Quotes & Sayings


We, and creation itself, actualize the possibilities of the God who sustains the world, towards becoming in the world in a fuller, more deeper way. - R.E. Slater

There is urgency in coming to see the world as a web of interrelated processes of which we are integral parts, so that all of our choices and actions have [consequential effects upon] the world around us. - Process Metaphysician Alfred North Whitehead

Kurt Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says (i) all closed systems are unprovable within themselves and, that (ii) all open systems are rightly understood as incomplete. - R.E. Slater

The most true thing about you is what God has said to you in Christ, "You are My Beloved." - Tripp Fuller

The God among us is the God who refuses to be God without us, so great is God's Love. - Tripp Fuller

According to some Christian outlooks we were made for another world. Perhaps, rather, we were made for this world to recreate, reclaim, redeem, and renew unto God's future aspiration by the power of His Spirit. - R.E. Slater

Our eschatological ethos is to love. To stand with those who are oppressed. To stand against those who are oppressing. It is that simple. Love is our only calling and Christian Hope. - R.E. Slater

Secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don't live in an age of secularity. We live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity... an age of religious pluralism. - Peter L. Berger

Exploring the edge of life and faith in a post-everything world. - Todd Littleton

I don't need another reason to believe, your love is all around for me to see. – Anon

Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all. - Khalil Gibran, Prayer XXIII

Be careful what you pretend to be. You become what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut

Religious beliefs, far from being primary, are often shaped and adjusted by our social goals. - Jim Forest

We become who we are by what we believe and can justify. - R.E. Slater

People, even more than things, need to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. – Anon

Certainly, God's love has made fools of us all. - R.E. Slater

An apocalyptic Christian faith doesn't wait for Jesus to come, but for Jesus to become in our midst. - R.E. Slater

Christian belief in God begins with the cross and resurrection of Jesus, not with rational apologetics. - Eberhard Jüngel, Jürgen Moltmann

Our knowledge of God is through the 'I-Thou' encounter, not in finding God at the end of a syllogism or argument. There is a grave danger in any Christian treatment of God as an object. The God of Jesus Christ and Scripture is irreducibly subject and never made as an object, a force, a power, or a principle that can be manipulated. - Emil Brunner

“Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” means "I will be that who I have yet to become." - God (Ex 3.14) or, conversely, “I AM who I AM Becoming.”

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. - Thomas Merton

The church is God's world-changing social experiment of bringing unlikes and differents to the Eucharist/Communion table to share life with one another as a new kind of family. When this happens, we show to the world what love, justice, peace, reconciliation, and life together is designed by God to be. The church is God's show-and-tell for the world to see how God wants us to live as a blended, global, polypluralistic family united with one will, by one Lord, and baptized by one Spirit. – Anon

The cross that is planted at the heart of the history of the world cannot be uprooted. - Jacques Ellul

The Unity in whose loving presence the universe unfolds is inside each person as a call to welcome the stranger, protect animals and the earth, respect the dignity of each person, think new thoughts, and help bring about ecological civilizations. - John Cobb & Farhan A. Shah

If you board the wrong train it is of no use running along the corridors of the train in the other direction. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

God's justice is restorative rather than punitive; His discipline is merciful rather than punishing; His power is made perfect in weakness; and His grace is sufficient for all. – Anon

Our little [biblical] systems have their day; they have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee, and Thou, O God art more than they. - Alfred Lord Tennyson

We can’t control God; God is uncontrollable. God can’t control us; God’s love is uncontrolling! - Thomas Jay Oord

Life in perspective but always in process... as we are relational beings in process to one another, so life events are in process in relation to each event... as God is to Self, is to world, is to us... like Father, like sons and daughters, like events... life in process yet always in perspective. - R.E. Slater

To promote societal transition to sustainable ways of living and a global society founded on a shared ethical framework which includes respect and care for the community of life, ecological integrity, universal human rights, respect for diversity, economic justice, democracy, and a culture of peace. - The Earth Charter Mission Statement

Christian humanism is the belief that human freedom, individual conscience, and unencumbered rational inquiry are compatible with the practice of Christianity or even intrinsic in its doctrine. It represents a philosophical union of Christian faith and classical humanist principles. - Scott Postma

It is never wise to have a self-appointed religious institution determine a nation's moral code. The opportunities for moral compromise and failure are high; the moral codes and creeds assuredly racist, discriminatory, or subjectively and religiously defined; and the pronouncement of inhumanitarian political objectives quite predictable. - R.E. Slater

God's love must both center and define the Christian faith and all religious or human faiths seeking human and ecological balance in worlds of subtraction, harm, tragedy, and evil. - R.E. Slater

In Whitehead’s process ontology, we can think of the experiential ground of reality as an eternal pulse whereby what is objectively public in one moment becomes subjectively prehended in the next, and whereby the subject that emerges from its feelings then perishes into public expression as an object (or “superject”) aiming for novelty. There is a rhythm of Being between object and subject, not an ontological division. This rhythm powers the creative growth of the universe from one occasion of experience to the next. This is the Whiteheadian mantra: “The many become one and are increased by one.” - Matthew Segall

Without Love there is no Truth. And True Truth is always Loving. There is no dichotomy between these terms but only seamless integration. This is the premier centering focus of a Processual Theology of Love. - R.E. Slater

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Note: Generally I do not respond to commentary. I may read the comments but wish to reserve my time to write (or write off the comments I read). Instead, I'd like to see our community help one another and in the helping encourage and exhort each of us towards Christian love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. - re slater

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Taylor Swift - "Mean"






Taylor Swift
Mean



Mean lyricsSongwriters: Swift, Taylor;

You, with your words like knives and swords and weapons that you use against me
You have knocked me off my feet again got me feeling like I'm nothing
You, with your voice like nails on a chalkboard, calling me out when I'm wounded
You, pickin' on the weaker man

Well, you can take me down with just one single blow
But you don't know what you don't know

Someday I'll be living in a big old city
And all you're ever gonna be is mean
Someday I'll be big enough so you can't hit me
And all you're ever gonna be is mean

Why you gotta be so mean?

You, with your switching sides and your walk-by lies and your humiliation
You, have pointed out my flaws again as if I don't already see them
I'll walk with my head down trying to block you out 'cause I'll never impress you
I just wanna feel okay again

I'll bet you got pushed around, somebody made you cold
But the cycle ends right now 'cause you can't lead me down that road
And you don't know what you don't know

Someday I'll be living in a big old city
[ From: http://www.elyrics.net/read/t/taylor-swift-lyrics/mean-lyrics.html ]
And all you're ever gonna be is mean
Someday I'll be big enough so you can't hit me
And all you're ever gonna be is mean

Why you gotta be so mean?

And I can see you years from now in a bar, talking over a football game
With that same big loud opinion but nobody's listening
Washed up and ranting about the same old bitter things
Drunk and grumbling on about how I can't sing

But all you are is mean
All you are is mean and a liar and pathetic and alone in life
And mean, and mean, and mean, and mean

But someday I'll be living in a big old city
And all you're ever gonna be is mean, yeah
Someday, I'll be big enough so you can't hit me
And all you're ever gonna be is mean

Why you gotta be so mean?

Someday, I'll be, living in a big old city
(Why you gotta be so mean?)
And all you're ever gonna be is mean
(Why you gotta be so mean?)
Someday, I'll be big enough so you can't hit me
(Why you gotta be so mean?)
And all you're ever gonna be is mean

Why you gotta be so mean?












 

"Mean"-ingful moment

Even the darkest cloud has a silver lining —
and in Taylor Swift's case, a CMA Award nomination as well
  • AP
  • Published: 00:02 November 10, 2011
Taylor Swift turned a negative into a positive, and it has netted her a special nomination at this year's Country Music Association Awards.

Swift received her first CMA song of the year nomination for Mean, her spunky rebuttal to cynical criticism. That trophy goes to the writer, not the artist, and is among the most coveted awards in a town where the songwriter is celebrated and revered.

"Respectfully, it's about time," said Scott Borchetta, head of Swift's label, Big Machine Records. "I don't think she gets near the props she deserves for her songwriting. I've been in the business with Taylor for almost seven years now and her songs were great when I met her at 14."

Swift has gotten her share of love for her songwriting. She won a Grammy for best country song in 2010. Nashville Songwriters Association International has named her songwriter/artist of the year four of the last five years — and at 21 she remains the youngest winner of that award. And BMI, the performing rights organisation, has awarded her all-genre song of the year once and country song of the year three times.

She's won a trunk full of CMA trophies, including top award entertainer of the year in 2009. But she's never broken through in that songwriting category.

Mean, a retort to nit-pickers, bullies and perhaps curmudgeonly commentator Bob Lefsetz, was hard to resist. It shows Swift at her best. It's both vulnerable and confident, with an infectious chorus, an upbeat, empowering message and among her most countrified instrumentation built around Swift's six-string banjo line.

The song went to No 1 on the country and adult contemporary charts.

"Getting a CMA nomination for Mean was definitely a jumping-up-and-down moment for me because this song is really close to my heart," Swift said.

"I'm so thrilled it was nominated for song of the year because it's a song that I wrote on a really, really bad day, but it has produced so many happy days for me since."

With more to come perhaps. Brad Paisley, a six-time nominee in the category, believes Swift has been unfairly overlooked as a songwriter among the industry voters who make up the CMA. He points out that most of the voters are in their 30s and 40s, and older. This year's nomination could be a breakthrough.

Groundbreaking

"There's no 18-year-old in the world that you talk to who doesn't relate to some of her lyrics," Paisley said. "And in that sense, though, she's laughing all the way to the bank as the voters might be saying, ‘Well, you know, that's not for me.' That's not fair. In some ways it's even more groundbreaking what she's done. I'm proud of what she's done."

Other nominees in the category are Zac Brown, Coy Boyles, Wyatt Durette and Levi Lowry for Zac Brown Band's Colder Weather, Kimberly Perry for The Band Perry's If I Die Young, Brantley Gilbert and Colt Ford for Jason Aldean's Dirt Road Anthem and Deana Carter and Matraca Berg for Kenny Chesney's You and Tequila. The field can be considered wide open with Berg the only previous winner, in 1997, as co-writer of Strawberry Wine.

Swift might not win, of course. But like the song points out, she's already a winner.

"She's just been on an amazing streak," Borchetta said. "Whatever her surroundings, wherever she happened to be, this is what she saw. And [the songs] are very sophisticated. They're very catchy. She's a brilliant songwriter and if you ask any of the other artists who are hip to her, they know. So I'm thrilled the CMA has acknowledged her."


 

Kelly Clarkson - "Stronger"





Kelly Clarkson
"What Doesn't Kill You (Stronger)"









"What Doesn't Kill You (Stronger)"

You know the bed feels warmer
Sleeping here alone
You know I dream in colour
And do the things I want

You think you got the best of me
Think you had the last laugh
Bet you think that everything good is gone
Think you left me broken down
Think that I'd come running back
Baby you don't know me, cause you're dead wrong

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone
What doesn't kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn't mean I'm over cause you're gone

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and I
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone

You heard that I was starting over with someone new
They told you I was moving on, over you

You didn't think that I'd come back
I'd come back swinging
You try to break me, but you see

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone
What doesn't kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn't mean I'm over cause you're gone

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and I
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone

Thanks to you I got a new thing started
Thanks to you I'm not the broken-hearted
Thanks to you I'm finally thinking about me
You know in the end the day you left was just my beginning
In the end...

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone
What doesn't kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn't mean I'm over cause you're gone

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and I
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone



latimes.com

Kelly Clarkson, 'Stronger' than ever

Nearly 10 years after becoming the first "American Idol,"
the singer says she feels great about her new album as well as her career.

October 26, 2011
by Gerrick D. Kennedy, Los Angeles Times


Kelly Clarkson was three songs into a stripped-down set at West Hollywood's Troubadour last week before she offered a declaration.

"This is my new CD. I just got it today," said Clarkson, barefoot and giggly after a pre-show shot (she prefers vodka), clutching a copy of "Stronger," released on Monday. "I'm in love with [it]."

Nearly a decade has passed since the 29-year-old was crowned the first "American Idol." Though she's since become a force on the charts with her sassy pop-rock anthems (her biggest record, "Breakaway," has sold more than 6.1 million copies), she admits the disc is a first of sorts for her. It's the first she's released without having to battle label brass. And the record is already garnering acclaim from critics praising its catchy pop hooks and dance-floor punch on songs like the second single, "What Doesn't Kill You (Stronger)," "You Love Me" and the deceptively titled "Dark Side."

"Literally every album, except this album, I've had to really push for songs or say no on certain stuff," Clarkson said. "It's very easy, obviously, for people when their main goal is to make money. But I don't want to do the same formula as someone else. I want to do my own thing. This album has been a piece of cake. There's no way to describe it. I'm just waiting for the kick in the butt."

Clarkson has never been shy about fighting for her music. There was that infamous clash with legendary music mogul Clive Davis — the only blip of controversy in her career — over her darker, rock-driven 2007 album, "My December," which she spent most of the promo cycle defending. The spat was quickly forgotten when she released 2009's "All I Ever Wanted," which featured the massive hit "My Life Would Suck Without You."

The new album sees her in a better place professionally, and she assures that the empowering title doesn't allude to any specific event from the past year. She simply comes off as more confident now and able to make choices based on experience. Though she worked with hit makers such as Max Martin/Dr. Luke and Ryan Tedder on her last album, this time she tapped a more eclectic team of talent, including Greg Kurstin, Ester Dean, Toby Gad and Bonnie McKee for the disc.

"I've just been doing this for 10 years, and looking back, the past four albums were kind of … everybody going against the grain on each other," she said. "This album, I'm getting along with everyone, everyone is loving the same stuff and the stars are aligning. I think it's because people know me better as an artist now. Producers and writers know me more. I'm not walking into a room and they don't know a thing about me."

Clarkson's relationship with the label might be at its best, but the release of "Stronger" still came with some hurdles. The disc is out nearly a year after it was originally slated, and the lead single, "Mr. Know It All," a mid-tempo R&B-driven pop tune, hasn't caught fire despite falling nicely in the vein of brazen kiss-offs she's known for. Plus, more than an album's worth of songs leaked onto the Internet earlier this year.