Head full of sermons, mouth full of spiders.

"During recent decades our politicians have told us a sweet bedtime story about Canada being an exceptionally compassionate country, a world leader in multiculturalism and wonderfully generous to the poor countries," Mr. Fulford said. "All of this expresses something called 'Canadian values.' All lies."

Ouch. However, I'm going to affirm this one, partially because it's true, but mostly because it takes the wind out of nose-in-the-air Canadian sanctimony. The most egregious expression of which is often manifested by ex-pats living south of the 49th, which always makes me shudder (except for those times when I was guilty of it - but hopefully those days are gone).

In other news, it's summer. Well, not officially, but I'm not going to let some solstice tell me how to feel about the changing seasons. What's one of the highlights of summer for someone who hates the beach and lacks the competitive spirit for most outdoor sports? Elective reading! whoooo!

So far, here's what I've read/been reading:
"Universal Salvation? The Current Debate" - edited by Robin Parry and Christopher Partridge.
"In Search of the Soul: Four Views of the Mind-Body Problem" - Edited by Joel Green and Stuart Palmer (and containing a chapter by my first-ever Calvin professor, Kevin Corcoran).
"The Man Who Was Thursday" - GK Chesteron
"Pornified: How Pornography is transforming our lives, our relationships and our families" - Pamela Paul

By looking at that list, you could surmise that I believe people are not just biological machines in the reductionist materialist sense; in fact, we have a will and soul that allows us to expose and parlor moral relativism and nihilism for the devils they are, and despite our wanton desire to peek at one anothers' flesh in ways that are mostly inappropriate, the vast majority of us will be reconciled to God via Christ's death and resurrection.

Oh, and I've put some new links at the side. You'll notice three new additions to the "Comrades" section.

Tom DeVries is a fellow student at CTS and is possibly the curator of the largest Jacques Ellul book collection outside of France. That fact alone should make him eligible for Sainthood. Not that Pope Benedict has necessarily read Ellul, but he would if he knew what was good for him.
Matt Lind operates an especially profound blog, and was a student at Calvin when I was an undergraduate there. Also, I think I went on a "Serve Project" to Toronto with him when I was a lad of 14.
Meg Jenista is also a friend from CTS, and even the briefest of conversations with her leave me profoundly humbled.

Also, congratulations to Dr. Meredith Guthrie. A surname that cool doesn't really need any adornment, but it does look nice next to the letters p, h and d.