EPISODE · Apr 14, 2021 · 17 MIN
Episode 320 - Moot Point
from PZ's Podcast · host Mockingbird
What did Dr. Johnson say concerning one's imminent death?: It wonderfully concentrates the mind. While I was sick recently, a familiar feeling came "shining through". Nothing is really important except love and God. That is not a cliche. Or better, it is a true cliche. I call this cast "Moot Point" because I've been following a tempest in the Church of England; and every time I read a new major story about the pros and cons -- almost all cons -- of a once highly regarded priest who has had a mighty fall, I say to myself, But wait a minute. Church isn't even meeting now over there (at least until two weeks in England, but not yet in Northern Ireland and Scotland). I mean this headline story, with all its letters and accusations and interviews -- what meaning does it have when the Church is essentially shut down? Remember the episode in the last season of X-Files, when Fox Mulder comes face to face really with a full-scale, in-the-now invasion of the Earth by aliens. No more bits and pieces, nor hints. No, Mulder turns to Scully and says, "Scully, now all bets are off." What Mulder means is, if this is really taking place, then just about everything is about to change. The episode is entitled "The Red and the Black". I feel the pandemic has consigned a large percentage of our everyday interests to the Buddhist category of "dependent arisings". A lot of things are just "Too Much of Nothing" (Peter, Paul and Mary). What matters? Well, personal love between two people matters. And the Love of Christ matters. And your children matter. And there are one or two other things that matter. But that's more or less it. COVID19 has rendered just about every enthusiasm and circumstantial anger of our lives a moot point! Except, maybe, a few movies (i.e., Bride of Frankenstein, 1935), together with Spanky and Our Gang (1969).
What this episode covers
What did Dr. Johnson say concerning one's imminent death?: It wonderfully concentrates the mind. While I was sick recently, a familiar feeling came "shining through". Nothing is really important except love and God. That is not a cliche. Or better, it is a true cliche. I call this cast "Moot Point" because I've been following a tempest in the Church of England; and every time I read a new major story about the pros and cons -- almost all cons -- of a once highly regarded priest who has had a mighty fall, I say to myself, But wait a minute. Church isn't even meeting now over there (at least until two weeks in England, but not yet in Northern Ireland and Scotland). I mean this headline story, with all its letters and accusations and interviews -- what meaning does it have when the Church is essentially shut down? Remember the episode in the last season of X-Files, when Fox Mulder comes face to face really with a full-scale, in-the-now invasion of the Earth by aliens. No more bits and pieces, nor hints. No, Mulder turns to Scully and says, "Scully, now all bets are off." What Mulder means is, if this is really taking place, then just about everything is about to change. The episode is entitled "The Red and the Black". I feel the pandemic has consigned a large percentage of our everyday interests to the Buddhist category of "dependent arisings". A lot of things are just "Too Much of Nothing" (Peter, Paul and Mary). What matters? Well, personal love between two people matters. And the Love of Christ matters. And your children matter. And there are one or two other things that matter. But that's more or less it. COVID19 has rendered just about every enthusiasm and circumstantial anger of our lives a moot point! Except, maybe, a few movies (i.e., Bride of Frankenstein, 1935), together with Spanky and Our Gang (1969).
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Episode 320 - Moot Point
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