Theological Fact of the Day - Today is the feast of St. John the Apostle and Evangelist. St. John was the only one of the twelve apostles to die a natural death - the others were martyred. Biblical scholars believe him to be the author of two (for sure) books of the new testament - the theological gospel - John and the First Epistle of John. We know that John was put in charge of Mary, the mother of Jesus. As well, we believe that he is the disciple whom John's Gospel refers to as "The disciple whom Jesus loved." Most scholars believe that, contrary to popular belief, John did not write Revelation. I concurr with this, mainly because the greek is totally different from that of the Gospel and the Epistle. John is typically shown in iconography with his head resting on Jesus' lap.

Christmas Story is the best movie of all time... but only at Christmas.

Sitting in the airport in Milwaukee, thumbs up to Midwest Express Airlines for putting free wireless connections in their terminal here. I should be posting pictures, but I checked my USB cable for my camera.

I took my own wardriving trip last night... I'm totally insane. I found 46 AP's in a pretty short drive. I even got on the net with a few of them.

My friend Nate decided to have a little fun cruising the streets of College Station with his iBook - looking for 802.11 AP's. He found 11 of them.

Here's the log:
linksys 00:06:25:60:13:FD 6 16 Managed 3Com Yes (null)
Itynet 00:09:5B:26:F9:78 1 18 Managed unknown No (null)
amumc 00:40:96:30:C6:E9 9 37 Managed Cisco-Aironet No (null)
amumc 00:04:5A:0C:58:8E 3 12 Managed Linksys No (null)
paunet 00:40:96:57:14:84 1 41 Managed Cisco-Aironet No (null)
default 00:40:05:BD:04:A7 6 14 Managed D-Link No (null)
linksys 00:04:5A:FA:20:BD 6 14 Managed Linksys No (null)
default 00:05:5D:EC:BA:96 6 21 Managed unknown No (null)
rudd-beef 00:40:96:29:F2:F1 1 17 Managed Cisco-Aironet Yes (null)
faneria 00:04:5A:FD:A4:75 6 20 Managed Linksys Yes (null)
linksys 00:06:25:59:7D:CE 6 37 Managed 3Com No (null)
Middle Earth 00:09:5B:26:F8:B6 1 96 Managed unknown No (null)

The semester is over... I am officially finished with finals. I'll be home on Sunday.

I have posted my take-home liturgy essay on the Revolution of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer here. It deals with the contrast of the 1928 BCP to the 1979 Book, claiming essentially the catholicity of the 1979 Book, as well as its relation to contemporarily relevant Christianity and administration of the sacraments in relation to the ideals of the Oxford Movement and the Ritualist Movement.

Greek exam today... may God have mercy on my soul.

If I were this kid I would drop out of high school and start my own security firm. This kid basically hacked into his school's grading system. He already had a 4.0, so what did he do? He gave himself a D+! Looks like he's using a G4 running Mac OS X to do the job.

Snow has left the icy shores and lakes of Nashotah, but another Snow cometh....

O Adonai!

Interesting experience tonight - I presided over Lessons and Carols at St. John's Northwestern Military Academy tonight with Bishop Roger White, Fr. Klukas, and the Archdeacon of Milwaukee. It was surprisingly more fun that I had expected. Of course, the place was filled with cadets, most of them probably with some troubles, but they were well mannered. I met the president, or the Admiral, who was the Naval Attache in Moscow for a number of years. We went to his house afterwards. It turns out that his wife was dating an Aggie at the time that they were engaged! Small world.

However, if you ever get invited to this event, I would suggest that you spare yourself. If hearing
"Highland Cathedral" on out-of-tune bagpipes and "Mary Did You Know?" to a soap-opera theme soundtrack with overall rhythmically challenged whiteboys is your idea of a good time, then suit yourself.

A friend of mine gave me the story of this anonymous somebody, both of whom will remain nameless. Anyways, this guy was trying to install his new mouse in Windows XP, and it seemed impossible. He couldn't understand the user manual. He plugged it in, and nothing. He tried to restart, and couldn't even figure out how to do that, until he thought that he could do it by hitting the power switch. It has now been two hours, and the mouse is still not installed.

This, my friends, is a total travesty against the right of every human being to not have to fight with a piece of machinery.

On my mac, I took the mouse out of the box, threw the instruction manual in the trash along with the cd, and plugged it in. I was using my mouse two seconds later. This is the way computers should treat people, not like the above.

Nate's iBook has finally shipped from Taiwan. Watch it make it's way to College Station and the Big House.

FedEx Track It!

This guy is my new favorite crimefighter.

The story starts when he sold his powerbook on eBay. It was delivered in exchange for a phony cashier's check. What ensues is a grassroots effort to remove one more pathetic lowlife from society.

Theological tidbit of the day - the last century was a time of great work towards the forging of unity within the Christian Church. Beginning with Anglican/Orthodox discussions in the early 1900's, between St. Tikhon of Moscow and Bishop Charles Grafton - Bishop of the Episcopal Church, this century proved to be one in which amazing strides were made toward unification of the separated Churches. Tikhon and Bp. Grafton have deep connections with Nashotah House, where Tikhon was awarded an honorary doctorate. Grafton was the bishop of nearby Fond du Lac. They brought a shockwave when they were pictured in the Living Church, dressed in full episcopal regalia, at the consecration of Grafton's suffragan, Bp. Weller, in which Tikhon and a bishop of the Polish National Church assisted in the laying on of hands. This permanently brought Eastern Orthodox Episcopal roots into the Anglican Communion for the first time in many centuries, in fact since East/West separation.

St. Tikhon of Moscow is one of the great saints of the Russian Orthodox Church. While Bishop of All Russia and Moscow, he was martyred in the Communist Revolution in 1925, during the supression of the Church.

This is just the first of many attempts an union, including the ARCIC commission resulting from Vatican II, and the Consultation on Church Union. Another great moment was when the Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie, held a common service with Pope John Paul II.

It is unfortunate that innovations such as the ordination of women in the Episcopal Church, and extreme groups in the Church, liberal and conservative, have quenched the spirit of union in the Church. One day, however, all of this will be overcome.

Αγαπητοι, μη παντι μνευματι πιστευετε αλλα δοκιμαζετε τα μνευματα ει εκ του θεου εστιν, οτι πολλοι ψευδοπροφηται εξεληλυθασιν εις τον κοσμον.

If you can tell me what the above means, you get a prize, because you just did my greek homework.

Actually, I already did it and it wasn't that hard. If you want to know what it is, it's 1 John 4:4.

"Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirit if it is from God, for many false prophets have gone into the world."

I saw this today on CNN.com. "Cyberbegging" has become the latest internet trend, and it's really sad. You can help a spoiled gen-x tv producer dig her way out of $20,000 in debt. You can help a guy in Dallas get a Hummer. You can give a mother of two a divorce.

My point is that these people are sick and entirely unwholesome. But, I am living almost entirely on other people's money, too. I would hope that you would see that I will never use this page for "cyberbegging."

But, if you would like to be the victim of real begging, send me an e-mail with your mailing address, and I will put you on my fundraising newsletter list.

Let's see if I can get this commenting feature to work...

The Lo Mein Challenge is officially over, with Emperor's House taking the top prize. Noodles and company, an unlikely contender, took second place and the seasonal underdog, Imperial House, took the 3rd place with a bland and unexemplary showing. But, because everything else they have is good, I have put a picture of their fine establishment on today's blog.

In other news, my liturgy paper took a grade of 94, which isn't bad. I would be lying if I said I'm not a little disappointed, since the paper went to 20 pages, and there was a 15 page limit. I would have liked to have gone more in depth, but considering the limit, I couldn't. Oh well. The paper, by the way, was posted below.

My good friend Nate just bought himself a brand new iBook, with a 20 gig iPod. Welcome to the Apple family! Pretty soon, you'll be waving at people in cars with apple stickers and wearing apple t-shirts.

You too can be a switcher.

Being the Advent Season and all, our friends at the BBC posted this great, and very freakishly British Advent Calendar.

In other news, Nate is back from his jaunt to Italy! Welcome back to the real world Nate, and congratulations on the ring.

So I Warchalked my 802.11b Linksys wireless access point and router today. I don't think anyone will use it, but it's such a cool idea. Even cooler is sitting on my couch and writing e-mails.

In other news, I have officially completed all of my papers for the semester. For your reading enjoyment and theological edification, I have posted a few of them in pdf format - Ah the things I can do on my mac that you can't :-)

The Carolingian Rennaisance and Its Effect on the Medieval Church

Gregory the Great's Pastoral Care - Advice for Pastors of the Church

Rites of Transition : An Introduction to the Christian Rites of Passage

St. John Chrysostom in Delafield gets points on my list for an altogether great saturday thrift store. Thrift stores are a big thing in Wisconsin, not just for the "trashy chic" types like we have in Texas. A lot of churches run them, too. This is a good thing, because a lot of times they liquidate their books. Today, the liturgy geek in me bought the Occasional Papers of the Standing Liturgical Commission Collection One. This was a big find for me, since they're hard to find, and esp. at 25 cents a copy. It is a little late though, considering my liturgy paper has been done for two weeks now.

I'm going to put in a big plug today for my favorite online bookstore, and no it's not Amazon.com. It's not Barnes and Noble.com either. I have found just about every book I could ever want, and at great prices at Abebooks.com. Give 'em a look.

I went to see Harry Potter tonight... great movie! Much better than the first one. But, I think the even bigger highlight was eating the best lo mein I have ever had. I've been going to this chinese place in Oconomowoc, Imerpial House. They're really great people, and their food is great, too. What I like about it is that it's cheap. But tonight, I went into Delafield, and to Emperor's Kitchen. It was a lot more expensive, but definitely worth it, for the Lo Mein at least.

Don't worry Imperial House, you're still my #1.

Recieved word on my car today... the total bill comes out to $350 something. Like I said, better than a car payment. Thanks to Gary's for getting to it so quickly!

Theological fact of the day - Today's bit of theology concerns the liturgies for the blessing of marriages. The Christian liturgies concerning weddings come from ancient Jewish traditions, dating back to before the time of Christ. Since the apostles knew that they should maintain marriage, and therefore weddings, they continued the only form they knew. The early Church did the same. Our form for Holy Matrimony today consists of three essential parts - the Betrothal, the Marriage, and the Blessing. Betrothals used to be very common as a fixture months or years before the wedding. Since, in a paternalistic society, women were seen as property, before any union could take place, the father had to "give away" the bride. In most cases, since it was in their eyes a true transfer of property, something of value was given, either for the burden on the groom or for the bride herself. In the Medieval Church, the betrothal took place on the porch of the parish church. Today, since women's suffrage and the right to own property, the custom continues, but in such a way that it could be easily missed. What it is today is essentially the father of the bride, or FOB, walking his daughter down the aisle and handing her over to the groom.

The next part is the Marriage itself. Here, there are two parts, the exchange of vows and the exchange of rings. It is important to note that the minister is in no way essential in this act. The bride and the bridegroom are acting, and sealing a covenant between each other and God. Some people have been led to believe that the rings are the outward and visible signs of matrimony. This is not entirely correct, but more important, it misses the point. The man and wife are the outward and visible sign of the union that God has made.

The third part is the Blessing, in which the Church blesses what has just taken place. It is here that the Church recognizes the two as one within the context of the Christian Community. Prayers are offered for them and their lives together.

Certain innovations, such as the unity candle, are the creations of secular society and they have little place in the context of the liturgy itself. A candle cannot bring a man and a woman into unity. It is God's Holy Spirit that is effective in this task.

One final rant - marriage is a vocation! It is a life calling that a man and woman enter into and accept from God himself. It is this vocational character that is so lacking in society today. Marriage may be seen as an occupation, an activity to be engaged in for a time, but not as a vocation - a tested and blessed action that one makes with the backing of God and the Church. Because of this, Christian marriage lasts! No legal document can break this holy bond.

Welcome to Aggieland, Coach Fran!

Theological fact of the day - The word "adiaphora" is a term used in reference to the idea that if something is not mentioned or forbidden in scripture, then it is permissible. This was a point of divergence in the Protestant Reformation. Lutherans, Anglicans, and Roman Catholics, for that matter, all argue on the side of adiaphora. Calvinist and Zwinglian offshoots - the Presbyterians, the Baptists, Congregationalists, and other "reformed" traditions disagree. They maintain that scripture is the absolute law of the Church and only those things stated in scripture have any governance in the matters of the Church. Some don't take it that far, but during the Cromwellian Commonwealth in 17th Century England, this was exactly stated. Organs, statues, stained glass windows, and paintings were all destroyed, or most of them anyway. But, the Church has maintained that images, icons, and other things not expressly stated in holy scriptures are permissible, as they are an emphasis upon the Incarnate reality that the Church celebrates. That is, we believe that Jesus Christ is fully man and fully God. Thus, matter, or what the creed calls "things visible" are not evil, but created by God and to be used for our purpose, especially advancement in holiness.

It is this Incarnation that we celebrate in this season of Advent, which comes to its full expression in the Christmas season, which doesn't start until December 25th, so don't break out the mistletoe and holly just yet.

Tomorrow, however is the feast of St. Nicholas of Myra, commonly known as Santa Claus. He is the patron saint of Sailors and Seafarers, but more known for his compassion and kindness to children. It is also probable that he was one of the bishops seated at the Council of Nicaea in the year 325 A.D.

This blogger stuff is so cool... If you'd like to give it a whirl, check 'em out at Blogger

Whoop! I got it working!!! This is so cool :-)

argh, this is taking a lot more time than I thought

there are things that are really great about driving an old, paid-for car. first, you don't have to make any payments. second, there is that ever-present smell and character that you can't buy like the new car smell. third, it becomes a place where, in the words of t.s. eliot, "prayer has been made valid." actually, my car is a vehicular sacrament - an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace occuring in a swedish concoction of steel that might sometimes work, but unlike ex opere operato, you can't ever be sure.

so, i'm driving back from the grocery store to get some cavendish and harvey lemon drops, and its nose-hair freezin cold, and my car just stops running, in the middle of the road. ptl for aaa and my new favorite bar in delafield wisconsin, jessica's. called aaa on my cell phone and went into the bar to drink a pint of bass, ah!

now my car is up to the doors in snow at gary's import mechanic, waiting for a new alternator, i think. good thing i've got the cash to cover it.