{"id":10240,"date":"2017-08-30T21:43:20","date_gmt":"2017-08-30T21:43:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/?p=10240"},"modified":"2017-08-31T13:42:49","modified_gmt":"2017-08-31T13:42:49","slug":"youd-think-we-learned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/youd-think-we-learned\/","title":{"rendered":"You’d Think We’d Learn"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

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\"<\/p>\n

You’d think we’d learn or, at least, take\u00a0notice:<\/em> the strangeness around us. But then again, many folks, including numerous in Catholicism, are too practical, “down-to-earth,” and sophisticated to believe in biblical\/medieval concepts such as chastisement and signs of the times.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And then there are the pagans, who entirely don’t get it, who revel in the current chaos and debauchery, oblivious to what voodoo-hedonism-materialism has wrought. Revel and rebel. (See 1 Samuel<\/em> 15<\/a>).<\/span><\/p>\n

\"SouthernNo, there is no notice taken; at the same time that Hurricane Harvey has struck as one of the very most damaging storms in all of recorded American history — with record rains, floods that evoke the notion of an ark, factories ablaze, making a second<\/em> landfall in Louisiana, where the annual gay\u00a0Southern Decadence event<\/a><\/span> just started (in the French Quarter, “debauchery at its best,” says Tripadvisor), there is also, on the hard high desert<\/a>\u00a0of Nevada a hundred miles north of Reno, what they call the “Burning Man.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Each year, grown-up hippies, Bohemian exhibitionists, New Agers,\u00a0gay activists, drug aficionados, and various and sundry hip billionaires (like Zuckerberg of Facebook, Bezos of Amazon, Musk of electric car\/space travel renown), gather for a week of letting it all hang out: “Do what thou wilt,” said an infamous occultist named Aleister Crowley. No villatic setting, this.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"ImageThey gather in Nevada and at the height of festivities — after all the parades have thundered through, after the bongs have made the rounds, after all the hard rock — they burn a large, towering effigy of a man, representing who knows what. The fire is what counts. It started last week and culminates Sunday.\u00a0<\/span>If past years are any indication, ecstasy will fill the stands as the burning man is all but worshiped. [New York Magazine photo<\/a><\/span>, above]<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

The images are something out of Dante. [From ABC-TV<\/a><\/span>\u00a0below.]<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n

It also reminds of the far more secretive annual summertime gathering in northern California at “Bohemian Grove,” where a human effigy is also torched under the watchful gaze of a large owl. There it’s a gathering of government types, military officials, foreign ministers, corporate titans — Kissinger-Bilderberg-types. Even presidents have attended (though not the current one). (<\/span>Ironically, both Bohemian Grove and Burning Man were born in the San Francisco area.)<\/span><\/p>\n

Burn, burn.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So: here we are, prayer need: a historic storm lashes one part of the nation, while party-goers gear up for festivities in Nevada and New Orleans. No tropical storm threat in Nevada, to be sure, but record hot temperatures<\/a><\/span>— the hottest since 1949 — are expected, warn weary meteorologists. The London Sun<\/em>\u00a0describes it as an “insane festival where 70,000 crazy party-goers dance naked, get high and enjoy orgies in Nevada desert.” One recent year it was disrupted by a sand storm. (Worldliness — earthiness — is not always the best place to be.)<\/span><\/p>\n

They want fire? <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

In today’s news<\/a><\/span>: “The main route between Reno, Nevada and\u00a0Burning Man<\/a>\u00a0is closed due a fast-growing wildfire that has burned more than 30,000 acres of land, emergency officials said Thursday. Officials now worry the fire could encroach on the festival itself.”\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"<\/p>\n

Oh, woe. <\/span><\/p>\n

Some day, we will see — all of us, earthy or not. <\/span><\/p>\n

Right now we are blinded not just by burning men but by the blaze of fame and fortune, the flames of lust, the glass-brass of a society that is precariously<\/em> distant from God.<\/span><\/p>\n

— Michael Brown<\/p>\n

[resources: Where the Cross Stands<\/span><\/a> and Tower of Light<\/a><\/span>] \u00a0 [Michael H. Brown retreat, Omaha<\/a><\/span>]<\/em><\/p>\n

\"St.<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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You’d think we’d learn or, at least, take\u00a0notice: the strangeness around us. But then again, many folks, including numerous in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[1201,1199,1200,714,1202],"class_list":{"0":"post-10240","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-commentary","7":"tag-bohemian-grove","8":"tag-burning-man","9":"tag-necada","10":"tag-occult","11":"tag-signs-of-times","12":"entry"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10240\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}