New Year Resolution: Conversation
The question: What are the central characteristics of a genuine conversation in your opinion?
I want to draw your attention to a massive and brilliant study, but for most of us far too specialized to be a book to “blog” our way through. The book is Benedetta Craveri’s The Age of Conversation. Her book is a detailed analysis of 17th Century salons, directed mostly by women, designed not for professors and specialists but for a nobility that wanted to form a society where its values and interests could become the central focus. I contend that the term “conversation” can be understood by taking an interest in this movement. I see its descendants in high society England and major metropolises in the world (e.g., high society New York — think The New Yorker). One publisher comes to mind: Alfred A. Knopf.
Forgetting Jesus–a Christmas resolution
Anyway, Crossan said that if you took someone who knew nothing of Jesus, but did understand that religious-political powder keg of 1st century Palestine–tensions between various Jewish groups with different ideas about God and how to live in their own land under Roman rule, and tensions between Jewish and Greco-Roman customs, now centuries old–and then handed that person the Gospel of Mark, he wouldn’t be far into it before he would ask, “Who is this Jesus?” and “When is he going to be killed?”
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/peterenns/2013/12/forgetting-jesus-a-christmas-resolution/
Byron Place Centre closed down
Uniting Communities general manager of services Gwen Moore said agency income had fallen “substantially” because of the global financial crisis and the dwindling resources were being put into services which “make the most impact on the community”.
14 Favorite Ways to Twist the Gospel
(I don’t agree with everything he says, but food for thought.)
http://howardsnyder.seedbed.com/2014/01/03/14-favorite-ways-to-twist-the-gospel/
