"Cesearius again: "a monk called called Bernard at Calavux was troubled by lust. He then dreamt that he was pursued by a man dressed as an executioner, carrying a long knife, accompined by a black dog. Eventually his persuer caught and castrated him, feeding his balls to the hound. The man found himself phyiscally intact but free from lust." (108)

Similar stories told about Elias, and a stranger story from the golden legend, where a pilgrim commits fornication and then is tempted by a demon in the guise of st james the apostle, to castrate himself, he is going to this until st james himself saves his balls

Cassian's 6 stages of chasity.

"the point of origen's castration was to remove scandal rather then to remove desire. The latter, as ORigen said, it refused to do" 113

Golden Legend, 98

The LAbour Of Contiteince: Masculinity and Clerical Virginity, John H Arnold found in
From Medieval Virginities. Edited by Anke Bernau, Ruth Evans, and Sarah Salih. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003. xiv + 296 pp.

From Untitled Album

via don iveson.

researchers have found a way to grow rabbit penises in a lab.

photos from WWI trenches, via Green Howard.

dozens of hand drawn theme park maps

From Untitled Album

Hulk Hogan is too old for this shit.

down low is not as important to high rates of women with hiv/aids as once thot.

ann powers on the cma.


How to Snap.

according to the new england journal of medicine suggests that pfizer regularly spins medical information.

more evidence that wealth breeds wealth.

the confernce of american bishops have an interesting finincal stake in allowing for the stupak-pitts ammendment to go through. and some worries that the ammendment might end abortion for all.


carrie brownstien on beards and indie music

From Untitled Album

john hamm, why wont you love me.

woodporn

a fantastic article on Pipolliti Rist, and the pleasures of looking. Choice qoute: "“Using moving images as much as possible for purely philosophical and poetical reasons and goals,” she says, “can work as a shield or exorcism of the over-image-reproduced world."

list of chicken soup for the soul books

the bbc never really liked enid blyton's writing

want!


i love this kid.

new pastoral letter on same sex blessings from the catholics. here it is and no i havent had the time to read it yet.

anthology of world sf

uterus pillow.


Golden REterivers TEach Science

schismatic lutherans.

tasteless holocaust foto shoot.

Armond White tears apart precious. (john said yesterday that it would be like john waters)

From Untitled Album

samuri armour from the 19th century, via the new show at the met.

19th century postcards from japan for the year of the monkey.

rodeo fotos from flickr.

led tattoos


Murder City Devils Swagger Boom Swagger.

patrick kennedy and bishop have abortion dispute, stemming from the bishop refusing to give kennedy the euchraist.,

mill creek church in seattle gives tattoos on the altar.

aspie kid spends 11 days running away from his parents, living on the subways of ny.

the walking paths of brasilla

michael julius is an emt operator in putnam, and shoots while on duty. the resulting fotos are pretty amazing.

From Untitled Album

1. cliched, but in an attractive bob mizer way
2. the way that he has played this, manipulating the media, playing games, the whole hockey thing, the promise of cock and then the refusal to deliver cock, suggests that instead of a stumbling, silly yokel, he is the dude from the sticks who knows how to fuck with the expectations of the city.
   
3. they are so weighted with personal and political signifers, with a history of desire and for poltical contempt, that i am not sure they can be entirely used as pornography
   
4. excellently timed, the boy will go far.
   

i saw geddy lee at caplansky's today

'jeremiah:

bloody skirts:
three possiblities:
a) rape imagery
b) extension of the menstrual taboo
c) stabbing etc

not mentioned by most men, tissue of horrors.

Top Twenty Singles from the Jukebox this year:

1. Yeah Yeah Yeahs---Heads Will Roll
   
2. Taylor Swift---Fifteen
   
3. Beyonce Diva
4. Frank Turner The Road
   
5. Britney Spears If You Seek Amy
6. Heartland Mustache
   
7. The Mountain Goats Ezekiel 7 and the Permanent Efficacy of Grace
8. John Mayer--Who Says I Can't Get Stoned
   
9. Simian Mobile Disco Audacity of Huge
10. 3Oh!3 Star Strukk
11. Susan Boyle Wild Horses
    
12. Florence and the Machine You Got the Love
    
13. Jay Z Death of Autotune
    
14. Mariah Carey Obsessed
    
15. Fuck Buttons--Surf Solar
    
16. Gossip Heavy Cross
17. Karen O All Is Love
18. The Drummers--Let's Go Surfing (alt: Lily Allen Not Fair)
19. Lily Allen 22
    
20. Sarah JArosz Left Home
    

i just woke up from an erotic dream featuring having sex with a straight boy of my acquaintance in a bland midlevel american hotel room while afternoon delight played. the sex featured cuddling.

moving slightly away from attending mary mags to somewhere else suggests that my christanity is emerging from one of its perodical slumps and i am ready for community again

three small anecdotes about the eucharist:

1. there were 14 of us or so, for adrianna's bday at the old spaghetti factory. they serve bread, and we had a bottle of not very good red. paul the baptist makes a joke about having eucharist right there and then. the sacramental ones among the anglicans are not really finding this funny. it's mostly a lame joke, but i am never sure what it means to be offended anymore. later on, nancy tells an anecdote about a priest sanctifying pretzels and beer in southern germany, later on, i think about my childhood with wonderbread and wonder. the host will be determined by what you have availble.
   
2. there is a conversation, half of which i understand, at class on monday, about kids taking the eucharist. i keep thinking about this idea of an open table, adults baptised and children baptised. people get angry in this discussion. i don't think i have ever cared to be angry about who gets to eat and who gets to drink.
   
3. chris and i are going to a lutheran church last sunday--chris's church. i have been curious about moving lower, but not too low that liturgy escapes. we talk about the eucharist, and about the gospel on the way to church, and the church itself barely post war, german, domestic, friendly. there are husbands and wives, children, everyone says the peace to everyone else. we sing the canticle of the turning, with discussions of the world turned upside down, and lyrics about tyrants being dragged from thrones. the eucharist was one bread, common like the cup. it tastes vaguely like cinamon. afterwards, it sits with the baked goods, at coffee hour, because the lutherans do not have a tabernacle. i have spent the last three days figuring out what is signifcant about this.
   

“Ultimately, cynicism is the great mask of the disappointed and betrayed heart.” -bell hooks

6. Then you say, "And all his pomp. " Now the pomp of the devil is the madness of theatres , and horse-races, and hunting, and all such vanity: from which that holy man praying to be delivered says unto God, Turn away my eyes from beholding vanity. Be not interested in the madness of the theatre, where you will behold the wanton gestures of the players , carried on with mockeries and all unseemliness, and the frantic dancing of effeminate men —nor in the madness of them who in hunts expose themselves to wild beasts, that they may pamper their miserable appetite; who, to serve their belly with meats, become themselves in reality meat for the belly of untamed beasts; and to speak justly, for the sake of their own god, their belly, they cast away their life headlong in single combats. Shun also horse-races, that frantic and soul-subverting spectacle. For all these are the pomp of the devil.


The First Apology of Justin:
Hence are we called atheists. And we confess that we are atheists, so far as gods of this sort are concerned, but not with respect to the most true God, the Father of righteousness and temperance and the other virtues, who is free from all impurity. But both Him, and the Son (who came forth from Him and taught us these things, and the host of the other good angels who follow and are made like to Him),9 and the prophetic Spirit, we worship and adore, knowing them in reason and truth, and declaring without grudging to every one who wishes to learn, as we have been taught.

And when you hear that we look for a kingdom, you suppose, without making any inquiry, that we speak of a human kingdom; whereas we speak of that which is with God, as appears also from the confession of their faith made by those who are charged with being Christians, though they know that death is the punishment awarded to him who so confesses. For if we looked for a human kingdom, we should also deny our Christ, that we might not be slain; and we should strive to escape detection, that we might obtain what we expect. But since our thoughts are not fixed on the present, we are not concerned when men cut us off; since also death is a debt which must at all events be paid.

Cyril of Jersuelem Catehcial Lecture 1
1. Having been baptized into Christ, and put on Christ Galatians 3:27 , you have been made conformable to the Son of God; for God having foreordained us unto adoption as sons Ephesians 1:5 , made us to be conformed to the body of Christ's glory. Philippians 3:21 Having therefore become partakers of Christ Hebrews 3:14, you are properly called Christs, and of you God said, Touch not My Christs , or anointed. Now you have been made Christs, by receiving the antitype of the Holy Ghost; and all things have been wrought in you by imitation , because you are images of Christ. He washed in the river Jordan, and having imparted of the fragrance of His Godhead to the waters, He came up from them; and the Holy Ghost in the fullness of His being lighted on Him, like resting upon like. And to you in like manner, after you had come up from the pool of the sacred streams, there was given an Unction , the anti-type of that wherewith Christ was anointed; and this is the Holy Ghost; of whom also the blessed Esaias, in his prophecy respecting Him, said in the person of the Lord, The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me: He has sent Me to preach glad tidings to the poor Isaiah 61:1 .


Hipoyltus of Rome:
6 Likewise, if someone makes an offering of cheese and olives, the bishop shall say,
2"Sanctify this brought-together milk, just as you also bring us together in your love. 3Let this
fruit not leave your sweetness, this olive which is a symbol of your abundance, which you made
to flow from the tree, for life to those who hope in you."
4In every blessing should be said:
To you be glory,
Father and Son
with the Holy Spirit,
in your Holy Church,
now and forever,
and throughout all the ages of the ages.
Amen.



6 Likewise, if someone makes an offering of cheese and olives, the bishop shall say,
2"Sanctify this brought-together milk, just as you also bring us together in your love. 3Let this
fruit not leave your sweetness, this olive which is a symbol of your abundance, which you made
to flow from the tree, for life to those who hope in you."
4In every blessing should be said:
To you be glory,
Father and Son
with the Holy Spirit,
in your Holy Church,
now and forever,
and throughout all the ages of the ages.
Amen.

eter
Brown's The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early
Christianity-

hey were determined either to rescue marriage and the family or to abolish them.
One moves from Tertullian, the arch-misogynist, though a happily married man, to
Jerome, his devaluation of marriage and exaltation of virginity, to, finally Augustine,
who is now seennot ashaving treated these problems as side issuesbut to have devoted
the best part of his energies to them.


Jovinian's position has,however, be considered context. He wasnot only say-
to in
ing that marriageand chastitywere conditions of equal worth, but he was actively
urging Christians-especially,accordingto Jerome,youngerwidows-to marry, and
manipulating scripturaltexts in order to make it seemobligatory for them to do so.
To this end, Jovinian cited God's first commandment,which, he argued,had been
reiterated againand againand wasas binding in the New Testamentasin the Old:
"Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth"



ery simply, for Jerome , one cannot acknowledge Christ without, at the same time,
acknowledging chastity. Jesus is the second Adam. He has all the equipment of a male
but chooses not to use it. He chooses not to be male. The passage seems rather boldly
antimasculinist:
What does the Apostle mean by exhorting to continence, if continence be conrtary to
nature? What does our Lord mean when he instructs us in the various kinds of eunuchs?
Surely the Apostle, who bids us to emulate his own chastity, must be asked, if we are to
be consistent, Why are you like other men, Paul? Why are you distinguished from the
female sex by a beard, hair, and other peculiarities of person? How is it that you do not
have swelling bosoms, and are not broad at the hips, narrow at the chest? Your voice is
rugged, your speechrough, your eyebrowsshaggy. To no purpose you have all these manly
qualities, if you forego the embraces of women. I am compelled to say something and
become a fool: but you have forced me to dare to speak. Our Lord and Savior, who,
though He was in the form of God, condescended to take the form of a servant, and
became obedient to the Father, even unto death, yea the death of the cross-what
necessity was there for Him to be born with members which He was not going to use?
He certainly was circumcised to manifest his sex.33

Jerome's first task is to discussthe basic nature of the marriage obligations and how
marriage compares, as a socially sanctioned relationship, with, on the one hand,
unregulated sexual impulse-"fornication"-and, on the other, virginity. What is the
difference between sex in marriage and sexoutside it? Why is the one condoned-if
not blessed-and the other condemned as a mortal sin? What about sex in marriage?
Under what circumstances-undertaken in what spirit-is it licit, under what others
not? What are the mutual obligations of husband and wife? To what extent do they
"owe" one another their respective bodies? How is their "indebtedness" qualified by
other obligations-for example, by prayer? How does the condition of marriage com-
pare with other status conditions?

This is carnal knowledge: it establishes the difference of the sexes. Chastity is not
a snare; concupiscence is. Sex, and sexism, for Jerome, seem to be mutually linked.
Abolish, or overcome, the one and the other is abolished. It seemsa draconian solu-
tion, an extreme measure, but I do not think Jerome's position is so extreme as it
appears. He is, to be sure, against sex in marriage or fot, if you like, the "sexless
marriage," but this is a metaphor as much as a reality, and it should not obscure the
point that Jerome is in favor of a deep, abiding conjugal affection. To assimilate
the husband/wife relationship to the brother/sister one is not, in my opinion, to
devalue marriage. To argue for mutual respect between marriage partners, asJerome
does, is not to devalue marriage

A more general concern appears in the Niclaean Canons and
the so-called Apostolic constitutions which contain statutes against self-made
eunuchs both among the laity and the clergy.

Moreover, the sources indicate that self-castrationwas sometimes adopted
by male ascetics to allay suspicion which might otherwise arise from their
living with female ascetics.

Indeed, the tacit approval with which Justin regards his Alexandrian
youth is exceptionalin the extant Christiansources.The second/third century
apocryphalActs ofJohn presents another young man who, upon converting


to Christianity, "took the sickle and cut off his private parts." When he
ran to John to show what he had done, the apostle displayed little char-
ity toward the man's first act as a Christian:it was rather "the devices of
Satan" that had made him "cut off [his] unruly members as if this were
a virtuous act.


y.After all, if a teacher as revered as Origen
was believed to have castrated himself, or a figure as revered as Melito,
Bishop of Sardis, was referredto as "the eunuch, living wholly in the Holy
Spirit,"30 if such an epithet could appear on a Christian gravestone,3'
or
and self-castrationhad already been a technique of long-standing in non-
Christian devotional circles,32it is not so surprising that many young
Christians,"young men hot with the faith" who "possessa passion for self-
control, though not according to knowledge,"33 thought it admirable to use
a knife or sickle in the service of their zeal.



addition to the testimony of Basil who, as quoted above, was
alarmedby the spread of "many such men" in the Church, Epiphanius
of Salamis observed by 377 that "not a few" monks in Egypt had "dared
to make themselves eunuchs."43 describes one Transjordaniansect, the
He
who
Valesians,
exceptfor a few... when they take someoneas a disciple,
are all castrated
as long as he has not yet been castrated does not partake animalflesh.
he of
But once they have persuaded forcedhim to be castrated, then he par-
or
their own this
takesof anythingwhatsoever.... They not merelydiscipline
way, but oftenimposethe sameon strangers entertained
passingthrough, by
them as guests.



The third and fourth-centuryphenomenon of the virgines the
subintroductae,
spiritual female friends and students of certain male ascetics and clerics,
seems to have been a survival from such communities of travelers (and
didaskaleia) an earlier period. Eusebius records a letter describing the
of
actions of a council at Antioch (268) brought against Paul of Samosata
who, besides teaching objectionable doctrine, was known to keep such
women in his household; his presbyters and deacons allegedly kept such
company as well.56Cyprian addressed a similar situation at Carthage, ca.
250


The Practice and Prohibition of Self-Castration in Early Christianity
Author(s): Daniel F. Caner
Source: Vigiliae Christianae, Vol. 51, No. 4 (Nov., 1997), pp. 396-415
Published by: BRILL

three texts:

Lev 26, Jeremiah 2:36-37, Exo. 32:4


six questions:

1. when were each written
2. what tradition do each have in common
   
3. what are they prohibiting
4. what do they say about the people of israel as a collective
   
5. the use of gendered language in the above, why is this different
   
6. the rhetorical use of the prophetic voice, the use of prophetic grammar.
   

Less pub than brothel, and you, the regulars
The ninth pillar from Castor and Pollux
Do you think you are the only ones equipped with a penis,
That you are the only ones licensed for fucking
And that the rest who do it are merely goats?
Do you think, as you sit waiting in rows
A hundred or two hundred together, that I shall not dare
To do the whole lot of you, two hundred together?
Think again: I will draw scorpions
All over the walls of the place.
For my girl, who has escaped from my arms,
Who was loved as much, and more than any is loved,
For whom I have expended all my forces,
She is there. You, the great and the good, all love her,
You the valueless, corrupt, adulterous all lover her;
You above all Egnatius
Long-haired son of a rabbit-toothed Celtiberian,
Only made good by your beard
Your teeth whitened by Spanish piss.

-Catullus (via Harold Pinter and translated by C.H. Sisson)

Comfort, comfort ye my people; speak ye peace: thus says your God. Comfort those who sit in darkness bowed beneath oppression’s load; speak ye to Jerusalem of the peace that waits for them tell her that her sins I cover, and her warfare no is over. Make ye straight what logn was crooked; make the rougher places plain. Let your heart be true and humble as befit Messiah’s reign. For the glory of the Lord now o’er earth is she abroad, and all flesh shall see the token that God’s Word is never broken. – Book of Common Praise, 100:1-3.

kos releases the sql code for the sequia voting systems.


Robert Lee is the hardest mobile home salesman in the world.

the sexiest goat in the world.


Collection of David Wojnarowicz Prints

paul higgis resigns from scientology in a spectacular fashion.

a russian historian who has been researching arctic gulags and germans in the 2nd world war has been arrested on trumped up charges last week. Russian security services has also confiscated his entire personal archives.

i have no idea why but there was also a range of explotation cannibal films in italy in the 70s and 80s.

cutest tarot ever


Lyke Wake Dirge, PEntagle.

Ameila Hill a novelist and critic, talks about the misogyny in crime novels.

From Untitled Album

Update of Phyisque Pictorial Aesthetic, Photo Unknown.

when the lights went out: britian in the 70s Bennett.

wired has been doing some really impt fairly traditional reportage of late, this article about vaccines is among them, and i would award it the pu litizer.


Burke and Hare, some Hammer cheese from the 70s.

a useful chart of john irvings recurring themes.

some asshole in columbus, ohio is sharpying all of the nasty words out of library books.

schwarzenegger uses an obsecene acrostic to tell the california house how he really feels.

women, sexual violence and PTSD in american combat situtaitons.

From Untitled Album

O Keefe as shot by Steiglietz.

more info on the really weird raids that shut down one of the largest halal butchers in michigan, and the sect that ran it. No real information yet but some more details.

North CArolina's supreme court cannot tell the difference b/w fantasy and reality when it comes to rape victims and rape sheiled laws.


John Cale covers LCD Soundsytem.

nyt obit on Claude Levi STrauss who died last week.

From Untitled Album

Schiaprelli Gloves, 1938, leather and lame.


the only female beefeater has been the victim of systematic harrassment due to her gender, hoping to make her quit

Justin Bourne writes in USA today about homophobia and hockey.

From Untitled Album

via regretsy.

photo essay on the marijuna harvest in medincino.

absoutely fucking gorgeous posters for the internaitonal year of astronomy.


Joni Mitchell, My Old Man, 1970 (for Maine)

sweden ordains a lesbian bishop.

Roberta Smith on Roni Horn.

praying with someone i think is so intimate, and i have been called to pray of late, and not sure quite how to do it. what it means to pray, what it means to speak to a god that might not be there, or a god you construct as a miasma of free floating signifiers. asking yhwh to intergrate yrself makes me lose all sorts of post modern points, but i need it, and so i get on my knees for the first time since child hood, and we hold hands, and he prays over me, and i pray for myself, and thanksgiving, grace, desire, joy, hope, and also a violation, a backsliding of all the hard work of instability and destabilizing i have done.

Townes Van Zandt Lungs.

Primordial landscapes, incorruptible bodies. New York: Peter Lang 2008.Immortal bodies, Before Christ. Bodily continuity in ancient Greece and 1 Corinthians». Journal for the Study of the New Testament 30, 2008: 417-36.
Greek Resurrection Beliefs and the Success of Christianity. New York: Palgrave Macmillan 2009.
Dag Øistein Endsjø

http://cbi.sagepub.com/cgi/content/refs/7/2/179
http://books.google.ca/books?id=wfNBQP2UaMEC&pg=PA748&lpg=PA748&dq=paul+hellenic+sexual+ethics+first+corinthians&source=bl&ots=sUeGpx1re7&sig=wDgv9UoBboOQ0zTfHDYDOqT17-g&hl=en&ei=y0f3Svr1EI_sMfP28egF&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CA4Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=paul%20hellenic%20sexual%20ethics%20first%20corinthians&f=false
http://books.google.ca/books?id=sclZnr2SUIgC&pg=PA87&lpg=PA87&dq=paul+hellenic+sexual+ethics+first+corinthians&source=bl&ots=wZOXnhSicw&sig=QeqwrJGKUq5rlnJ9Iy27W_gk6fA&hl=en&ei=y0f3Svr1EI_sMfP28egF&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CBkQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=&f=false
St. John Climacus, The Ladder of Divine Ascent

http://www.theandros.com/bantekastemp.html