do Other Stuff Good Too

Awww this is so sad. Jemma is such a sweetie.

Hahaha Snowflake is a trip

Melinda May is such a queen

She deserves better than faux Phil though

Which considering what we’re getting in season 7...

Anyway please give her a happy ending, ok?

Yay it’s Daisy!!!

Whew is there so much catching up to do

Fitz is super not happy with his bestie

Nooooo I hate it when besties fight

“I will always consider you a friend”

Interesting way of showing it

This episode was a bit of a ride. It gets a 100000/10 on the Philinda scale, but also a -550/10 because of all the stuff with Sarge. Boo! Meanwhile, the space crew definitely rates a 50000/10 on the Wacky Heroics scale.

I have 2 song offerings this episode because one is the song I really want and one is the song I can actually put on a Spotify playlist because the first song isn’t on here. And yes I know Philinda weren’t in Hawaii I don’t care.

First is “He Moana Ke Kai” by Randy Lorenzo. This is a Hawaiian language version of “The Water Is Wide,” and easily the most beautiful version I’ve ever heard.

youtube

My second, this is actually on Spotify choice, is “White Sandy Beach of Hawai’i” by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole. Philinda deserved more time. :(

youtube

#aosrewatch #aosrewatchs6 #philinda #Phil Coulson #melinda may #sarge #snowflake #jemma simmons #Daisy Johnson #leo fitz #enoch #agent davis #agent piper #alphonso mackenzie #elena rodriguez

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filmsisnice · 6 years

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Published by Film Ireland

Paul Schrader’s First Reformed doesn't simply begin, it bleeds into consciousness. Blooming from darkness our eyes creep through time where a divine relic looms large. A simple yet striking design, this white washed steeple sits quietly detached from its surroundings as twig-tipped trees strike silhouettes against the churning sky. The camera ushers its audience as if a stray procession seeking refuge from the toppling clouds above yet we cant help but feel a sense of doubt as the church contorts with every yard gained. Is this building a shelter for the stranded or salvation’s snare?

For Schrader, cinema is that shelter and together we tiptoe into his church. Dreyer, Bergman and Bresson make up the three wise men and their gifts brought and borrowed embalm each frame with a meditative stillness. It’s a transcendental cinema of ritual and routine where form shapes content into a flickering genuflection. It’s what Schrader calls the ‘scalpel of boredom’, time unspooled and sculpted into an existential itch out of reach. There’s a silent fury boiling behind the camera, frothing the vocabulary of a collective anxiety. It’s an unease that can be traced back through the mottled diary of Travis Bickle where apocalyptic predictions pry open the blistered boroughs of Taxi Driver (1976).

Reverend Ernst Toller (Ethan Hawke) too keeps a diary, but what starts out as an exercise to keep his thoughts in order, soon becomes a document of spiritual malaise. Toller oversees the aforementioned Church, more a tourist pit stop than a place of worship this parish is on the verge of celebrating its 250th anniversary. Toller is soon approached by Mary (Amanda Seyfried) to lend spiritual counsel to her husband Michael (Philip Ettinger), a radical environmentalist wrought with despair. Expecting their first child Michael can’t bear the thought of introducing a new being into a world teetering on the edge of oblivion. The Reverend’s heartfelt words do little to stir Michael from his misery, instead a reversal occurs. Like an infection Toller contracts a sickness of the soul and soon festering concerns seep across diary pages with the ominous mantra ‘Will God forgive us?’.

Toller has become disillusioned not with God but with humanity. While he preaches to half empty pews congregations crowd Abundant Life, a nearby megachurch run by Pastor Jeffers (Cedric ‘The Entertainer’ Kyles), a corporate Christian whose disarming warmth represents the modern faith Toller rejects. Schrader grinds his camera against the mounting tension between faith and politics to explore what hope can be held in a hopeless world.

It’s a tension that lies ever present across Toller’s face. The narrow crease cutting between Hawke’s eyes externalizes a lacerated soul, a mind torn in two. Hawke quietly tinkers behind a face of numbed expression to internalize a soul screaming to be heard. An actor whose giddy limbs and casual charm oozed his way to stardom, now seems a shadow slipping through scenes to elude our grasp.

A stark shooting strategy is incorporated which echoes the reverend’s torment where static shots linger in a tight aspect ratio smothering any sense of relief. It’s a style that harks back to the European greats, a nostalgia that seems at odds with the film’s lifeless digital format, where images appear crisp and cold. A tug of war ensues, where even the film’s form is wriggling in its own skin. Schrader nudges us adrift in time only to find ourselves lost behind a modern lens.

The dissonance in design spills over to the film’s dressing where just a kitsch lamp is enough to unbalance an uncluttered composition. There is no comfort to be found. With every camera move, every slow push in and pan we sense a whispering menace, we’re being simultaneously pushed and pulled, passively asphyxiated to the point where even Toller’s church begins to look like a courtroom, where judge, jury and executioner make up the Holy Trinity.

According to reports, First Reformed could be Paul Schrader’s last film, if so it marks the end of a terrific thematic through line. ‘God’s lonely man’ stemmed from the budding rage of Travis Bickle, nestling in the narcissism of American Gigolo’s (1980) Julian Kaye to then be caught in the midst of a mid-life crisis with John LaTour in Light Sleeper (1992). Now, later in life Rev. Ernst Toller hosts the malignant spirit snarling against a faceless future. Cast loose on the periphery of society these bodies drift through a city slumped in a capitalist comatose, they’re wanderers, lookers, sleepless and shirtless, disciplined but deranged as if unsprung coils set to spring these bodies lay outstretched craving communion in every street corner, bedroom and diner. But for all First Reformed’s soundless fury it’s the perforated moments of intimate wonder which gnaw against our subconscious, a divine sweetness blossoming between bruises.

#first reformed #ethan hawke #paul schrader #film criticism #Film Review #cinema #taxidriver #cinephile #film

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brothalynchhung · 4 years

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2019 overview.

this year.. was fucking two years in one. also a little late again but whatever. this is going to be long as FUCK.

started 2019 in dubai

spent the first couple of days in Dubai on the beach

YOOO AS AM WRITING THAT IT FEELS SO FUCKING LONG AGO HOLLYY SHITT

went to London and just fucked around dt and chinatown lost that damn snake ring fml

I got drunk eating dumplings watching Jeffrey star in that bed LMFAOOOYOO LMFAOOOOOEGJEORIGHSREUG

got back to Ottawa and it was straight GRIND from the get go

back to my last semester of uni

back to club m (omg.. I miss:( kinda lol)

started that govt job

back to social media marketing for Dubai

3 jobs + school basically

did that dumbass STUPID FUCKING govt job all the way in quebec that I woke up for and travelled for everyday

would go straight to gym, work again, or school fml

wasn't entirely bad I kinda needed it cuz I applied to a million jobs during that time and did school work LMAO also printed a lot of important shit and got paid so whatever

CAME TO TORONTO IN MARCH W TRAND OMG I FORGOT THAT WAS 2019

SAW VINCE STAPLES!!

AND The fortune teller who like prophisized all this shit goddddd

iconic if I must say

little did I know...

I miss movati fml lol

working at club Monaco omg ugh they gave me life honestly

fun times w trang cc precious Courtney mich JACK Amanda Raman donia even tho she annoying lol and whoever else I worked w jana jil Daria honestly I just miss Courtney LMFAO uhh jenn was cool too

I'm never going to forget that place I swear to god I have so much loyalty and pride for my memories for that place im never going to take my experience there for

chilling with avid Vinny and like Alex a bit LMAO he would randomly ask to chill it was weird

that Chinese dinner and chat time thing in his car WHAT WAS THATTT

chilling like a scrub a cu with hector and that crew goddLMAO

avin vin rideau gang

visiting avid at nordstorm the Rui girl and Herman lol he was sofunny

MY BODY IS FOR ME NOT THESE BITCHES LMFAOO

last class with strangle omg he was iconic honestly

trang pargol fidede zainab mannnn honestly shoutout old Ottawa friends

xinyii!! and jelly!! my last times with them

I miss Xinyi so much :( im so happy I got to see her before leaving she was so nice I wish her so much success

remember working those last shifts at cm like.. yo I feel like things are going to change and my days are numbered.. I feel it.

did interview after interview, applying EVERYDAY to escape

the amount of focusing I did on applying around feb and April like I was just focused on working and getting out of there

did two interviews in like 2 hours always on the go always moving always working

and then like clockwork.. at the govt job.. went to the bathroom knew? to bring my phone with me.. and then right when I left I got a call from mk went into that empty conference room and got the offer. cried. accepted. life changing

I honestly just left that place... went to cm and just.. resigned... put my two weeks in...

and it happened literally in my last week of the govt job..

like fate

immediately went home told cc precious fam

fam weren't happy

BUT I FINALLY ESCAPED!!!! LOOKING BACK ON THIS BLOG AND EVERYTHING I FINALLY F I N A L L Y GOT OUT OF THERE THE BITCH ASS CURSED SHIT CITY NEVER GOING BACKEGIUEHGEIRUGH

shout out precious for helping me honestly he helped so much

found my place through hmida who held it down

that whole condo scenario LOL godddd my landlord a HOE

met zgy gvy at precious while I crashed a night

THE MILLIONS OF RIDESHARESSS GOODDDDDD

remember the one I took last minute from Yorkdale LMAO that one wasn't bad honestly I slept good

moving my things packaging them up. like yo.. lol

bringing the boxes from shoppers godddd LOL

finally landed in Toronto with my place

waiting outside for 5 hours for my damn keys crazy with my suitcase lol...

THEN FINALLY GOT TO MY FIRST PLACE!! MY FIRST RENTAL CONDO ALL ON MY OWN NO ROOMATES JUST ME

unpacking my things

like just finally having my own place mannn that was my dream for such a long ass time

getting around dt a bit getting used to tdot...

crazy exciting

then... 3 days in..

...

met that bitch that fucked me up

met everything I ever wanted in a person? physically and interest wise and yet?

nothing?

SO CONFUSED I MET SOMEONE WITH EVERYTHING I THOUGHT I WANTED

first hookup? lost v?

new city new job new life new home lost v new everything

in 3 days.

my life crazy..

spent the whole time like until October till low-key NOW just thinking about it bitterly

my feelings up and down I was drowning in obsession and confusion

I know I fucked it up but it was fucked up since the beginning

shook everything about what I thought I wanted in gl or a person

standards are definitely raised and all men trash and hoes Idgaf

I feel nothing towards nobody

my whole mind switched to money and power.

gl I love you but you're not here and we got a lot growing to do so imma see ya ass in a couple of years

anyways started working at mk!!! craziest 3 month probation thing I had

HOWWW DID I DOOOO ITTTTTTT

met so much people... holy shit.. zgy,gvy,hailey,gab,aisha,priya,rach,lisa,alex,DANIA, goddddd

clubbing.. mon., thurs... weekenddd... wake up... 8:30 work

how did I do it.... fuck lol

met a lot of hoes.. fucked with Sunday once more before he died bye bitch ass hoe.. Leo, sleeve, uhhh that's it I think actually

CABANNNAAAA

OMG I SAW SEAN PAUL LIVE ICONICC YOO THIS FUCKING YEAR LMFAOOOOO

omg YEAH I SAW NCT IN MY FIRST WEEK OF TO WITH PARGOL LMFAOOO YOOOOO

damn this year was crazy I keep forgetting shit

all the weird ass ppl I met at cabana omg the humber guy YOO THE ASIAN GUY WITH MY KEYS LMFAOOO ZGY FUCKLMFGIESH

omg tsf lmao and like yeah all the clubbing ppl in to fuck

half and half like didnnt know if I liked it or not but it was crazy

still think about that Frans night the damn milkshake and food omggg

just spent summer exploring to trinity Bellwoods ossington like summer stories clubbing stories

managing my double life lol

SPIDERMAN OBSESSION LMAOOOO TO DISTRACT MY MIND FROM THAT BITCH ASS HOE LMFAOOFREJGIEURHSTESUIH THEN I FOUND OUT HE HAS A WHOLE WIFE AND BABY YOOO LMFAOOO

good distraction made work fun when I needed it during my last months of probation LMAO

omg going home during lunch and then back to work ICONIC

leaving the girls at my place and coming back for lunch LMAOOO god really iconic honestly showering and going back to work sleeping hoeing all that LMFAO

omg the time I left Leo at my place YOO LMAO

still have that expensive ass sweater LMFAO WAT A SIMP

those drunk texts he sent Me in august and I punked him off LMFAOO 😩😂

men trash

darren Chris rob goddd all those damn ppl I met the one guy who saved me during that blacTHE BLACKOUT CABANNA NIGHT GOD THAT WAS A MESS LMAO TITTIES OUT EVERYTHING but yeah he was low key useless I forget his name highboy but whatever

YOOO THAT GIRLS TITTIES I SLEPT ON NGEIRGHEUHUE ICONIC

I got catfishes twice 😩 the change bitch and the John bitch airehguerihserh FUCKKK LMFAO

AND THEN THE CHANG BITCH WAS TRYNA SAY OH U JSUT LOOK TO ARAB THATS WHY WE HAVNET TALKED AGAINL IKE BITCHHHHH FIRST OF ALL UR A WHOLE CATFISHFHERGUERBKSHETERU AHERUIGESRUYR LMFAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

and then I catfish Sunday to punk him off for revenge and call him a thot and thought he was talking about me for catfish when it was just about another bitch he was hoeing with cuz he a hoe.. Jesus my life wild

SO MUCH SHIT THIS SUMMER UHERGHSREG

gained weight fml I don't even wanna mention it iDONT WANNA TALK

even if it is muscle I dDONT WANNT TALK ABOUT IT

the cabana pool jump... godd... walking home drunkregiuhersguhe fucK

summer was crazy

nada and mama coming wow that was annoying I rlly can't do family even though I love them

getting high swimming the catfish racing munchies arguing with Alex LMAO

eating out with Dania gab Lisa the normal ppl I met lool

a lot of stress of money and where I want to go I was in a hella rush idk why I think everything happening so fast made me not want to slow down at all but im finally slowing down

priya end of the year rebel tiff stuff

basically drowning in depress and regret around the end of summer cuz everything calmed down and I had the time to think and reflect about everything and yeah.. got super depressed

that bitch cc and her bullshit yo just fucking go bye

notice how there's like no memories with her like yeah there was but they were just annoying cuz she was annoying highkey

thanks for bringing my shit from Ottawa tho dumbass LOL eat a dick

THE HOT TUBBBB SUMMERSSS AND SUMMER NIGHTS

omg all my emo ass walks at night to the port and water and trillium park in the morning aiohreughresehre writing with my journal god that was actually nice tho

super peaceful so happy to live near the water highkey

always in between losing myself who am I what do I do now who am I like did I lost myself did I ever have myself

major existential crisis

how did I survive work god

musicmusiscmusicccc

moviesmovesmoves

readreadread

actually I had a lot of night walking home from the club sad

omg remember the ovo guy fucking loser liar

as usualllll

RECORDRESCORSDCRECORDDSSS SO MANY TDOT IS PERFECTT

ugh what else fuck too much shit happened OH YEAH

my birthday with the girls and the bbq!! the cake!! omg so nice :((( so funny lol

that weirdo ass man that I still see in the gym sometimes god help me lol

passing my probation!!!! and then like finally fitting in and feeling apart of mk and the “family” lol

CLARK KENT AND SCOTTISH MANS MAKING MY LIFE EVRYDAYYYYYugh love them

got a moomin from Scottish mans 🥺 love him

anyways got depressed drowning in obsession.. nothing surprising there 🙄

got high and drunk like bottom of the barrel...

right before pargol came LMAO

oh yeah I went to Ottawa because yo I was going out of my mind about losing myself.. needed to go BACK to the place I hated to find myself

went back and it was like??? everything was the same.. still saw vin and avid and Herman at Rideau still had bbt with them

still fucking around hector and that whole crew had Ivan his girl moe.. ribal..Kyle YO lol that weird ass club experience AS USUAL Ottawa clubs trash god

apple picking same year in a row wit z <3 and hamza and fams lol

saw the kids and got to be stupid again loool

anyways came back to my actual life

like it just felt weird knowing that the place I had all my memories and experiences in like.. felt nothing

even the forest felt weird like I didn't need to be there anymore?

as much as tried to drown myself in obsession and my past and bad habits.. I couldn't?

im being forced to move forward and learned Sunday was the last experience it was just eye opening

after the emotional shit I sat down again and had a whole purging

I never felt that bad and horrible and drowned in obsession since raglan..

like.. deleted the hidden pictures... the feeling.. like I've done this before...

that was the final straw..

you think its over just because I am dead but its not over..the games just begun.

never again.

anyways I met Aisha!!! love her vibe with her heavy

introduceed me to the sugar shit YOOOO LMFAOOO

THEN WE STARTING PIMPIN AND MAKING EXTRA MONEY

NO MORE MONEY STRUGGLE

GOT FUCKED OVER HEART TURNED COLD NOW WE FOCUSING ON MONEY CAREER POWER PLAYING THESE HOES FOR THEY MONEY AND RECLAIMING MYSELF

weird ass fucking people but get the money and go

stack up crazy and saving up this past few months

and just chilling w friends and therapy sessions

scheming and planning for the future

therapy sessions

got close with Lisa

oh yeah BOLO!! UGH BEST GYM

ALSO OMG I FORGOT I SAW BROCKHAMPTON AGAIN!!! AND SOMEHOW GOT TO THE BARRIER AND LITERALLY HAD SO MUCH INTERACTION WITH KEVIN LIKE SINGING TOGETHER AND THEN HE CAME DOWN SAID I GOTCHU AND TOOK TWO PICS WITH ME FUCKGIERGEIUTHSEUH THAT WAS INSANEEE MY LIFE WILDDDD

iconic holiday party and New Years with again like random weird ppl and my girls exemplifying how wild and fresh the whole experience of this year was

at least I be waking up warm and clean in MY PLACEby myself with no bullshit

just like.. got a new place new job new city basically live the life I always wanted? reading movies? new friends no problems? wtf how my life change so quick

new interesting experiences

getting drunk high dancing at my place out in these streets just meeting bare people all these new people and experiences holy shit...

and like yeah im not where I want to be but this progress and process is FUN now

everything a strategy and a move and love staying busy

wish I had more free time tho I never feel rested my life fucking crazy LOOL

that weirdo bitch who thought he was dating me UGHHH BOTTOM OF THE BARRELL JUST FOR A CAR AND FOOD BITCHARE U CRAZY

power trip crazy im so sorry jfc

anyways block and move on

met Chris and we still talking for like 3 months in a row god... lol gunna see him Saturday idk was the HALE going on

im like surrounded by hoes???? and I don't want it GOD I JUST BEEN FOCUSING ON ME AND MONEYFUCK EVERYONE ELSE

idek what else maybe im missing shit but this whole year wild best year of MY LIFE though

idk what the fuck gunna happen in 2020 cuz my split lives and the chaos and playing hoes and always thinking about opportunity and abundance and money got my mind and moves all wrapped in strategy but we only ONNLY ONLYYY GOING UP from here no excuses lets fucking go I always say this but 2019 was fucking wild and you know what.. lets fucking go 2020 LETS FUCKING GO as long as I don't gain weight LMFAO lets fucking GO. money and power on my mind exclusively. gl imma see you in 2 years. focusing on bigger things but at least im OUT HERE and ESCAPED and we onLY ATTRACTING AND MANIFESTING ABUNDANCE

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becauseanders · 7 years

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i really wonder how much the giant ass crush i’ve had on trinity since i was like 12 has to do with my giant ass crush on aria t’loak, ahaha (my guess is not everything, but definitely more than is reasonable, lol)

but holy gods i constantly feel so fucking old because this movie was the absolute shit when i was in like middle-high school and it was all “ooh snazzy futuristic” and it actually does hold up decently enough but now when i say “there is no spoon” to describe a high pain/low energy day half the time people just stare blankly at me and i then have to remember that i am absolutely dating myself by making matrix references in casual conversation, which just feels so wrong somehow, and fall into an awkward existential crisis over it because of who i am as a person

#shut up julianna

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cassianus · 6 years

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Pope Benedict XVI on St. John Climacus and the Ladder of Divine Ascent

Dear Brothers and Sisters, After 20 Catecheses dedicated to the Apostle Paul, today I would like to return to presenting the great writers of the Church of the East and of the West in the Middle Ages. And I am proposing the figure of John known as Climacus, a Latin transliteration of the Greek term klimakos, which means of the ladder (klimax). This is the title of his most important work in which he describes the ladder of human life ascending towards God. He was born in about 575 a.d. He lived, therefore, during the years in which Byzantium, the capital of the Roman Empire of the East, experienced the greatest crisis in its history. The geographical situation of the Empire suddenly changed and the torrent of barbarian invasions swept away all its structures. Only the structure of the Church withstood them, continuing in these difficult times to carry out her missionary, human, social and cultural action, especially through the network of monasteries in which great religious figures such as, precisely, John Climacus were active.

John lived and told of his spiritual experiences in the Mountains of Sinai, where Moses encountered God and Elijah heard his voice. Information on him has been preserved in a brief Life (PG 88, 596-608), written by a monk, Daniel of Raithu. At the age of 16, John, who had become a monk on Mount Sinai, made himself a disciple of Abba Martyr, an “elder”, that is, a “wise man”. At about 20 years of age, he chose to live as a hermit in a grotto at the foot of the mountain in the locality of Tola, eight kilometres from the present-day St Catherine’s Monastery. Solitude, however, did not prevent him from meeting people eager for spiritual direction, or from paying visits to several monasteries near Alexandria. In fact, far from being an escape from the world and human reality, his eremitical retreat led to ardent love for others (Life, 5) and for God (ibid., 7). After 40 years of life as a hermit, lived in love for God and for neighbour years in which he wept, prayed and fought with demons he was appointed hegumen of the large monastery on Mount Sinai and thus returned to cenobitic life in a monastery. However, several years before his death, nostalgic for the eremitical life, he handed over the government of the community to his brother, a monk in the same monastery. John died after the year 650. He lived his life between two mountains, Sinai and Tabor and one can truly say that he radiated the light which Moses saw on Sinai and which was contemplated by the three Apostles on Mount Tabor!

He became famous, as I have already said, through his work, entitled The Climax, in the West known as the Ladder of Divine Ascent (PG 88, 632-1164). Composed at the insistent request of the hegumen of the neighbouring Monastery of Raithu in Sinai, the Ladder is a complete treatise of spiritual life in which John describes the monk’s journey from renunciation of the world to the perfection of love. This journey according to his book covers 30 steps, each one of which is linked to the next. The journey may be summarized in three consecutive stages: the first is expressed in renunciation of the world in order to return to a state of evangelical childhood. Thus, the essential is not the renunciation but rather the connection with what Jesus said, that is, the return to true childhood in the spiritual sense, becoming like children. John comments: “A good foundation of three layers and three pillars is: innocence, fasting and temperance. Let all babes in Christ (cf. 1 Cor 3: 1) begin with these virtues, taking as their model the natural babes” (1, 20; 636). Voluntary detachment from beloved people and places permits the soul to enter into deeper communion with God. This renunciation leads to obedience which is the way to humility through humiliations which will never be absent on the part of the brethren. John comments: “Blessed is he who has mortified his will to the very end and has entrusted the care of himself to his teacher in the Lord: indeed he will be placed on the right hand of the Crucified One!” (4, 37; 704).

The second stage of the journey consists in spiritual combat against the passions. Every step of the ladder is linked to a principal passion that is defined and diagnosed, with an indication of the treatment and a proposal of the corresponding virtue. All together, these steps of the ladder undoubtedly constitute the most important treatise of spiritual strategy that we possess. The struggle against the passions, however, is steeped in the positive it does not remain as something negative thanks to the image of the “fire” of the Holy Spirit: that “all those who enter upon the good fight (cf. 1 Tm 6: 12), which is hard and narrow,… may realize that they must leap into the fire, if they really expect the celestial fire to dwell in them” (1,18; 636). The fire of the Holy Spirit is the fire of love and truth. The power of the Holy Spirit alone guarantees victory. However, according to John Climacus it is important to be aware that the passions are not evil in themselves; they become so through human freedom’s wrong use of them. If they are purified, the passions reveal to man the path towards God with energy unified by ascesis and grace and, “if they have received from the Creator an order and a beginning…, the limit of virtue is boundless” (26/2, 37; 1068).

The last stage of the journey is Christian perfection that is developed in the last seven steps of the Ladder. These are the highest stages of spiritual life, which can be experienced by the “Hesychasts”: the solitaries, those who have attained quiet and inner peace; but these stages are also accessible to the more fervent cenobites. Of the first three simplicity, humility and discernment John, in line with the Desert Fathers, considered the ability to discern, the most important. Every type of behaviour must be subject to discernment; everything, in fact, depends on one’s deepest motivations, which need to be closely examined. Here one enters into the soul of the person and it is a question of reawakening in the hermit, in the Christian, spiritual sensitivity and a “feeling heart”, which are gifts from God: “After God, we ought to follow our conscience as a rule and guide in everything,” (26/1,5; 1013). In this way one reaches tranquillity of soul, hesychia, by means of which the soul may gaze upon the abyss of the divine mysteries.

The state of quiet, of inner peace, prepares the Hesychast for prayer which in John is twofold: “corporeal prayer” and “prayer of the heart”. The former is proper to those who need the help of bodily movement: stretching out the hands, uttering groans, beating the breast, etc. (15, 26; 900). The latter is spontaneous, because it is an effect of the reawakening of spiritual sensitivity, a gift of God to those who devote themselves to corporeal prayer. In John this takes the name “Jesus prayer” (Iesou euche), and is constituted in the invocation of solely Jesus’ name, an invocation that is continuous like breathing: “May your remembrance of Jesus become one with your breathing, and you will then know the usefulness of hesychia”, inner peace (27/2, 26; 1112). At the end the prayer becomes very simple: the word “Jesus” simply becomes one with the breath.

The last step of the ladder (30), suffused with “the sober inebriation of the spirit”, is dedicated to the supreme “trinity of virtues”: faith, hope and above all charity. John also speaks of charity as eros (human love), a symbol of the matrimonial union of the soul with God, and once again chooses the image of fire to express the fervour, light and purification of love for God. The power of human love can be reoriented to God, just as a cultivated olive may be grafted on to a wild olive tree (cf. Rm 11: 24) (cf. 15, 66; 893). John is convinced that an intense experience of this eros will help the soul to advance far more than the harsh struggle against the passions, because of its great power. Thus, in our journey, the positive aspect prevails. Yet charity is also seen in close relation to hope: “Hope is the power that drives love. Thanks to hope, we can look forward to the reward of charity…. Hope is the doorway of love…. The absence of hope destroys charity: our efforts are bound to it, our labours are sustained by it, and through it we are enveloped by the mercy of God” (30, 16; 1157). The conclusion of the Ladder contains the synthesis of the work in words that the author has God himself utter: “May this ladder teach you the spiritual disposition of the virtues. I am at the summit of the ladder, and as my great initiate (St Paul) said: "So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love’ (1 Cor 13: 13)!” (30, 18; 1160).

At this point, a last question must be asked: can the Ladder, a work written by a hermit monk who lived 1,400 years ago, say something to us today? Can the existential journey of a man who lived his entire life on Mount Sinai in such a distant time be relevant to us? At first glance it would seem that the answer must be “no”, because John Climacus is too remote from us. But if we look a little closer, we see that the monastic life is only a great symbol of baptismal life, of Christian life. It shows, so to speak, in capital letters what we write day after day in small letters. It is a prophetic symbol that reveals what the life of the baptized person is, in communion with Christ, with his death and Resurrection. The fact that the top of the “ladder”, the final steps, are at the same time the fundamental, initial and most simple virtues is particularly important to me: faith, hope and charity. These are not virtues accessible only to moral heroes; rather they are gifts of God to all the baptized: in them our life develops too. The beginning is also the end, the starting point is also the point of arrival: the whole journey towards an ever more radical realization of faith, hope and charity. The whole ascent is present in these virtues. Faith is fundamental, because this virtue implies that I renounce my arrogance, my thought, and the claim to judge by myself without entrusting myself to others. This journey towards humility, towards spiritual childhood is essential. It is necessary to overcome the attitude of arrogance that makes one say: I know better, in this my time of the 21st century, than what people could have known then. Instead, it is necessary to entrust oneself to Sacred Scripture alone, to the word of the Lord, to look out on the horizon of faith with humility, in order to enter into the enormous immensity of the universal world, of the world of God. In this way our soul grows, the sensitivity of the heart grows toward God. Rightly, John Climacus says that hope alone renders us capable of living charity; hope in which we transcend the things of every day, we do not expect success in our earthly days but we look forward to the revelation of God himself at last. It is only in this extension of our soul, in this self-transcendence, that our life becomes great and that we are able to bear the effort and disappointments of every day, that we can be kind to others without expecting any reward. Only if there is God, this great hope to which I aspire, can I take the small steps of my life and thus learn charity. The mystery of prayer, of the personal knowledge of Jesus, is concealed in charity: simple prayer that strives only to move the divine Teacher’s heart. So it is that one’s own heart opens, one learns from him his own kindness, his love. Let us therefore use this “ascent” of faith, hope and charity. In this way we will arrive at true life.

Vatican, Feb. 11, 2009

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deanlawrencekowalski · 5 years

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Elite Failure Has Brought Americans to the Edge of an Existential Crisis | The Atlantic The nuclear family, God, and national pride are a holy trinity of the American identity. What would happen if a generation gave up on all three? Source: Elite Failure Has Brought Americans to the Edge of an Existential Crisis

#Institutional Policy #Left

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the-end-of-art · 7 years

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Empathetic distress

From Empathy is Not Charity by Patricia Snow at First Things

Empathy, in this secular kingdom, does not mean simple kindness, consideration, or compassion. It means actually feeling what you believe someone else is feeling at any given moment. If I am sorry that you are suffering, I am compassionate, but if I am suffering what you are suffering, I am empathic, which means that presidential candidate Bill Clinton got empathy exactly right when, in a crystalizing moment at a 1992 fundraiser in New York City, he said to AIDS activist Bob Rafsky, “I feel your pain.”

Many of us in the larger audience laughed at Clinton’s assertion at the time, but the joke turns out to have been on us. For many years now, we have been living in what Frans de Waal called an age of empathy, an age not of reason but of overflowing emotion, as if the sea, that great universal symbol of ungoverned passion and seething affective life, had burst the bounds God laid down for it in the beginning (“so far and no further”) and covered the whole earth with its waves.

In our neurological arsenal, scientists now tell us, we have neurons called “mirror neurons” that do not distinguish between the self and others. They tell us, too, that an empathic response to another person’s pain can involve the same brain tissue that is activated when we ourselves feel the same pain. Moreover, while some people are naturally more empathic than others (women, for example, tend to be more empathic than men), with practice, or “empathy training,” everyone can improve. By deliberately and habitually dwelling on the sufferings of others, as the empathy commandment, sensational media, and a culture of victimhood encourage us to do (contemporary versions of Ignatius’s Spiritual Exercises, which required traditional Jesuits to dwell on the sufferings of Christ), everybody can enlarge their empathic capacities. Indeed, given a choice between reason and emotion, or sense and sensibility, as a culture we incline to emotion and sensibility more and more, and we are proud of our choice, as if it were evidence of our evolving humanity.

But is it? What have been the real consequences of our unprecedented emotional spending? What have we purchased by it, and have there been hidden costs for what Buddhism calls “sentimental compassion” and psychology “unmitigated communion”?

Sadly, it turns out to be an exhausting, counterproductive business, this business of trying to participate in the sufferings of other people. In his recent book Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion, Yale psychologist Paul Bloom summarizes the experimental evidence and concludes that empathy, strictly defined, “[corrodes] personal relationships; it exhausts the spirit and can diminish the force of kindness and love.” Far from being kinder and more supportive of others, overly empathic individuals are so overwhelmed by the sufferings of others that they are finally helpless to help them, and may even actively avoid them. Nursing students, for example, whose empathy scores were high spent more time seeking support for themselves than caring for their patients. Bloom’s book is full of examples of people suffering from what he calls “empathic distress,” not only in the helping professions but in relationships in general.

Part of the problem with empathy is that it is so vulnerable to manipulation. If empathy means feeling what you believe someone else is feeling at a given time, then not only the psychopath but any especially needy or unscrupulous individual will enjoy an advantage in an empathy-driven world. Empathic individuals are imaginative individuals, easily persuaded that the sufferings of others are worse than they are. (Who would know?) In The Great Divorce, in an imagined posthumous encounter between an emotionally manipulative husband and his long-suffering wife, C. S. Lewis distinguishes between a proportionate, constructive pity and a pity that we merely suffer, a Passion (Lewis’s word) that Endō all but divinizes in Silence, but one that impairs our judgment and destroys our peace, and may persuade us to concede what we would not otherwise concede.

Consider, too, Adam Smith’s mournful observation that “Nature, it seems, when she loaded us with our own sorrows, thought that they were enough, and therefore did not command us to take any further share in those of others, than what was necessary to prompt us to relieve them.” Is it reasonable, or wise, to expect people to bear other people’s sufferings? Is it a coincidence that in a world that has made a fetish of vicarious suffering, suffering itself—real suffering—has become taboo? (...)

Solidarity in suffering is a keynote of the Body of Christ, but it is a solidarity constituted by singular individuals, whose unity derives from each one’s primary allegiance to Christ. Empathy solidarity, on the other hand, is Christian solidarity’s demonic counterfeit, one that carries within itself the seeds of its own destruction. If the Holy Spirit strengthens both individuals and the ties that bind them, empathy weakens them. Excessive, unmediated intimacy leads to affective confusion (whose suffering is whose?), and even to confusion about identity and agency (whose choices are whose?). In a world of porous boundaries and blended identities—think of Dante’s thieves in hell, bleeding into each other—Guardini’s confident assertion “my every act begins in me, who am alone responsible for it” is cast into doubt. Modernity suffers not only from Harold Bloom’s anxiety of influence (an oedipal fear of being influenced by one’s forebears), but also from what we might call an anxiety of influencing others, a disabling fear of being responsible for others’ choices. (...)

Our age’s obsession with individuality is expressive of a crisis of individuality; it is symptomatic of a deficit rather than a surfeit. People today are no more selfish or egotistical than previous generations; rather, their selfhood is more genuinely imperiled. Unacquainted with the Holy Spirit, which introduces into human relationships the same kind of spacious, identity-enhancing intimacy that characterizes the Trinity itself, and far from the Church, whose sacraments, the Eucharist especially, “[enable] us to break our disordered attachments to creatures and root ourselves in [Christ],” too many people fall into binary, diminishing relationships; thievish relationships in which, in Guardini’s words, “always the one must live at the cost of the other”; mutually destructive relationships from which people eventually withdraw in dismay.

Put another way, in a world without God, man attributes too much agency to himself. This may exhilarate him for a time, but in the end, he cannot bear so much responsibility. There is a reaction, and, across the culture, a collective retreat, as unprecedented numbers of people lick their wounds in solitude, or seek comfort in drugs, legal or illegal, or in pornography, or in the soothing, impersonal ministrations of electronic devices.

This is not a world in which Christianity can flourish. Christianity, to be passed on, depends upon strong individuals, people who know where they end and others begin. It depends upon people who understand both their natural limits and their supernatural potential—secure individuals, who are unafraid either of proposing strong truths or of entertaining challenging proposals from others.

In the swamp of modernity, these conditions no longer obtain. In Silence, Inoue calls Japan a swamp in which Christianity cannot take root, but in fact it did take root in the seventeenth century, surviving underground for generations. Modernity is the real mud in which Christianity struggles to find a footing. Christianity, after all, can only take root in individuals, and in our day, bona fide individuals are in short supply. In a world of recovering codependents, God’s word is still reverberating, but man is too timorous to repeat it. He is too fragile and insecure, too existentially touchy and emotionally raw. Suspicious of others’ influence and terrified of exercising his own, frightened of suffering himself but even more unnerved by the thought of others suffering—how can such a person receive Christ or offer him to others, when either to receive or propose Christ is always, at the same time, to receive and propose his cross? In a suffering-averse world, handing on the Gospel is almost impossible. In the culture of the modern West, it is not God’s silence that should trouble us, but our own.

(https://www.firstthings.com/article/2017/10/empathy-is-not-charity)

#First Things #Patricia Snow #Silence

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enchanted-flowers · 7 years

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Hiya! Which Youtube gamers do you think the Skelebros resemble? I'm talking UT, US, UF bros. I was just... like, giggling to myself imagining US Papy being a little like Markiplier, just being real chill irl but when he gets in his studio for a vid he just EXPLODES with googly eyes and major attitude and incoherent screaming that can be heard from downstairs. Also, how do you think their brothers would react to them being a famous Youtube gamer? Thank you!!

okay so like, i only know like, 3 gaming youtubers (the holy trinity as I call them) and I only watch 2, so there’s no way I can do 6. So instead of gaming youtubers, I’ll do youtubers in general if that’s okay? I don’t watch a lot of youtubers either, but I’ll try my best! (I apologize of they’re all british bloggers lol)

Undertale

Sans

Hands down, Ryan Higa. They both jump at the chance to make shitty puns and have enough originality to make people laugh. Ryan is one of the original youtubers and Sans, is well, the original Sans, and people still like them even with the changing times. They both can make serious topics into a joke, yet still retain their seriousness when needed.

Papyrus

It’s only natural to match one ray of sunshine, with another. Papaya resembles Phil Lester! They’re both optimistic in life and sees the good in everyone. They both bring joy to everyone around them, including their nihilistic, existential crisis friends and family.

Underswap

Sans

I match Blue with Jacksepticeye! They both have boundless energy and somehow always have the vocal chords to scream. Jack and Blue are hardworking and have a desire to bring a smile to everyone’s faces.

Papyrus

I know you said Markiplier...but I see Stretch as more of a Pewdiepie kind of guy. They both make crude jokes once in awhile without really meaning it and they’re not afraid to speak their minds and call out on bullshit. Stretch seems like the kind of skeleton who on camera would be loud, cringe, and a total meme, but in real life, is the a really chill and cool guy, just like Pewdiepie.

Underfell

Honestly....I have no idea.

#undertale #underfell #underswap #sans #papyrus #i really wanted to try and fit thomas sanders somewhere #but i couldn't #sad :(#Anonymous #undertale headcanons

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paulsebert · 7 years

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A brief guide to 2010 DC’s crossovers so far

Previously

Marvel Crossovers: 80s, 90s, 00s, 10s

DC Crossovers: 80s, 90s, 00s

Reign of Doomsday: Doomsday runs around kicking everyone's ass. Then Cyborg Superman absorbs some of Doomsday's powers and becomes Cyborg Doomsday! Doomsday Clones arrive! Doomsday clone named Doomslayer shows up. Somewhere along the way Lex Luthor gets a Black Lantern ring. Oh and original Doomsday pulls a face turn of sorts! The send-off of the post Crisis Superman/Pre Flashpoint Superman era throws every bonkers Dan Jurgans era Superman idea at the wall.

Flashpoint: Flash goes out back in time tries to prevent his mother's death and ends up fucking everything up. Unlike the excellent Elseworld story “The Nail” none of the changes to the timeline make a lick of sense. So we're expected to believe Barry's mom living causes Thomas Wayne to become Batman and Wonder Woman to be evil? Oh and THIS is final send-off of the Post Crisis DC Universe... Hope you weren't hoping for any grand send-off to a bunch of beloved characters. Night of the Owls: Scott Snyder's Batman starts off strong with a secret society that's been maneuvering behind the scenes in Gotham that decides it wants to move into the spotlight and voilently take over the city. Because DC is DC they decided it to release it in two trades. One

has the complete story but none of the tie-in issues. The other has all of the tie-ins but fails to include the last two issues of the story. DC is there nothing you can't screw up?!

Rise of the Third Army: After screwing things up over and over again Pre-New 52 the Guardians decide to just turn straight-up evil and unleash Star Treck's Borg on the DCU. They're called The Third Army but it's the same thing.

The Culling: Someone told Scott Lobdell that no one could write a dumber teen superhero book that Avengers Arena. Scott Lobdell said “Hold my beer...” Also everyone gets Tron Legacy costumes because that's totally going to be the next big thing.

Rotworld: Swamp Thing and Animal Man fight the existential force of death itself guarded by the nightmarish Parliament of Decay.

Death of the Family: The new and 100% more grimdark Joker (look at me I cut off my face!) stalks the Bat Family leading to a final confrontation in the Batcave. The weakest part of Snyder's Batman run fells like a six part story unnecessarily blown up to crossover length.

H'el on Earth: A Superman crossover featuring an unstoppable new villain from the writer of “The Culling.” Nope... just nope...

Throne of Atlantis: Ocean Master having usurped his brother as the new King of Atlantis is all “Imperius Rex motherfucker!” and decides to declare war on the surface world. Inspired a loose animated adaptation that you should watch instead. A Trinity War prequel..

Trinity War: Several Justice League members get possessed by Pandora's Box and the Justice League Dark intervene. At least I think that's what happens. Anyway the whole thing turns out to be a Forever Evil prequel and nothing really matters.

Forever Evil: The Crime Syndicate takes over the world and Lex Luther is like “holy shit this is a job for Superman... the guy I'm always trying to kill. But I neeeeeed him!” Lex and several bad guys have to save the day and Lex actually turns face legit. The main series is big dumb fun but some of the tie-ins (like the story about Harley Quinn murdering children) are god-awful.

Lights Out: A new villain named Rellic (That's “Killer spelled backwards!) wants to destroy the various Lantern corps for repeatedly screwing up. After what the Guardians just pulled I can't blame him.

Gothtopia: Wikipedia actually describes this as “an event set in all Batman Titles.” It certainly is.

Superman Doomed: A fight with Doomsday causes Superman to mutate into a monster called “Superdoom.” Really? They called it that? Hahahahaahahah!

Batman Endgame: Now we're talking. The finally seeming to lose his sense of humor The Joker decides to destroy Gotham City once and for all with a super insanity virus. DC makes the same damn trade mistake they did with Night of the Owls.

The New 52: Future's End: Five years into the future something bad involving Brother Eye happens and several heroes travel back in time to stop it from happening. Sort of like Days of Future's Past which had a movie adaptation in theaters at the time this book was coming out. Notable for having a Free Comic Book Day tie-in that was so bleak and so grimdark that no one actually wanted to read the main story.

Convergence: Brainiac has imprisoned bottled cities from across time including a lot of pre-New 52 characters as well as a few Elseworlds. The main series is a bit of a mess but a lot of the tie-ins are fun romps.

Robin War: DC realizes it needs to promote it's cool “We Are Robin” concept about six months too late. Oops! Multiversity: Series of interconnected oneshots by Grant Morrison that introduce all new and improved multiverse. An artfully done labyrinthine mind melt. If you one read one issue make sure it's the Shazam one which is deligthful. Really between this and the Convergence one-shot how did we not get a new Captain Marvel book? C'mon!

Darkseid War: Darkseid dies there's a civil war on Apokolips. Then the Crime Syndicate shows up. Steve Trevor is possessed by the Anti-Life Equation. Then Darkseid comes back as a talking baby... Dammit DC did you make any of these decisions between 2004 and 2015 while sober?

DC Rebirth: Several years after the launch of the New 52 comics DC tries the novel idea of just publishing some largely self contained books that don't suck. Shockingly this is their most successful event in years!

Night of the Monster Men: Professor Hugo Strange unleash big-ass giant Pacific Rim type monsters on Gotham City and it's awesome!

Justice League vs Suicide Squad: The Justice League finds out about Task Force X and aren't happy. Meanwhile Maxwell Lord and a gang of villains also have a serious grudge against Amanda Waller. A big dumb loud enjoyable action movie of a book. Features the third reboot of Lobo in less than 4 years.

#DC Comics #Shorter Comics #Crossovers #10s Crossovers #Every Crossover Ever #Reing of Doomsday #Flashpoint #Night of the Owls #Forever Evil #Trinity War #Multiversity #convergence #DC Rebirth #New 52 #Night of the Monster Men #Justice League vs Suicide Squad

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