This Pilgrim's Progress

Family Christmas Letter

You can see our Family Christmas Letter  by clicking on this link. *

We also have some photos posted that you might enjoy.

Merry Christmas and Blessings in the New Year!

*(I've de-activated the link. Leave a comment or send me an email if you would like to see the letter - family and friends only.)

Thomas Kinkade

The World Magazine Blog has an interesting question posted by Olaskey: "Why is Thomas Kinkade's Art so popular?"   Click on the link to read some spirited exchanges of opinion. 

I personally don't care for Kinkade's art.  It seems so trite and contrived to me. I like art that's less interested in special effects and more interested in communicating a message of beauty or transcendant excellence.  But then I enjoy Jackie Chan movies, so my entertainment choices don't necessarily reflect my aesthetics unless humor and the execution of flawless martial arts stunts constitutes a form of art? Maybe they do at that!!  The fact that Kinkade produces so many of these paintings, one wonders if he's got some trained chimpanzee's chained up in a basement somewhere cranking them out for him, or maybe he's outsourced to Chinese-prison-labor??  (just kidding!!).

"Kingdom of Heaven"

The other movie we watched this weekend was considerably less satisfying. "Kingdom of Heaven" is director Ridley Scott's interpretation of the Crusades. First of all, Orlando Bloom is not very convincing in this film. It may be the script, direction, or maybe his androgyny gets in the way of portraying a "True Knight".  His love interest, Eva Gregor as Sibylla the Queen of Jerusalem,  is also not very convincing.  The scenes of the siege by Saladin are entertaining and intricate, but don't seem to add much to the story line.  The one convincing acting turn was Ghasson Massoud as Saladin. Within the limits of the script he managed to convey some depth to the character.

The main thing I was bothered by was the overwhelming slap at Christianity this film delivers. It protrays Christians as devious, evil, cynical and "irreligious"!! Now some of them are surely, but does the story require that the entire faith be characterized so negatively?? The Crusaders might have been a blood-thirsty lot, but they were also sincere in their belief's.  They show King Baldwin as an "enlightened" king, and seeming the only "good" Christian, who tries to keep the peace by ruling fairly and treating all religions with tolerance, and all the other nobles as grasping bandits eager for blood-shed. This wouldn't be so bad if it was balanced on the Muslim side too. We only see one Muslim "bad-guy", yet the Saladin character is portrayed more evenly, not necessarily all good or all bad.

Finally the main character Balian is less than satisfying as the so-called True or Perfect Knight. First of all he kills a priest, then declares his estrangement from God, then ventures on this quest to Jerusalem to atone for his sins.  Bloom is not convincing in his portrayal. He doesn't do the job like Crowe did with Maximus.

I did like Liam Neeson as the great knight Godfrey of Ibelin (Balian's/Bloom's father).  He was convincing in his portrayal. I also liked the script's attempt to communicate the ideal of medieval Knighthood, what a Christian Warrior was supposed to be and what his duty was. Unfortunately the anti-Christian bias and poor portrayal by Bloom completely fails to draw a full picture of the "True Knight".  The concept of chivalry and knighthood was one that was an important ideal in Christendom, regardless of how much most knights failed to achieve the ideal. The historical characters of Richard the Lion-Hearted or El Cid are important historical archetypes of the "True Knight", and it would have added a lot to this film's impact if the makers had casted a better actor for the role of Balian that could have lived up to the archetype.

I would not recommend this film as a fair treatment of the Crusades. I would recommend it for the siege scenes and some of the cinematography. Watch this film only if you've got nothing better to do.

"Mad Hot Ballroom"

Seeing as the TV offerings were dismal this weekend we watched a couple of movies on cable. The best of the two was a documentary. "Mad Hot Ballroom" is a delightful film that follows three groups of students from different elementary schools as they learn ballroom dancing and then compete with other students from elementary schools all over New York City.  The makers of this documentary did a wonderful job of showing us what a transforming experience learning and then competing in ballroom dancing was for these youngsters. And not only for the students but for their teachers and their parents too! Without sentimentalizing it too much, they helped us get caught up in these youngsters' story and at the end you are cheering for your favorites as they compete.  This documentary shows what can transpire in education when you require and expect the best out of young people.  The motivation to learn and succeed leaks over into the rest of their life and helps set them on the path to a successful life. I highly recommend this movie as one to watch if you are getting dragged down by all the crass secular mercantilism of the holiday season!! It will buoy your spirits and help you refocus. It did that for me!

"Daniel of the Year"

World magazine's "Daniel of the Year" for 2005 is Makoto Fujimura. It is a fascinating choice, and I think they made a great decision.  Be sure to read the article, and then don't forget to read his opinion piece , "Walking Backwards" in the same issue. He has a blog at: makotofujimura.blogspot.com and that article is also posted there.  He has a lot of insight,  so much so, it's almost too trivial to leave it at that!!  But my writing talents aren't up to the task, so take a look for yourself.  Check out his post "Why Art" .  It speaks to the importance of art and the arts as expressions of our culture, and the choices we make in our expressions conversely affects our culture.  There's probably more there, but that's what I took away from reading it on my lunch hour. I hope to dine more leisurely on his thoughts later.

Daughter is 18!!

I had a great weekend, hope you did too!!

We saw a great Christmas music program at Biola. They had classical, choral, jazz and pop music, and they did a great job. 

I spent most of the day Saturday creating a slideshow of my daughter's life. She turned 18 Sunday, and I wanted to surprise her a little with it. Everyone seem to enjoy the slideshow, and the party on Sunday was real nice. We were at my mother-in-law's beach condo and we had food from Rubio's. It was just a family gathering,  but even then we had almost 20 people.  It's hard to believe she is 18 already, the time seems to have flown by.  But she has grown into a beautiful, intelligent, and godly young woman. I'm sure the Lord has a great life in store for her as she ventures into adult-hood.

I'll have some picture posted and maybe even the slideshow later. But first I need to get some sleep back!!

Genealogy - When is it history or just family legend??

  This weekend I finally finished reviewing a genealogy that a distant cousin wrote, and sent it back to my uncle.  It was a frustrating experience!!  There was so much that could have been really interesting and very good, but it all fell apart due to lousy methodology. 

The basic fault was that there was no attempt to publish or attribute the sources of the various stories, photos, and scanned documents. Further the "compiler" had basically cut and pasted all these various items together without any real attempt at generating a rigorous family history. There were photos in there that I would have loved to get copies of, but there was no indication of where the photos came from or who owned them.  Likewise for some of the narratives that were directly cut and pasted from other people's writings.

More Anza-Borrego photos posted

I uploaded the rest of the Anza-Borrego photos I took this Thanksgiving. They are listed on the side in the Photo Album section.  So now you can see photos of Canyon Sin Nombre,  Torote Canyon, Mtn. Palm Springs, and Little Blair Valley (Motreros and Pictographs).

Enjoy!

Squirrels Attack Dog!?

The BBC reports that a pack of squirrels attacked and killed at dog that was barking at them. This occurred in the village of Lazo in the far eastern part of Russia. I think that might mean they're in for a tough winter!! A resident of Lazo observed:

A Lazo man who called himself only Mikhalich said there had been "no pine cones at all" in the local forests this year. "The little beasts are agitated because they have nothing to eat," he added.

You know, I've never really liked squirrels, now I know why!! A critter with over-sized teeth can't be trusted no matter how furry and cute they are!!

Maybe the citizens of Lazo need to come up with some recipes for Squirrel stew and start thinning out the herd!!!  These guys have the right idea!! They might want to make copies of the Russian news article and give it to the protesters.

Here's a recipe for you if the squirrels in your neighborhood are molesting your pooch. Squirrel stew is actually a traditional American dish. I'm sure my Southern/Cherokee ancestors ate quite a bit of it in their time. I bet they didn't have a dog-molesting squirrel problem!

Our Lab, Toby, has permission to catch and "play with" any small critters that wander into our yard. Exceptions of course for the other family pets (1 parakeet, 2 cockatiels, and 1 tortoise).  He's caught and killed a number of rodents and a few stupid pigeons.  He's a pretty friendly pup and probably has no idea he's killing them. He probably thinks they look like great play-toys!

Anyways...watch out for those darn pesky squirrels!