Noah > Recent Status Updates

"The nights were so brief and the days so warm, they dried out quickly and napped in the leaf-filtered sunlight, drowsing in the warmth, contented and lazy as dogs by firelight" - pg. 227

Faced with the Divine, people took refuge in the banal, as though answering a cosmic multiple choice question : If you saw a burning bush would you (a) call 911, (b) get the hot dogs, or (c) recognize God? - pg. 119

“In filterworld, it becomes hard to separate the nature of something, or its reality, from its popularity in terms of attention. Popularity alone often gets confused for meaning and significance.” - 121

There is now a generic global consumer, whose preferences and desires are molded more by the platforms they use then where they live. In some cases, we conduct our lives more in the space of [platforms] than in the [geographical space in which we live]. Along with our world, we are now flat, too. - 104

“Algorithmic anxiety is something of a contemporary plague…there’s an emotional fallout to this quest for attention: we end up both overstimulated and numb, much like glassy eyes slots player waiting for matching symbols to come up.” - 40

“Quality is subjective. Data alone, in the absence of human judgment, can only go so far in gauging it.”

And, the author includes a two page discourse surrounding the term “sacred clown”. Two words I never anticipated I’d see connected - especially in regards to Christ - and are now branded into my reading of Matthew from here on out.

I had a plethora of reflections on H. Daniel Zachrias and his commentary on an Indigenous reading of the Gospel of Matthew. In short, his emphasis on the intertwined concepts of geographical land as spiritual space, and Jesus as a type of Indigenous “medicine man” in his healing work were two reflections that changed my perspective on Jesus ministry in Matthew.

“ it’s a classic rule and film. Many of the best cinematic moments happen by accident. A scene tried that doesn’t work when first tried will ultimately tell you what does work.

Don’t be afraid to make mistakes.”

“Where do we get the idea of perfection from anyway? It comes from how we perceive how the outside world perceives us relative to others. In other words: perfection paralysis comes from comparing yourselves to others…

Just let some of your output be bad. At least you’ll be working, And that means you’ll be improving.… The professionals are the ones who keep going back to their plate and working it”

“So it is a rejection of the reality of Grace to hold her enemy at fault. Those things can only be true. It seems to me people tend to forget that we are to love our enemies, not to satisfy some standard of righteousness, but because God their father loves them.”

"I have thought about that very often – how the times change, and the same words that carry a good many people in the howling wilderness in one generation are irksome and meaningless in the next"

And often enough, when we think we are protecting ourselves, we are struggling against our rescuer.

I wish I could leave you certain of the images in my mind, because they are so beautiful that I hate to think they will be extinguished when I am. Well, but again, this life has its own mortal loveliness.

“When things are taking their ordinary course, it is hard to remember what matters”

People talk about how wonderful the world seems to children, and that’s true enough. But children think they will grow into it and understand it, and I know very well that I will not, and would not if I had a dozen lives. That’s clearer to me every day.

“Sometimes I have loved the peacefulness of an ordinary Sunday. It is like standing in a newly planted garden after a warm rain. You can feel the silent and invisible life. All it needs from you is that you take care not to trample on it.”

“Bell tried to think about his life. Then he tried not too… I didn’t know you could steal your own life. And I didn’t know that it would bring you no more benefit than about anything else you might steal.”

“Bell nodded. He sipped his coffee. The face that lapped and shifted in the dark liquid seemed an omen of things to come.”