Wonderful Matters

I blog because I really think I have something to say. Right now I know not a whole lot of people read this. I still write for a number of reasons. Maybe someone will come across it. At some point in the future my children may actually read some of this and think deeply about what their dad was about, what he was thinking and feeling. And I do this simply to "put on paper" what God has shared with me. "Share all good things with your instructor." I like that a lot. Here I may do that. My last two blog entries were simply about things I want. Yes, call me selfish, but I don't think for a second God didn't put deep passionate acquisitiveness into each of us for a reason. After living many years in the World, I found its treasures profoundly lacking. What is still a bit amazing to me is how well the World fools people into thinking its things are the things to acquire. Oh I understand it. I understand why it does that, and I see at least a little bit of how i...

In my last blog entry I kind of went off on rank disunderstanding, if I may coin a phrase. Just thought I'd add a few more thoughts around the visceral feeling about it all. Yeah, I know. It was yet another time I laid it out there. My good friend from work with whom I pray is a very even-tempered guy, he's awesome. He said don't sweat it, God's got it, it's all good. That's fine. I know. But I still feel it. Today in the news/opinion aggregator that I habitually scan were these link headlines. "What If It's All a Lie?" This was from blogger Edward Harrison, who is himself a financal advisor of some stripe. But look at that question. It actually makes me laugh. I mean, come on, how many times can you say "This guy/company/country just ain't payin' us back... um, aren't they?..." without actually getting a clue. 'Scuze me, I've got the answer to your question . I'm no genius because it's the answer that...

I really wish I could blog more. I work ten hour days and spend lots of the other time I have with family. 'Course I really wish for a lot of things, like mixing it up with people who actually understand. Not to brag that I'm the one who does understand necessarily, or even that they'd read my blog. That's kind of the point. I do very very very much wish I could talk with people who get it -- I just want to be getting it. Thing is, paying attention to Jesus' words, you'd get it. When I pay attention to Jesus' words I get it. Paying attention to Jesus' words and seriously getting out there and doing them, I already have the answer. That may sound arrogant, but as I've emphasized, it ain't me for jack. It's Him. Know Him and know the answer. Don't know Him? Don't spout about how much He isn't or that I don't know the answer. It only means anything if someone else whoever that is gets it and knows Him and understands. ...

I went with my family to see the film How to Train Your Dragon the other night. It was fun, and worth a couple of remarks to introduce my latest home page piece . Much of it was about the idea that people can make mistakes about things based on their preconceptions. Vicious flying dragons frequently "raided" the vikings' village, but the vikings didn't understand the reality of their predicament. They honestly considered the dragons evil combatants, until a young man discovered what was really going on and learned how to benevolently interact with them. This theme is often repeated in cinema, and it parallels my latest webzine feature. People honestly trust the Roman Catholic Church to save them, really honestly rationally because all they see is the World System in all its glory. There are too few Kingdom people out there to share Christ with them because so many who say they're Christ's are tied to one World god club or another. I also thought about h...

Last night PBS’s Nova had a broadcast titled “Mind over Money” about the ways psychology affects economic decision-making. It was a standard World take on the latest in behavioral economics, namely that there is really no such thing as a rational market. The typical proponents of this view were favorably interviewed, Robert Shiller and Richard Thaler among them, stridently advancing the idea that emotions play such an important role in decision-making that few people are truly rational about the decisions they make. This is all played out in the market, and with the financial markets recently demonstrating how hosed people got, it must be true. Nah. Sorry. Everything anyone does is always and perfectly rational, every time. The reason is simple, and has a bit to do with a portion of the show that featured a scientist doing experiments to graphically see how much of a certain part of the brain is activiated when a subject is offered money. It turns out it is stimul...

The biggest news on Wall Street is that the Securities and Exchange Commission is coming after Goldman Sachs. They've been hit with fraud charges, so significant that today the Dow took its first hit in a while. Everyone who watches what's going on there at street level isn't surprised that Goldman Sachs is in the crosshairs, and some are a bit surprised that the SEC is actually standing up and pointing its shaky finger at the behemouth. Slate writer Heidi Moore got through a manhole and looked around a bit underneath the street, and saw some very interesting things. Among all the stories in the web aggregate I look at, my attention was drawn to her piece: "It's Not Just Goldman--It's the Clients." Sure enough, you'll find that all of our huffing and puffing about rich guys being eeevil is woefully misplaced. We need to do a lot more huffing and puffing about Ourselves . The fault, dear Brutus, lies with ourselves. Wait, I'm getting ahead o...

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission is holding hearings this week and whenever, calling all sorts of really official finance officials to the table to 'splain themselves. Today's featured showman was Daniel Mudd, at the helm of Fannie Mae when she started sinking. (Fortunately just before she went completely under, millions of taxpayers with buckets started bailing feverishly to get her back into fine sailing form.) He said something interesting today, I think. He said that if Fannie Mae were allowed to diversify, they'd have been better off. Now, what precisely does this mean? Please, do enlighten me, I want to get it straight. Tell me if I'm wrong, please, I mean it, I invite your comments. But does this not mean that if Fannie Mae were able to suck the blood from other sources, they'd have been able to cover their asses when the blood they'd been sucking from home mortgages ran dry? After all, they were required by law apparently to have "all t...