Latest Posts by drowningworms - Page 3
This list includes doctors in the United States, Australia, Canada, and Europe!
Even if you're not the target demographic, please share for any of your friends who may be.
And if you or someone you know would like to be added to the list, there's a place for that!
Ki-Adi-Mundi is too fabulous for you
Did I just make the hardest starwars shirt of all time???
‘We Beat Them Before, We Will Beat Them Again!’
Some Rebel Alliance propo pictures to go with the Imperial one!!! 😃
The last chapters of ‘only as strong as the warrior next to you’ feature quite a few rebel themes and visual elements, so it felt like a good time to share!
“Star Wars Propaganda: A History of Persuasive Art in the Galaxy” is the source of many of these. It’s an incredible and highly enjoyable reference book, and it that comes with 10 free posters. :3 The rest of the images are taken from the excellent and inspiring works of Russell Walks Illustration, who I’m given to understand also has a tumblr. @russellwalks 👀🙏
Followers of the mother goddess Cybele were famous for whipping themselves into religious ecstasies. Modern historians love to use the word “orgiastic” to describe her worshippers and their rituals.
One of the stories associated with Cybele is that of Attis, a shepherd whose love for Cybele was so great that he castrated himself under a pine tree in a fit of religious enthusiasm and died. Many of the rituals associated with Cybele attempted to recapture both the intensity of Attis’ devotion and the bloodiness of his act.
All this struck the normally staid Romans as a bit too, well, eastern. They tended to look down on the Persians, Egyptians, and so forth as too emotional, too effeminate, and too undisciplined.
Powerful Romans worked to mainstream Cybele, turning her from a wild mother of nature into a placid Roman matriarch. Cybele was incorporated into less intense new rituals — games, animal sacrifices, that sort of thing — orchestrated by powerful Romans; her priests were not invited to these events. The wild rites associated with her seem to have faded away over time.
Augustus, the first emperor of Rome, was especially interested in using Cybele. Though he had overthrown the Roman Republic, he positioned himself as a traditionalist, someone who would bring back “traditional” Roman values. In doing so, he promoted a vision of Cybele as the “Magna Mater” — the great mother of Rome. She was now portrayed as a virtuous Roman matriarch, often without her lions:
Here’s another Roman depiction from around the same time, which attempts to incorporate all of the symbolism associated with Cybele. We have the lion, which signifies her power over nature; a cornucopia, symbolizing her role in providing abundant harvests; and her crown, representing her role in protecting Rome’s cities.
{WHF} {Ko-Fi} {Medium}
A new myth. A myth is not meant to be accurate history, but to tell a story that conveys a deeper spiritual truth. Stories are powerful.
This myth is the over-arcing story of Genesis to Jesus.
I'm not trying to save you or anything. And I don't think God is waiting for us somewhere else. God is always with us, walking with you and me and every other person through time and never turns away. But home is where the heart is. And God wants us to come home to the heart of God where there is Love, kindness, justice, generosity, Creation, the poor, the oppressed, etc. The things God loves and cares about.
I don't even really want you to believe the truths within the story. I just want you to consider the possibility and see if it resonates for you with history, our experiences, scripture, and who we know God to be as revealed in Jesus. You need to wrestle with this angel and make it make sense to you. Especially if you can't understand. The less you understand the more I beg you to listen again and sit with it.
You might hear a bit of anger or derision especially in the first few minutes. I'm not angry or derisive towards you or Christians in general or Jews at all. Any anger or derision towards people/powers towards those much, much higher up the food chain than you or anyone you know (probably).
As I tell the story, I am using lots of voice inflections to tell the story and that include sometimes a sing-song or sarcastic tone. The tone of the story is never to make fun of the reader or Christians. It's never to say that I'm smarter than anybody or put people down or anything like that.
The purpose of the incredulous voice inflections is occasionally to draw your attention to a joke, but usually it is to highlight the absurdity of the story we were given. The absurdity of the theology we were given. And the absurdity of the judgmental, autocratic, 1-strike picture of God we were given.
I really don't want to convince you of anything. If you have the eyes to see, the ears to hear, and understanding, you'll probably be able to recognize the messages in here.
Rather than looking to confirm or reject the ideas you are expecting to find, please just consider. These are brand new ideas (for you anyway) using old pictures and familiar stories. But they are not the same ideas or messages. I'm telling a different story.
See how it is different.
Consider what's different about this story & consider a few of these as you go:
-what is different from the original stories we were given (as you know them)
-what is different about the meaning
-is it more or less likely to be true than your present understanding of things, given all we know?
-Does it resonate with who we know God, humanity, creation, & the World to be?
-Does it seem truer in meaningful ways?
-Does it somehow misrepresent God or Truth?
-Does it encourage more things of God?
-Does it more things of the World?
-What do you think of the Paul and Philemon story?
A response on a friend's Facebook page to a fundie trying to pick a flight over a single verse because he has a gotcha lined up.
I'm pretty sure you would walk out of my talk too. And a lot sooner.
I don't read the Bible the same way you do. I used to. I used to be a very good fundamentalist and 6 day anti-evolutionist. So I understand where you are coming from. And I empathize with your position. So I’m warning you that what I believe is going to offend you and probably make you think some uncharitable things about me, my relationship with God, and my salvation.
I have no expectation of changing your mind, I’m just sharing what I believe and we are going to have to agree to disagree and live as good neighbors as best we can and discuss things nicely till God sets us both straight in a few decades after you and I have both kicked the bucket.
I am not a gap theorist. I believe, much like CS Lewis seemed to based on some things he said in "The Problem of Pain" that creation stories are meant to communicate deep spiritual truths and they were not meant to communicate historical accuracy or scientific understandings.
Unlike fundamentalist Muslims, I don't believe God dictated the scriptures to a prophet. Unlike fundamentalist Mormons, I don't believe prophets copied scriptures off of golden plates.
I believe that the Jewish scriptures are far more of a team effort.
The Jewish scriptures are the result of imperfect humans trying to hear Holy Spirit's whispers. Being human, they could not hear perfectly and were understanding Holy Spirit through their own cultural lenses and personal experiences/lenses. There is a huge subjective element to the Jewish scriptures as Noah, Abraham, Moses, and the prophets did their best to write/tell their understandings within their very small and isolated worlds.
Genesis did not have Genesis chapter 1 when first put down by Moses.
It only had the Garden creation story that came from Noah.
The creation Week story was written during or soon after Babylon. It does not plagiarize the Babylonian myths as some like to snidely accuse. It uses them like a meme. The meaning is in the differences. Everyone knew the Babylonian myths because they were the main superpower and had been for centuries and would be for centuries more. Using the Babylonian myths seemed a good way to keep their own creation story relevant and understandable for a very long time. The Jews include a huge amount of snide swipes at the Babylonian’s mythology/religion while also communicating the beauty and goodness of God and the goodness and beauty of God’s Creation. Mel Brooks carries on that tradition.
So for most of events in the Bible, the Jewish people only knew the Garden story of how it was all perfect till the snake tempted the woman to sin and the woman then tempted the man to sin too and then God cursed not only the snake and those two humans, but all of their descendants, the animals, the planet and the whole universe to death and suffering. And the sin stories that followed showed how sin ruined everything and that even wiping out all of humanity and starting over didn’t work so God chose Abram and the Jewish people to be God’s special project and that God was a patriarchal suzerain king who demanded perfection to God’s every demand even when it came to murdering your own children. (Or other people’s children who were living in the land God told you you could have.)
What followed was a learning experience lead by the prophets and opposed by the priests/aristocracy to learn how God was different from that and that God really really wanted people to treat each other and even the animals and the land fairly and that caring for the poor and oppressed was the most important thing. While the priests and the rest of the aristocracy and fundamentalists were convinced it was primarily about perfect obedience and worshipping God correctly and within their religion and justice, kindness, and mercy were secondary.
It was not until the priests and aristocracy had their power and wealth stripped from them and were exiled into Babylon that they began to question their understandings without their “promised” land or temple or sacrifices.
When several generations later they were returned to the land their ancestors had lived in, they were a different kind of people. The priests and other aristocrats had lost so much of their wealth and power and pride and were a new people with a better understanding of God. And they wrote a new creation story that focused, not on sin, but on Creation and God’s goodness and generosity. That they lived in a good creation. And that the things other people thought controlled everything were lights and calendars to help them. That the world was full of order and beauty. Even if it wasn’t safe, it was good.
And humans were no longer sinners. They were very good.
And they put this new piece of scripture, not in its own book as you or I might have, but instead they put it at the very beginning of their most important scripture to change the way they read and understood all of their scriptures.
That argument between the Priests/Aristocrats/Fundamentalists vs the Prophets was still going on at the time of Jesus and is still going on today.
I think that if we can let go of our fundamentalist reading and interpretation of the first few chapters of Genesis, and reinterpret things in light of Genesis One as being it’s own little section from a different place/time/context, we will have a much truer understanding of God and, more importantly, God’s heart and the purpose of Jesus and the meaning of Jesus’ death and resurrection. And furthermore we will have a better relationship with God and our neighbors and God’s good Creation.
Sorry not sorry to write so much. But it is a complicated question and a complicated answer and I still only gave you a barebones outline.
We are not our possessions,
but we are our gardens.
Within and without,
our story is told
through what we nurture.
"Look at this video of a child disappointed at their expensive gift! Children are so spoiled these days!"
That's cool. So, why did their parents upload their small child being upset online? In a public video, shared to the entire video? Why did they even save the recording?
Like. The kid in that scenario could be saying the most entitled nonsense in the world, and if their parents post it online to be publicly shamed, I'd still support the kid 100%. Thinking your child's life is a toy to exploit freely for #content is "spoiled"; when faced with mommy vlogers, kids should be demanding three PS5s and a new Bugatti, and we should be applauding them for it
Sometimes I find something like a cowboy themed cooking channel and I’m like how lovely. I hope I never learn what this person’s political beliefs are.
Just because you can’t understand something, it doesn’t mean it’s wrong.
I've been ruminating on the Garden of Eden and what was the point of the magic fruit.
i was worried my cat is dehydrated because i never see him drink water so i’ve started leaving a cup of water that’s “mine” (aka he sees me drink out of it once before he does) in my room so he thinks he is being a rebellious naughty by drinking out of it but rlly he is just following my plan & being hydrated .
The two best reasons to get into fossils are booping trilobites and getting to say the word "fossiliferous" a lot.
Fossil [Explained]
Transcript Under the Cut
[Cueball is holding two pieces of rock in a paleontological site. Megan, Ponytail and White Hat are in the background.] Cueball: It's weird to pry open a rock and see an animal that no one has laid eyes on for 400 million years.
[Zoom in on Cueball looking at the fossil he is holding.]
[Cueball pokes the fossil.] Cueball: Boop! Off-panel voice: Hey! Don't boop the trilobites!
this is what i boop with btw
What if we heard Noah's story differently? How would that change our understanding of scriptures and Christianity?
That is what is explored here. It's worth a listen.
happy old gnoll
why does my caladium act like she is starving for light. hang on
My 8yo nephew challenged me to an online chess game. Barely into the game and he sneaks in to wipe out my base pawn in my king's rook fortress and he even got to keep the knight.
He's white. I'm black.
the scream i scrumpt
I don't want to die anymore, but if I am ever an innocent bystander, I really hope I'm wearing this shirt that day.
this might sound silly but when people share pics they took on walks with me i kind of believe in beauty and humanity again like oh? you noticed a small creature? you were in awe of the deep blue of the sky? the way the light touched the houses and reflected off the windows? my heart sings we are alive we are alive we are alive
Salaried is just another word for full time slave. All your time is their time.
Hourly full time is just another word for exclusive part time slave because for 10 hours of your life 5 days a week or whatever you belongs to them.
If you are part time, you are a full time slave with uncertain pay because all your time still belongs to them because they keep jerking you around and they always fuck up your hours.
But they aren't slaves. Nobody owns them. They can go with somewhere else if they must. Nobody is holding a gun to their head.
Well, that is all true. But if chattel slavery is the only thing that counts as slavery to you then you need to open your eyes, man.
Using someone's poverty against them to take shitty pay for shitty working conditions where you do whatever they tell you or lose your kids doctors food and shelter and join the growing masses of unhoused.
Sounds even worse than putting a gun to my head. Have you seen how we treat homeless people? They have to huddle in the corners and alleys and vacant buildings and bridge underpasses breathing the exhaust of our cars on every street and feeling our scorn everywhere.
We won't even let them duck in to shit in any store like you or I can. They have to shit in the street and get filmed for Fox News.