Comments for Foolish Times

Comment on What Can Christians Learn from the Gay Mardi Gras? by Kevin

Kevin — Fri, 02 May 2008 10:20:01 +0000

Hi Matt

good to hear from you. I know what you mean about liturgies, children and church. I’ve enclosed my email address. How’s Steph? Any news on the baby front?

cheers

Kevin

Comment on What Can Christians Learn from the Gay Mardi Gras? by matt smith

matt smith — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 02:29:31 +0000

Cool story, I really like your ideas of foolishness and your other idea about game playing that you mentioned another time - looking forward to seeing more on that. Foolishness is a big part of our life at the moment as we have a three-year old who likes to fool about. Sadly, fooling is not accepted by all Christians: especially in the context of church liturgies where we are required to be sombre, reflective and generally quiet. This has meant that I don’t always feel my family is welcome in church.

BTW, you need to change the colour of some of the text as it has turned white and can’t be read (unless you are tricky like me and press CTRL-A.)

Also, can you get in touch with me on email? I’ve lost contact with you.

Matt

Comment on The Fool & His Money Are Soon Parted! Part 1. by kfollett

kfollett — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 07:45:48 +0000

thanks for your response. Your comment about emptying `my entire account’ is not far from the truth. I once gave away all my savings to a charity during a time when I was on a very low, fixed income. Later on, I realised that my motives were extremely tainted. I was trying to be `spiritual’. I gave out of my a motive of wanting to acquire spiritual maturity rather than from a place of freedom. I now believe that real spiritual maturity arises from a context of freedom. I have since learnt that challenging old ingrained patterns sometimes means doing unusual things as giving away money to people who are better off. I think for some people, like Francis of Assisi, giving away all there possessions and social position maybe necessary to make a radical break with their past. In my present phase, making a radical break with the past means being generous to people who are better off and generous towards myself.

Comment on The Fool & His Money Are Soon Parted! Part 1. by djfoobarmatt

djfoobarmatt — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 12:03:59 +0000

You really are a fool. I suppose this has some parallels with the phenomenon of retail therapy where one rebels against the rational forces that tell us to hoard and invest our money by reckless showing contempt for money, spending it on useless momentary gratifications. The feeling of being free with money is liberating and empowering but there is a looming repressed knowledge repercussions at the back of the therapeutic shoppers mind.

Your experiment also highlights the dis-empowerment that occurs in welfare provision. By giving money to another, you put yourself above them - especially if you refuse to form a mutual relationship with that person or persons.

I’m disappointed that you didn’t empty your entire account onto the counter at the bank but I guess there are limitations to this foolish experimentation. I’m reminded of a the greatest fool of all time who I think you mentioned previously: St Francis. As the story goes, on not being able to obtain support from his father for his mission to the poor, he stripped himself of all his clothes and gave everything he owned to his father as a way of publicly shaming him.

Comment on The Clown’s Universe: An Unknown Story by Duncan

Duncan — Tue, 15 May 2007 04:02:58 +0000

Hi Kevin. Was good to meet you today. I’m looking forward to more posts on the perspective of the fool.

Comment on About by kfollett

kfollett — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 10:36:20 +0000

testing, testing