The Exotic World that is Home

I just lost a glove. Sometimes when I'm running, I'll notice a lone shoe or glove or sock and think "How silly, how could you possibly loose just one? Wouldn't you notice?" Of course such thoughts are selfish. A loss might be a product of a unique circumstance, like using the uni computers because the net isn't working at home and you're a hygeine freak and so you wear a glove on you right hand so that you don't have to rub palms with evey other uni student who has used this mouse.

Yesterday was a exhausting. Firstly, I met with Greg, my logic lecturer, who lives and breaths formal logic. The meeting was thus: If I had a program to upload images on my computer, I would draw a little picture of me with my head sawn open and Greg trying to cram in a mountain of books and proof diagrams. An hour or so later, I escaped the vaulted hall, and opened up my head and let all the precious information dissolve in the uni pool.

I swum hard and I was exhausted when I arrived at Jason's place in the city. I should have saved my energy. You see, Jason loves philosophy more than I do. He lives and breaths philosophy of religion and metaphysics. And he's much smarter than me and far more rigorous. So, if I had that image program enabled, I'd draw a little picture of me in the corner of a cell, getting beaten with a club. I read his essay for "God and Evil" and it's so much better than mine it's embrassing that he read mine. Other than that, the evening was pleasant; Val and a friend were there and the four of us ate a yummy stir-fry.

The ride home on the train was disturbing, however. I boarded at Parlaiment station with a group of Indian guys and sitting at the back of crowded carriage were a couple of girls from Ringwood (yes, the suburb is as bad as it sounds). From that moment to the inner suburban station where the guys disembarked, I heard the most horrible barrage of racist insults from those girls mouths. Maybe I'm just niave, but I was horrified. I felt physically sick, embarressed, sad and angry. The best way to alienate myself from those girls would have been to tell them off but I'm too much of social coward to do so. Besides, on what grounds could I have done so? I was sad because the attitudes and behaviour of those girls (and presumably others) does nothing for good race relations. And I was so angry, I wanted to administer justice, physically. But prayer is mightier than violence.

That said, violence does have its place. My mind swings from anger about violence (sexual abuse of children, gang warfare, "collateral damage", violence against people who live on the streets) to the desire that violence be the vechile of justice. I guess this is a false dichotomy. God is a God of justice and when Christ returns, there will be violence, but this violence will be administered to those who commited injustices and violence against the innocent and did not repent and take refuge in the one who judges.

Oh and I guess I'd better make some reference to the title. I was thinking about home: running along the dirt road through the forest to the meadow, our rustic mudbrick house in the bush, the vista of Hobart and the Derwent and Mt Wellington, the cold fresh air... These are all familiar things to me - I was immersed in them for years and now that I reflect on them on the train, in the mundane here in Melbourne, they become so alien to me (and almost dangerously romanticised). How strange.

By the way, I wrote an article titled: Feminism, Christianity and Strip Clubs: A manifesto.

Today Paul gave me "New Issues Facing Christians Today" by the John Stott as a belated birthday present. It looks set to be a ripper.