your thumb on the blade, and strike upwards

Only a dead man could convince me to take another serious gander at Christianity, and it isn't Jesus Christ. His name is G.K. Chesterton and if I could kill him a second time for that final page of The Man Who Was Thursday, I would.

I've begun reading Orthodoxy in order to gain some insight into the religion that so enamored someone who seems to have been a(n otherwise) highly intelligent human being and inspired what has quickly become my favorite book of all time.

On the other hand, ol' G.K. didn't have to contend with the horrifying spectacles of today, which I admit have me disenchanted with and rather frightened by the faith (generally speaking) in which I was raised:



...which at least has spawned some amusing lolcats:


What strikes my interest is that according to Wiki, the older versions of the Apostles' Creed describe Jesus as having first descended into hell post-crucifixion before pulling his resurrection trick. More interesting yet is that despite my Catholic upbringing, I was never taught these hellbits; there was no descending to anywhere. Jesus just popped right back up out of the ground -- "like DAISIES!" Hm. Curious.

Turn on, tune in, drop out.

I Wikied "Timothy Leary" after noticing his name pop up in a number of places--most recently in a graphic novel I just checked out. It's a massive page, and I didn't read it thoroughly--just enough to learn that the man was a writer, and went through a lot of schooling, and was verily into drugs, and coined the phrase that serves as the title of this post, which I'd first heard mentioned in my postmodern lit class.

Anyway, I saw the photo of him laughing uproariously as he was arrested and figured him to be youngish at the time: mid to late twenties, maybe, with traces of teenage rebellion lingering in his veins, mixed with and amplified by fresh-in-the-world joie de vivre. But no--52. He was 52 years old and his face could still light up like that as he was getting dragged off to face incarceration.

A girl could fall for a laugh like his.

Leary's explanation of his catchphrase, from Wiki: "'Turn on' meant go within to activate your neural and genetic equipment. Become sensitive to the many and various levels of consciousness and the specific triggers that engage them. Drugs were one way to accomplish this end. 'Tune in' meant interact harmoniously with the world around you - externalize, materialize, express your new internal perspectives. Drop out suggested an elective, selective, graceful process of detachment from involuntary or unconscious commitments. 'Drop Out' meant self-reliance, a discovery of one's singularity, a commitment to mobility, choice, and change. Unhappily my explanations of this sequence of personal development were often misinterpreted to mean 'Get stoned and abandon all constructive activity.'"

Surely some revelation is at hand

I was reading an outdated version of Marik's essay, "Sigils, Servitors, and Godforms," and I got in a tizzy because that version accredits an excerpt of a Dylan Thomas poem to Yeats' "The Second Coming." I shot off an e-mail to the writer, actually, concerning the matter, which is how I found out that version was outdated--wrong e-mail address.

Because it's not like I'm an English major or anything.
Or an utter nerdbomber who has "The Second Coming" practically memorized.

Anyway. Found a newer, or at least more accurate, version of the essay here.