#its pentacost

[tanadrin]

Doug Pagitt (the Chris Hayes guest) also talks about why evangelical voters like Trump, and he says it's because they have more power under him--he's willing to make them an important part of his coalition. Which is like politics at its most basic, right? People support the coalitions that give them power! All other considerations fall away when it comes to this most basic principle. On that basis, trying to cleave evangelicals away from Trump seems kind of silly, especially for reasons as minor as "hypocrisy." OTOH, evangelicals aren't a monolith, and (at least within the last 40-50 years) haven't always been synonymous with "Republicans." Jimmy Carter was an evangelical, after all. Within the category "evangelical," the three big groups are charismatic pentacostals, Southern Baptists, and nondenominational evangelicals, and Trump's support is weakest (though still high) in the third group. But his performance among evangelicals (mostly driven by his performance with this third group) declined from 2016 to 2020; if its declines further still in 2024, that alone could torpedo his chances. He has, after all, never won the popular vote; he really needs every vote he can manage to win.

[randomberlinchick]

Pentacost aka Whit Sunday

Okay, so 50 days after Easter and 10 days after Jesus finally went home to have it out with pops, the Holy Spirit (or Ghost if you prefer) - up to its fucked-up shenanigans again - visited the Apostles with some holy hallucinogens while they were getting their party on by celebrating the Feast of Weeks. [To be fair, this brand of shenanigans on the part of the Holy Spirit/Ghost was much better than impregnating an underage virgin, which was just wrong.] In any case, the Apostles started wilding out - speaking in tongues and shit like that - and as a result, I have Monday off.

And because I want to wild out like they did recover from an exhausting week, I've taken today off too.

This gif is an alarmingly accurate portrayal of me right now...though I do intend to leave my flat at some point for a nice lunch and a stroll in the park. Y'all have a good one! 😂

#pentacost #whit sunday #the holy spirit is a menace

[sunriseverse]

beloved tell me about the anchoring and the canon <3

HI BELOVED!!!!! thank you for asking me i love you mwah mwah mwah! this got long so i'm tossing it under the cut.

okay so! anchoring! first of all, we both know that i love pacific rim, and i love the concept of drifting, and so of course, when i started coming up with an au (which at the time i thought would just be a one off—oh, how wrong i was!), i wanted to include drifting in some way.

so, in sunrise, the main conflict is the incursion of the Hive, which tears rips into reality and seeps through, poisoning the area around the rifts. due to the fact that the Hive is from another dimension/world (called "hiveside"), it's not comprehensible to humans, and physical contact with the Hive leads to brain damage and eventual death.

the rifts are dealt with by zhang rangers, technologically upgraded members of the foremost martial sect, the zhang. the rangers are the only ones who can come into contact with the Hive and not die almost immediately—though they almost all, with one exception, will die from brain damage due to repeated exposure within seven years. the exception is xiaoge, the earliest ranger, who's survived in his position for about a century, probably because of the fact that when he's critically injured, he winds up with amnesia, wiping the memories of the contact with the Hive from his mind and saving his life. however, as you've probably guessed, this isn't a cure all—and, some time after the iron triangle is formed, he begins to show signs of "rift madness" (which starts off as relatively benign absence seizures that become longer and longer, then shifts in personality, aggression, etc, leading finally to death).

backtracking a bit here, the rangers are able to link with each other through a special form of what's essentially mind-melding called "sensesharing". it was created in order to allow multiple rangers to fight in synchrony if there was a rift too large or troublesome to be delt with by a single ranger. however, sensesharing is potentially dangerous, as most minds innately rebel against intrusion—which is why the techniques taught to all zhang sect members of minimising their thoughts and emotions is so important to rangers, who need to be able to senseshare with minimal feedback from their partner(s). as you can tell, this is somewhat inspired by stacker pentacost's drift abilities—the rule is that you take nothing into the senseshare, to minimise damage and disconnect between the involved parties. however, unlike in pacific rim, it doesn't inherently require trust or respect (the zhang rangers might respect each other, but for a variety of reasons, there's rarely any trust involved). the link is broken as soon as the battle is completed, to minimise the risk.

now to jump back to xiaoge: as you've seen, sensesharing was never intended to be used outside of noncombat situations or by anyone who isn't a ranger. however, when xiaoge realises that he's dying, he makes the decision to offer to senseshare with his partners, wu xie and pangzi, to share his joy and love with them. this, shockingly, works—and, in fact, winds up saving his life, because when utilised correctly, sensesharing with partner(s) whom you trust anchors your mind, giving you a reference for healthiness and sanity that allows a Hive-touched mind to repair itself, rather than further degrade into a dangerous, damaged state, provided the bond isn't broken (xiaoge assumed that it would fade on its own, hence why he didn't bother breaking it, but this turned out to be a misassumption. he also didn't realise that an anchor bond allows for information to be transmitted in both directions—it's generally fairly minimal, and only the strongest emotions come through, but think generally similar to pacrim fanon "ghost drift")(it's called "anchoring" because the ranger's mind is "anchored" to reality, rather than to the Hive they're interacting with in combat situations.)(another fun thing about anchoring is that if it's done with a partner who 1. doesn't have training in clearing their minds or 2. whom you don't trust will cause you physical and mental harm—the mind, as stated, reacts badly to intrusions.

unfortunately................remember how i said only the zhang are rangers? along with this, it's only specific zhang—initially. while all zhang sect members can survive upgrading due to their specific sect's training methods, those who are qilin-blooded are initially preferred, with the eventual draft targeting only them. once anchoring is discovered, the draft is expanded to all zhang who are of-age, pressing previously-excluded sect members into service. (i have, like, a whole section of my lore document dedicated to sect politics and explanations and ramifications surrounding all of this. i spend far too much time thinking about sunrise.)

also, going back to xiaoge specifically—in his time behind the rift in changbaishan, the reason he doesn't go mad or die is because he's still anchored, so even though he's in a world he cannot comprehend and that would harm him to try to do so, he doesn't sustain brain damage. also random fact but rangers' swords are specifically attuned to them and will act "sluggish" with anyone else, with the exception of their anchor(s).

okay this was a very long ramble now you can see why my lore doc is over 5.6k u_u but THANK YOU AGAIN FOR ASKING BELOVED <3

#ask #theo tag #sunrise verse #c.txt

[skylariumrose]

Let’s talk with Skylar!

Super Giant Robot Brothers! Ep 1. Gone and Back Again

So to start off,

RISE UP! ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS! FORGED BY SUPER SCIENCE! MIGHTY METAL SAVES THE DAY YEEEAAAHHH! FEEL THE POWER! ITS THE SUPER GIANT ROBOT BROTHERS!!!!!

Now that that’s done 😆 I’m gonna just go with First Impressions:

• The cozy music and everyday life in that nice dawn or evening is really peaceful. And No joke, I had to rewind because I was so shocked by the diversity and I loved that 🥰

• The ORT is what I wanted for Pacific Rim 2

• The confirmation scene is like Galaxy Quest with Weaver’s job 🤣

• My brother called Creed ‘discount Pentacost’, eh I think they’re same level. Just different levels

• The media! 😆

• Alex apparently skipped all Bachelor’s Degrees 🤷🏾‍♀️😆

• Baby Alex is also the best thing, her ‘His name is Shiny!’ had me in tears because babysitting has told me this is very true

• Shiny makes me think of baby’s first bouncy ball, all the energy, no direction

• This launch sequence 🤣🤣🤣 (rewatch show him catching Frank 😆)

• Soundtrack 😎 Lit!

• The military (in maser tanks) asking about their need to be here if the robot will be here has the same energy as the clones asking about the Zillo Beast

• The tanks have a crash trying to back up

• Excellent Fight! Hilarious and undignified end 😆

• They didn’t need to throw the pain-nostalgia of Iron Giant, but they did

• Thunder is the baby of Prowl and Ultra Magnus with Symbiotic Titan as the surrogate. I don’t make the rules. I just tell them.

• Rose and Rose, need I say more

• Thunder is so ruffled

• Running to the rescue! And Shiny’s entrance is fabulous, but his immediate smack down makes it funnier

• The media!!!

• The arguing is felt in my bones because I do this with my brother

• She made a rainbow beam! Baby Alex was adorable and perfect

• That triumph music is still like the best thing 😆

• Thunder my beautiful literal mech, I love you 💙

• Okay that synthwave 80’s into this alternative rock end is top tier!

Review & Thoughts:

An excellent kick off, like I was so engaged, laughing, and feeling for everyone almost every second. I do think this episode ends a bit suddenly, but hey one miss doesn’t take away everything else about this fantastic episode.

And the show runners to actually allow human being shown dying, something we always know is happening, but not to shy away from the death happening - I like that a lot, especially because they do it in a fun way.

Already I see the ground work for brotherly hilarity and I love that it’s the time tested and live trope of excited sibling and literal sibling, but switched so instead of the strict older sibling it’s a fun loving one and a more controlled younger sibling.

Also the bots are so humanized I love that to, not just human anthropomorphizing them. I hope that’s common.

And writing this little review hits me that Creed is basically Alex parental figure now. Can’t wait to see how that shows up. Also the fact that Alex is a female POC is so epic too. Can’t wait to se what tropes she follows and breaks!

And Finally

Favorite lines this episode that has me 🤣

• Rose&Rose

• “Who’s the detriment now sucker!” (With two finger salute)

I don’t know when the next little talk will be but I hope soon with the weekend coming up 😉

#super giant robot brothers #sgrb #sgrb shiny #sgrb thunder #sgrb alex rose #sgrb colonel creed #netflix #watch along #episode review

[dustedmagazine]

Ethel Cain—Preacher’s Daughter (Daughters of Cain)

Photo by Helen Kirbo

Ethel Cain’s swampy, smouldery second full-length feels the pull of Jesus and the pull of sex and danger with nearly equal weight, and you can imagine the artist Hayden Anhedönia’s slender frame on rack, being torn apart by their opposing forces. Likewise, Anhedönia pines for pop diva-hood and bracing classic country self-revelation, her voice whispering smoke and murder, while the reverbed drums boom and the synths swell glossily behind her. Preacher’s Daughter is as good an encapsulation of red state America as you’ll find this year, with its broken families, its bleak economic realities, its primitive pieties and its cheap plastic ideas of romance.

Anhedönia grew up in fundamentalist west Florida, steeped in its Christian culture but also separated from it by the fact that she was gay; later she came out as a trans woman. She left for Tallahassee and lost her way, slipping into a vortex of drugs and despair. She created the persona Ethel Cain just after she turned 20. She began experimenting with a reverb-echoing form of choral music (she still loves reverb) in 2019, with a self-released collection of songs called Carpet Bed in September, followed by the Golden Age EP in December. She recorded her dream pop Inbred in 2020, in a converted church where she lived in Richmond, Indiana. Preacher’s Daughter is larger and more ambitious than any of these previous recordings, with a 13-song, 76-minute epic arc tracing a path towards damnation.  

It begins with the disc’s most god-obsessed song, “Family Tree (Intro),” which begins in a mutter about the sanctity of motherhood, pokes at the scars left by a religious childhood and builds, ultimately, into a synthy swirling climax. But no matter how big and disco-glitzy the song becomes, Anhedönia’s voice remains at the center of it, hoarse and raw and well acquainted with evil, no matter how much emo drama you surround it with. 

The single “American Teenager” is, to my ears, the least interesting of these songs. It’s the closest to unadulterated pop, though its wide-angle vocals and splintering guitars frame verses in which the pieties of patriotism and religion are considered and ripped apart. “And Jesus, if you’re there, why do I feel alone in this room with you,” keens the singer, more heartbroken here than she’ll be later when she sings about romantic betrayal and personal destruction. 

This is an artist who likes to spin out her songs, letting their slow, doom-y textures unfold over seven, eight or even ten minutes. It’s not always apparent, as in “Thoroughfare,” why the song needs to run for as long as it does. There’s a fair amount of repetition and feigned endings. Yet “House in Nebraska,” at 7:47, seems exactly as long as it needs to be to let the widely spaced piano chords stake out their epic territory, to let Anhedönia’s ravaged, heart-sick murmur hit its mark. She’s at home wondering if another self-destructive lover is still out there somewhere, but realizing that “you might never come back home, and i may never sleep at night/but god i just hope you’re doing fine out there, i just pray that you’re all right.” “Western Nights” also celebrates the more desperate varieties of love, a low-rent scenario where neighbors are always pounding on the walls. It has some of Springsteen’s epic, common man bravado, but from a female perspective and pitched a bit lower on the economic ladder. Sings Anhedönia, “He’s never looked more beautiful/on his Harley in the parking lot/breaking into the ATMs/sleeping naked when it gets too hot.” 

Preacher’s Daughter is a concept album, with an overarching narrative about slipping from grace, but where the conventional story might turn up from the bottom, Ethel Cain continues in a downward direction. “Gibson Girl” is a Pentacostal “W.A.P.,” seething with sexual tension and thumping with an R&B beat, but it doesn’t exactly celebrate sexual empowerment. No, it pulls you further down the drain, leading you towards the hellish noise of “Ptolomea,” which buzzes with flies and groans like the damned. Three more songs follow, giving a bit of sonic respite, but no one gets saved in “Preacher’s Daughter.” “God loves you, but not enough to save you/so baby girl, good luck taking care of yourself,” she sings, clear-eyed and desolate and on her own. 

Jennifer Kelly

#dusted magazine #album review #jennifer kelly #ethel cain #preacher's daughter #daughters of cain #country music #pop music #southern culture

[maaruin]

Thoughts I had today about science and religion. (In the following, "science" doesn't just mean the natural sciences but all academic fields of research.)

Science/the institutions of science play the role in modern society that religion played in previous societies: telling people what they should believe about the world and how they should act based on those beliefs, and demanding the ultimate authority in any matter that it thinks concerns it.

While other religions have been orthopractic (the religions distinguishes between insiders and outsiders based on what they do) or orthodox (the religions distinguishes between insiders and outsiders based on what they belief), science is a - and perhaps the only - orthoepistemic religion (if you are an insider or an outsider depends on how you come to hold your beliefs).

Science as an institution started as an offshot of medieval Christianity but separated from it in early modernity.

Science has the universal ambition that religions like Christianity, Islam and Buddhism have (but that's a good thing).

Faced with science, religions have three options: a) accept the primacy of science and only make claims about things that science says are outside its purview, b) became an orthoepistemic religion themselves, or c) scientificize themselves and use the epistemology commonly used in science to evaluate their own doctrines.

Within Christianity there have been attempts at all three of these approaches: a) is most common, b) was tried for example with Vatican I (the infallibility of the church as a way to reach true beliefs) and in evangelical/fundamentalist protestantism (the infallibility of the bible as a way to reach true beliefs) and in the charismatic/pentacostal movement (immediate personal experience as a way to reach true beliefs), and c) is a project within philosophy of religion and parts of academic theology.

In my assessment a) doesn't do justice to the consequences of Christianity, be it the consequences of it being true or the consequences of it being false, b) will most likely fail because scientific epistemology is really good at figuring out what's true and I doubt Christianity will manage to come up with a better one, and c) has a better chance of succeeding in the long run than the other two options - but may also end up proving Christianity wrong.

I myself have decided to try my luck at Option C - if God is real then I trust that at some point science will confirm this.

#my thoughts #science #religion #christianity

[mourningmage]

i got problems and issues

#solid snake #snotacon #otasune #priest au #its pentacost

[angelicgarnet]

speaking in tongues (at least as a concept) is really cool even if im not fully sure i believe in it 

#woof #religion tag #Christianity mention #i could never be pentecostal tho #i mean theres other types of Christianity that believe in speaking in tongues too #but i feel like its WAY more emphasized with pentacostals and like. uhhh whats it called (googles) #TELEVANGELISTS thats the word

[kmclaude]

Jehan getting married……. ✨

Tiefer taking his sweet godsons perfect little bride and defiling her…… ✨

sweet sweet suffering when he’s fucking her on their wedding night and she whimpers “Emilien,” and his life comes crashing down around him ✨

uh-oh my hand slipped...

--

Tiefer is all smiles and pleasantries when Jehan drops by the church with his fiancée, Connie, to finish the rounds of meeting the family. He's always been nigh perfect at wearing a mask, and he keeps his mask cheerful even as he notices the way Connie's cheeks flushed just a bit or the way she didn't take her eyes off him. When they leave, he embraces her and then Jehan with a soft "swing by later, cher, let's chat, yeah?"

It's not a question.

So Jehan goes, alone, that night -- lets himself in because he still has a key -- and finds Tiefer in the kitchen, pouring two drinks and decidedly less smiles and pleasantries, though he holds out a whiskey all the same to Jehan.

"Mazel tov."

Jehan doesn't take it.

"Boy, take it. 's just whiskey."

"You wanted to chat?"

Tiefer rolls his eyes and drinks from the glass he had been offering--downs it in one gulp--before pulling out a chair from the kitchen table. "Yeah. Let's chat."

"I'll stand."

"Learned where to get a backbone in college there, huh?"

"Something like that."

"That where you found your girl?"

"What's it to you?"

"Just asking. You go off to college three years, barely hang around, then all of a sudden it's 'hey mom, hey parrain, I'm getting married' outta the blue. Ever thought your mama might worry? Ever thought I might worry about you?"

Jehan gives him an odd look. "You...worried?"

Tiefer's eyes widen. "Of course! I know we've had our...disagreements,"--and Jehan winced as he had the scars to prove it--"but that don't mean I don't love you."

It was quiet between them for a moment. And then.

"You...you're taking this better than I thought."

"Shit, boy, I'm taking it."

"I thought you'd be mad."

"What, mad some little girl stole my boy?"

Jehan's face grew hot. He had almost, almost, entertained the thought of staying with Tiefer, of coming back home and being all his, especially after his first semester -- but then he met Connie and, well, she was much sweeter than Tiefer had been.

"Does she know?"

"About us? I...no. No one knows. We haven't...so she hasn't seen..."

"She saving herself?"

Jehan nodded.

"You saving yourself?"

"What's left."

Tiefer laughed--hollow. "It should be nice, then."

--

Agnes doesn't leave Jehan alone about the wedding plans. Connie eventually asks why not get married here? His parrain's a priest. It just makes sense. Agnes agrees.

Jehan takes their lead and tries not to scream.

--

"If you get married in the church, you know you have to do pre-marital counseling, yeah?"

Tiefer sits across from Jehan and Connie in the living room of the rectory.

"That's required?"

"Shit yeah! Ah, sorry Connie."

She waves him off. "Oh I don't mind."

"It's called Pre-Cana. Your mama should've told you all this--I did it with your parents."

"You... right. Yeah."

"Parish by parish, it gets a little different. For you two, we'd have a few one on one sessions but I'd like to first and primarily meet with you as a couple to discuss the normal topics: faith, finances, commitment, communication, sex--"

"Sex?!"

Both men turned to look at Connie.

"Sorry--I was raised Pentacostal. I didn't think Catholics...er..."

"You don't think we fuck?"

"Parrain--"

"--It's a valid question, Jehan--"

"No, I mean, I know Catholics...I know Catholics have sex, I just didn't realize you guys...talked...about it?"

"Oh honey," Tiefer smiled, "just because I wear this collar now doesn't mean I haven't worn other collars in the past."

He winks and Connie's face goes bright red.

"He's joking."

"Mostly. But it is something you should be talking about. How does sex in your marriage fit in? What's its role? What if one of you wants it all the time and the other doesn't? How will you deal with that? Yeah, you're supposed to do it to have kids, but sex is also supposed to bring y'all together. It's supposed to be fun, otherwise shit who'd ever have kids?"

Connie laughs, her cheeks still pink. Jehan bites his tongue.

--

Their premarital counseling sessions were going well. They'd finished all their sessions together as a couple. Besides an initial "tell me now if you have any reservations before we start" one-on-one, Tiefer had saved the one-on-one sessions towards the end.

Jehan had completed all of his. Mostly, he and Tiefer shot the shit, drinking more heavily than needed.

"Is it weird?"

That night, Tiefer hands him another shot of whiskey that evening, which Jehan accepted happily.

"Hm?"

"Being back home," Tiefer continues. "For me, it was. It was weird after seminary when I wound up here. Well, correction -- first I went upstate to some school for wayward girls. You know, girls that get knocked up and their daddies find out?"

"Yeah."

"Depressing shit, p'tit. But then I came here and...not a damn thing had changed, but everything had changed."

"Guess so," Jehan sighs, taking a drink. "Jean's...fourteen now? I know I saw him last summer but it feels like he's growing so fast. Mom's the same. You're the same. Most of the town's the same. But..."

"But you ain't."

"Ain't I?"

"You're 'bout to be a husband."

"And you're takin' it well."

"Well. Couldn't stop you from leavin' here. Almost lost my eye with that."

"Sorry."

"Eh. Maybe I shouldn't've threatened to strangle you if you left me."

"Might've made it more appealing to come home."

Tiefer nudges him, gently. "Didn't stop you from swingin' by here a few times over summer to get your cock sucked, p'tit."

Jehan's ears are bright pink. "I..." He stutters then laughs. "Yeah. Well. You're good at it."

"And Connie's not?"

"I told you. Saving herself."

"Shit. Not even...?" He mimes jacking off.

"Mn-nuh."

"Well fuck. Your mama at least gave your daddy a handjob once before they tied the knot."

"Ew."

"Oh fuck off. Your grown enough to hear that."

"I don't wanna know, parrain."

"Emi."

"Emi."

They were inches from each other -- and Jehan kisses first, as if he's drowning and praying for a way out, but Jehan also pulls away first, as if he's got something to prove.

"Jehan."

"Pa...Emi."

"Is this what you want?"

"Is what--"

"Do you want someone to decide for you?"

"I..."

He doesn't know.

--

The day she met Tiefer, Connie confided in Agnes, "I can't believe that man's a priest!"

To which Agnes had replied, "Oh you'll fit in here, that's at least a monthly talking point among the ladies in town: he's WASTED on the priesthood. In fact, the number of ladies jealous that he was so close with my family..."

It had been a bonding experience and gave the two a chance to know each other.

It didn't bother Jehan and doesn't bother him now even as she comes back from her one-on-one talks with Tiefer late in the evening. After all, Tiefer wasn't just a waste on the ladies in town by virtue of his collar: Jehan knew, first hand, how little interest he had in women.

Tiefer was not a threat.

His marriage would be fine.

--

"Oh fuck--Father--daddy..."

She's spread wide fucking open on the bed and moaning and so fucking willing that it's almost sad to take her.

Almost.

"There you go, that's it," Tiefer growls against her throat, pressing the head of his cock against this mousy doe-eyed little thing's virgin cunt, stretching it, pausing to let the crown catch right on her opening, pulling a low groan from her gut. "Just a little more..."

"Fuck!"

"There. Breathe. Don't wanna disappoint your husband on your wedding night, hmm?"

"N-no, no sir, Emilein..."

"Good girl."

--

Jehan pulls up her white dress and eats her out. It's a little fumbling--they're both nervous--but she's clutching the sheets not long after.

She's wet, his cock's hard, they're soon out of whatever's left of their clothes entirely, bodies pressed together. He slides inside her easily, easier than expected really, and fuck it's so nice, so hot, that he's afraid he might cum too fast (he dimly remembers Tiefer offering, the both of them rather drunk, to let Jehan practice being inside someone for once with him -- "no thanks" he'd choked out but was now reconsidering) but she's so pretty and it's dark and if she feels scars crisscrossed on his back she doesn't say anything, only moans louder and louder (he'll tell her all about it later, in the morning, right now though is perfect, is beautiful, is fun--)

"Oh fuck, Emilein--"

They both freeze and for a minute Jehan thinks he'd said that, he'd called out his abuser's ex-lover's godfather's name, but then Connie's apologizing, face too red, and Jehan's gone soft, his mouth forming the words "it's fine" while his mind screams "what did you do?!" and he's not quite sure who he should be asking.

#writing #my writing #au where jehan gets married #character stuff #fhcaoos #kmclaudereplies #queerasforks #kmclaudereplies to queerasforks #kmclaudereplies to ask

[yellowocaballero]

hello hi, i am a person who only really knows abt catholisim and protestantism, pls inform me, what is a pentacostal and why jon would be one? give me the essay

I am very sorry it took me two weeks to get to these! I was stressing out about vacation, and then I was on vacation! Thanks for your patience.

So, preface this by saying that I'm not a Pentecostal and I have never been. I was raised Catholic, which...disturbingly, people have told me is evident from my writing...not going to psychoanalyze that one. I’m also not British, and I’m most familiar with American Pentecostalism, so I’m not sure how Britain changes the landscape on that. I’ll try to summarize them neutrally. 

But as a quick summary: Pentecostalism is a branch of Evangelism, based around a direct experience with God, and often includes faith healing, speaking in tongues, and getting "imbued" with the Holy Spirit. It’s pretty distinctive for its very loud, charismatic preachers. Sermons tend to be very fire-and-brimstoney. Probably most notably, the average sermon has a very active and engaged crowd due to the Holy Spirit - you will see it moving through people, inducing them to dance or shake their limbs, and people very frequently speak in tongues as the Holy Sprit passes through them. I highly recommend checking out a few videos of Pentecostal sermons and seeing people speaking in tongues, it’s highly interesting. Pentecostals believe in faith healing, prophecies, and Biblical literalism. A pretty notable Pentecostal event is the Azusa street revival and the birth of institutional Pentecostalism, which had made waves at the time for its Black preacher and multiracial, impoverished congregation. Despite those pretty multiracial origins and its booming popularity in the South, the movement quickly split among racial lines, and the Church of God in Christ became the predominant ‘Black’ arm of Pentecostalism. 

So...what does this have to do with TMA...

BBC had a lot of highly religious themes because it was a story about a man becoming closer to God, and a story about the formation of a family. Not religious themes probably in the way that you’re thinking, but more in the sense of - what does a relationship with God look like? How can a relationship with God provide relief, and how can it induce fear? And stuff like that. It was also about Jon’s history and the way he grew up and how it influences him today, and when I Forcibly Assigned Him Ex-Pentecostal he really had to grapple with that and his internalized sense of shame and sin. 

I basically picked it because it’s a religion that’s very predominant in poor Black populations, that emphasizes a ‘direct connection with God’, that features God/Holy Spirit moving through you, and that highlights prophesizing and speaking the Word of God. Like a lot of Evangelist religions, its rhetoric is heavy on the fire and brimstone, sin, shame, and guilt. Also like a lot of Evangelist religions, it’s really heavy on eschatology - the rapture and talk about the apocalypse! The end is always nigh and all of that. 

I think that if I woke up to find myself the Anti-Christ and I grew up in a religion that was talking constantly about how the apocalypse was going to happen because mankind is damned I’d start thinking about Jesus a lot too. It’s heavily tied up in his culture, history, hang-ups, and framework of viewing the world, so this specific facet of Jon is something is a framework that I approached BBC through. It’s also just my general headcanon for him, although it’s less of a thing in the other stories. I mention it in Fahrenheit 101, but mostly as a joke combined/contrasted with Sasha’s Cuban Catholicism. 

Basically: 

#my writing #i'm talking out of my ass here plz forgive me if I get anything wrong #or if i accidentally use any catholic terminology lol #me: fuck what do those guys call mass again #on one hand it would have been cool if ol johnny sims went more into religion in tma #the exorcist style goofy catholic story does not count #on the other hand i feel as if it would have been done somewhat badly #religion in horror movies is like #an ENTIRE other conversation #an interesting one! but also very loaded #Spare Character Backstory Sir?

[cma-medieval-art]

Initial D[eus in loco] with a Prophet Excised from a Gradual, Lorenzo Monaco, 1409-10, Cleveland Museum of Art: Medieval Art

This jewel-like initial is one of a series of prophet portraits painted by Lorenzo in a set of choir books commissioned by the church of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence. Striking for its blue and orange-red foliage, the initial is set against a highly burnished gold ground decorated with punch marks, much like a small panel painting. The initial begins the Introit (introductory section) to the Mass for the eleventh Sunday after Pentacost: Deus in loco sancto suo (God is in his holy place). Lorenzo, who was a Camaldolese monk, produced a vast quantity of work—illuminations, panel paintings, and frescos—an indication that his art was highly esteemed and sought after during his lifetime. Size: Sheet: 16.7 x 16 cm (6 9/16 x 6 5/16 in.); Framed: 52.4 x 39.7 cm (20 5/8 x 15 5/8 in.); Matted: 48.9 x 36.2 cm (19 1/4 x 14 1/4 in.) Medium: ink, tempera, and gold on vellum

https://clevelandart.org/art/1949.536

#museumarchive #clevelandartmuseum #cmaopenaccess #MedievalArt

[ramrodd]

01 Is Sinaiticus a Fake?

COMMENTARY: Who cares? Christian apologists have missed the most important fact long before any codex gets to Sainai and the question is, where did the first codex transfer the intelligence report from Caesaria to Rome that Tertullian writes that compelled Tiberius to propose making Jesus a legitimate deity to the Senate come from?  How did the Gospel According to Mark get to Rome? By scroll? John Mark didn't write The Gospel According to Mark in Rome: he was it's publicsher in Alexandria some time after Cyprus and before he was reconciled with Paul who was in a dungeon and needed all the moral support he could organize. Cornelius wrote The Gospel According to Mark and was the curator of Quelle, which began as a routine surveillance file on a potential Zealot who had just come out of the closet with the Jewish aesthetic John , aka "The Baptizer". Cornelius was probably the source for the Roman content of the Gospel of Peter, which is a surrmary of the intelligence report that Pilate and Cornelius sent to the Praetorian Guards as quickly as they could after the Resurrection. Coronelius was a combination of Pilate's Chief of Staff and Command Sergeant Major. That's the significance of the associateion "the Italian Cohort" i.e. the Praetorian Guard, Cornelius was a career centurion with the Praetorian guards and had hit his glass ceiling in Rome so he did a little retirement planning and was seconded by Sajanus to Caesarea with Pilate in 27 and began to carve out a little retirement villa in basically the Isreal version of the South of France. Nobody is nto charmed by Galilee. And he was very well paid on active duty and was guarnteed the land he occupied when he retired in a very fashionalbe Roman colony. Across Lake Tiberius/Galilee Sea was a planned community of 10 urban centers that Jesus visits and Jesus' mother Mary grew up in what was basically a gated community for middle class Romans and Israelis. The Zealots fucked it up for everybody, but in 30 CE, Cornelius had it made in the shade and then Jesus shows up leading a lynch mob and is haded over to Pilate and Cornealius is in the room and he knows Jesus from Capernaum because Jesus saved his servant's life with a word across space and time. The reason why he and Pilate were in Jerusalem was for crowd control and quick reaction against things like Tet 68 and January 6 because every Jew in walkding distance showed up for this festival. And nobody wanted a riot.So, the Gospel According to Mark is the punch-line to that old chestnut: "Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?"  What happened next is why the codex changed the epistemology of communications and record keeping. Cornelius is the centurion in Matthew 8 and Luke 7. He is not the centurion at the cross nor the centurion at the tomb. He's done that kind of work and is from what was basically the Roman "Old Guard" at our Arlington Cemetary and White House  events. I mean, this guy is totally squared away. But, by 58 ce, he is also a grandfather and his kindliness is the merce of the grandfather with his children's chlidren. Ollie North compares himself to Cornelius on the stump and says that talking with Jesus was as dangerous for Cornelius as working in a Republican White House was for him, Ollie.. Ollie is a genuine centurion of the American republic, but Cornelius's relationship to Jesus in Capernaum was that of a Alabama State Trooper pulling over Barack Obama for driving while negro. He wasn't belligerent in any manner, and authentically mindful of the Hebrew cultural value around clean and unclean. The hting that blows Jesus's mind is that he assumed Jesus could do his magic from long disttance. The timing in the gospels is that this happens before Jarius's daughter falls ill, so the question I've never heard any preacher in the world ponder, how did Cornealius come to track down Jesus and make his ask? Well, we know his servant asked him to do it, but did he know about Jesus before his servant became ill or did he become interested in him with an intelligence report came across his desk as a APB kind of thing, new guy in town, keep and eye out. The Romans had a garrison in Capernaum guarding the frontier of Isreal along a trade route from Asia. This operated as a forward listening post for the two legions in the Caesarea garrison and, well, Jesus is bapatized between Passover and Pentacost in 27 and John the Baptist is arrested just before Tabernacle and is the trigger for the spiritual tulmet in Galilee that generates the storm Jesus calms just before Tabernacle, Cornelius comes to Jesus with this request. Only, it's not mentioned in the Gospel According to Mark. Nor is the Lord's Prayer. Peter remember Cornelius from the old days when he's summoned by the Holy Spirit to Cornelius's villa. You get the feeling of a very mellow community before Peter get's there and it echoes the salutation Cornelius receives in his vision: Cornelius has made a career as a faithful republican servant-leader and his pagen wholesomeness reflected his God-Fearer relationship with Judaism from the balcony. He was content to be a second-class citizen of the Hebrew community and he got to keep his foreskin, best of all worlds. And the Holy Ghost agrees and reinforces his faith with a visti from the Spirit of the Lord before Peter could really get a head of steam on what amounts to the Apostle's Creed, which employs the same syntax as the Lord's Prayer. Acts 10:34 - 43 is the essence of the Apostle's Creed. This is what Peter relayed to Cornelius that Cornelius didn't have, which was insider information of what was going on inside the Jesus Insurgency as it matched up with the time line of the narrative Quelle was recording with Roman spy reports. If you are reading Mark in the original, everytime you hit the word εὐθὺς, that is a Roman apparatus indicating Quelle is either the source of the pericope or verifies the event from independent sources or both. 10 times in the first chapter. Peter's narrative is woven through Quelle's time line until we get to Chapter 15, which is entirely Roman content. This is what Cornelius tells Peter what happened to jesus after the cock crowed twice. And that becomes the Gospel of Peter, which reveals that the Crucifixion is a coventant cutting ceremony like in Genesis 15 but between the name in Genesis 15 and the Roman republican centuriate. I mean, which version went up the chain of command to Tiberius: the Roman content in the Gospel of Peter or the combined narrative of Matthew and Luke at the tomb? The Romans worked on an uncompromising habeus corpus basis. Somebody was in deep shit if Jesus wasn't dead and somebody else was in deep shit if they couldn't produce the body they had officially sealed for safekeeping, on pain of death. The person that thinks the most like Cornelius currently is CMA Michael A. Grinston, who is at the apex of the American republican servant-leader. This is the Archetype of the covenant cutting ceremony washed in the blood of Jesus. it isn't a religous thing, but the essence of Romans 13:1 -7 as the expression of the secular rule of law. The centurion, as a functional role, is the iron jaw and teeth of the 4th lion of Daniel. The leading edge of the Industrial Revolution. The difference between the NRA version of the 2nd Amendment and the actual nature of a well regulated militia relative to the secular rule of law. The difference between the well-behaved and loving tourists of January 6 and the Capitol Police. John Mark is probably the author of The Gospel of John. The Gospel According to Mark is called the Gospel According to Mark because it was published by John Mark and it was important to keep the Roman origin a secret. The enemies of Tiberius made it dangerous to embrace the god of Tiberius, no matter what hoops He had managed to jump through. The word of the Resurrection went through the Roman legions like grass through a goose. True or not, it was just too juicy for the basic infantry soldier. It's a great war story to share around a camp fire or in a comfortable barracks or local night club. But Timberius had made serious enemies when he executed Tiberius for conspiracy and its not clear to me if Sajanus was still alive when the first report of Resurrection came to the Praetorian Guard: he was killed in 31 and could have inhibited the feed forward function he represented from Tiberius's beauracracy. Pilate is recalled in 36 and TIberius dies in 37. And then, the Holy Ghost brings Cornelius and Peter together and Cornelius updates the first field reports about Jesus and the Christians (a Roman construct) in Quelle and forwards The Gospel According to Mark autograph by codex to Rome just in time to hit the seam between Caligula and Claudius but the nascent Roman Church of Rome stayed on the down -low. from the residual poison against Tiberius, but everywhere the Roman legions patrolled, Christianity took root. The thing that Paul brings to the Roman Church is Romans 13:1 - 7, which validates the moral structures of the republic as a creature of the secular rule of law. This goes back to Socrates and the nature of civic duty. The debate between Stoics and Epicureans is an inquiry into the dimensions of Duty and the republican servant-leader. It's why the NRA version of the 2nd Amendment is such bull shit. I mean, the Roman example of duty is a Roman general who beheaded his own son for violating standing orders to not leave your post. The connection between that example and a God who purposefully sacrifices His Only Begotten Son is irresistable. And it all came north by codex. Loose leaf papryus bound together for easy assembly and access.

[canary-prince]

Growing up as a militant atheist fucked me up. ‘

Emphasis on militant; aggressive skepticism to the point of discouraging imagination or speculative questioning, prioritizing Logic and Reason over kindness, and the constant undercurrent of elitism, sexism, and white homogeny. It was not just an absence of church. My parents took me to CONVENTIONS, to TALKS and EVENTS about atheism and its supremacy over Faith. 

My spouse was a Pentacostal for years. Assemblies of God specifically. When I learned that I said, “Ah. Them.” My spouse asked what I was told about AoG. “Nothing in particular,” I said. “Just that they’re The Enemy more than most Christians.” 

“You’re special,” I was told. “You’re lucky to be raised in a Skeptical house.” There was a constant air of being smarter than other kids, than most adults because I didn’t believe in God. It was treated as a central tenet of my identity and I embraced it as such. 

Dogma can grow anywhere. And no kid benefits from it.    

#the monster speaks #dogma #militant atheism

[measlyfurball13]

Pacific Rim: Into the Black fucking sucked.

It’s problem isn’t that it’s different from the first movie. Look, I LOVE the first movie, but I agree that more of the same might have been boring. I respect the writers for pushing the boundaries a little and making an original story with an original tone. . . If by original story you mean “make it Attack on Titan but worse” and if by original tone you mean “cheap shock value and needless edge that adds nothing”.

Full rant under the cut. Swear warning, whatever.

This series has so many interesting and creative ideas but they’re buried under loads of blundering edgelord tropes that have been done before in every other anime ever. Taylor the protagonist is a flavorless “older brother” trope. Mei is the tsundere badass who’s been traumatized by daddy. Boy (yes, that’s his name) is the mystical superpowered child. Oh, and he pulls this whole Attack on Titan thing and turns into a Kaiju.

You wanna know why this is a problem? Because holy fucking shit it’s a problem. Because it’s stupid. Because it’s magic handwavy bullshit. Pacific Rim, for all of it’s big robots and big monsters, grounds itself in reality by having consistent internal rules. Kaiju are monsters with some occasional cool unique abilities, but they’re all based in biology. Stuff like acid, extra limbs, flying. Even the EMP pulse ability from the first movie feels plausible, because electricity is used in a biological body in the form nerves. Another consistent rules is that Kaiju are big monsters. Big. Monsters. Big monsters who stay big, because they’re established as having so much mass and bulk and presence that they can’t get rid of because they’re biological creatures. The first movie establishes that they eat and breed and even defecate and have parasites. These rules make the Kaiju feel plausible. These rules allow us, the audience, to suspend our disbelief and immerse ourselves into the universe.

So why the fucking hell did the writers throw all that out the window, pull some magic bullshit out of their ass, and make a human that turns into a Kaiju? They don’t even show us the transformation sequence on screen. Flash of blue, and now the little human boy is a Kaiju. The problem is not that it’s unrealistic, the problem is that it doesn’t fit in with the Pacific Rim universe. It’s disjointed. It’s stupid. Any questions?

Now, where was I? Oh, right, characters. Haley, the younger sister, is. . . okay. She feels like the extroverted younger sister cheerleader trope, but then they also give her this character facet (it’s not an arc because it’s never really addressed) about murder guilt? And she also mothers a lot Boy? And she also makes really stupid decisions for the sake of the plot sometimes? Out of the main three cast members, she’s by far the most interesting and bearable, at least, but she doesn’t feel consistent at all. She also gets damseled a lot, too, which doesn’t add to her likeability or agency.  

Moving on, one of the two even remotely interesting characters was killed for shock value in episode five in the cheapest, most abrupt way possible, so I can’t talk about him very much, other than the fact that I’m still pissed that the writers thought killing him off was a good idea. Nothing narratively was gained by it; his death doesn’t even affect any character’s trajectory! He had so much more to give alive than he did dead. But that’s all I can say, since he is dead. The only other interesting character was the Jaeger AI who gets maybe all of 13 voicelines in the entire season and is barely, barely even a minor character. Nothing much else to say.

Remember the part where I mentioned that this show actually has wonderful creative ideas? I didn’t just say that for flavor, and that’s the most frustrating part of this all. The problem is just that there’s so many ideas, all at once, so in the end none of them end up shining. Here’s a shortened list of the great ideas- you could base an entire show around each one:

Interrogating someone with drift technology

Altering people’s memories through drift technology

Australia gets claimed by the Kaiju and survivors have to duke it out to survive with the remaining Jaeger technology with no help from the outside world

Training Jaegers and what Jaeger academy looked like

Jaegers having sentient AIs inside of them- and what happens when to the AI when a Jaeger takes damage or even loses a pilot? Is the drift in a Jaeger technically a three-way bond?

What happens when you drift too much, with too many people? Inheriting someone else’s memories or even skillsets?

(this one is probably my least favorite, but still has merit:) A Jaeger and Kaiju fusion. How utterly terrifying would that be?

These are all incredible. I probably would have adored Pacific Rim: Into the Black if (magic Kaiju kid notwithstanding) it had focused on maybe one or two of these ideas in its meager 140-minute runtime. However, Into the Black tries to tackle all of these amazing ideas at once along with about a dozen other shitty ideas that fall flat. As a result, nothing gets the time it deserves. Fascinating ideas are quickly glossed over, never to be mentioned again despite being extremely relevant to the plot, just so the show can truck through the next portion with the same lack of thought.

The season feels disjointed. Nothing builds on anything else, and plot points don’t lead into each other. Characters make stupid decisions, take meandering courses of action and are constantly changing their mind, or, most of the time, just stumbling upon their objectives by pure chance. The only throughline that even remotely delivers with proper buildup and payoff is the aforementioned magic Kaiju boy. The one competent plot arc they develop is the one that breaks the believability of the universe. Great.

Finally, to top it all off, I’m going to speedrun my more minor nitpicks with the general plot/continuity holes. Here goes:

Multiple breaches and breaches on land. If the Kaiju have been able to open breaches on land this whole time, then how in the everlasting fuck has humanity survived at all? I mean, really- why would Kaiju waste time coming from the oceans if they can just pop up wherever they please?

Mr. McRandom nobody protagonist decides on a whim to be the fourth person ever who solo pilots a Jaeger after piloting for maybe 3 days, tops, and then succeeds. The show explicitly references Raleigh and Pentacost as it does this, spitting in the face of their achievements by implying that anybody can do it, no big deal.

This show acknowledges that Pacific Rim: Uprising exists and builds a lot of its background conflict off that, which pisses me off because that movie sucks ass. Here was a chance for a fresh start and they wasted it.

The protagonists fuck up so constantly to the point where they should have lost their Jaeger several times over, yet it always survives, because (go figure!) this is a show about protagonists piloting Jaegers. The protagonists do nothing to solve their problems and do nothing to earn their clever escapes or sudden powerups, leaving everything tensionless and contrived.

The villain has no motivation at all and is so cartoonishly evil it’s a miracle that he has any minions that are willing to follow him instead of ditching him the first chance they get.

The protagonists sometimes just kinda forget their goal and wander around until they miraculously stumble upon something that just so happens to connect to it.

A lot of edgy, horrifying, traumatizing shit happens, and it doesn’t seem to ever affect the characters in any meaningful way outside of maybe 1 or 2 throwaway lines after the fact?

The show takes place in Australia but only gives asshole characters an Australian accent. What?

So that’s it. Bad characters. Universe-breaking concept. Needless, meaningless edge. Contrived plot. Rushed to all hell. Pacific Rim: Into the Black is capital “b” Bad. I love this franchise and I want to support it, but I can’t advocate that anyone give this show their time.

#pacific rim #pacific rim into the black #rant #damnit I'm mad!

[chambergambit]

this was gonna be in the tabs of another post, but it got too long and i decided it should just be its own thing.

look i guess it's ok if none of the original characters are in this and that it's a separate story, because it makes the world bigger, but i would like to see some anyway? i would like to know if newt recovered from being controlled by the precursors, and if hermann was involved. i’d like to see more of john boyega’s character, even tho i can’t remember his name lol. i’d like to see more of stacker pentacost’s legacy, you know?

i’d like to see more the pacific rim world that i fell in love with.

#pacific rim #pacific rim the black

[tobacconist]

its time horror movies leave catholics alone for fuck sake show us a pentacostal exorcism or something about djinn instead for fuck sake

#that new film ‘the unholy’ is basically jus ‘oOoOoOoh catholics 😱’ #cmon!